The most persistent myth in content marketing is that virality is luck. It isn’t. More than a decade after Jonah Berger, marketing professor at the University of Pennsylvania, published Contagious: Why Things Catch On, his core argument still holds: the reasons people share things follow predictable principles, not chance. Berger distilled those principles into six elements, neatly captured by the acronym STEPPS — Social currency, Triggers, Emotion, Public, Practical value and Stories.
There is no guarantee any single campaign will spread, and a little luck never hurts. But the brands that consistently earn shares, links and reach are not the ones rolling the dice. They are the ones pressure-testing every idea against a framework before it ships. STEPPS remains one of the most useful lenses for doing exactly that — and it maps cleanly onto how content travels across social platforms, newsletters, group chats and, increasingly, AI-generated answers today. Here is how to apply each element to modern content and digital PR.
The six STEPPS elements, refreshed
Social currency
People share things that make them look good. We post, repost and forward content to signal that we are clever, in the know, or ahead of the curve — exactly as we do in face-to-face conversation. The modern application is the “data drop”: original research, a surprising statistic or an exclusive benchmark that makes the sharer the most informed person in the thread. Give your audience something that raises their status when they pass it on, and they will do your distribution for you. This is why genuinely original, data-led content consistently outperforms recycled opinion — proprietary numbers are inherently shareable because no one else has them.
Triggers
Triggers are the hooks that keep an idea top-of-mind and tip-of-tongue. Berger’s point is that we share what we are reminded of, so content tied to a frequent, everyday cue gets talked about long after launch. Seasonal moments, recurring news cycles, payday, the Monday commute — anchor your idea to something your audience encounters regularly and you build a slow, compounding stream of shares rather than a single spike. In a search and AI context, triggers also map to the recurring questions people actually ask; content that answers a predictably repeated query keeps resurfacing.
Emotion
We share what moves us. Berger’s research found that high-arousal emotions — awe, excitement, anger, anxiety, amusement — drive sharing far more than low-arousal states like contentment or mild sadness. The practical lesson is to aim for a clear emotional spike rather than a vaguely “nice” piece. Awe-inspiring scale, a genuinely funny angle, or a finding that provokes a strong reaction will travel; lukewarm rarely does. Find the emotional core of your story before you worry about the format.
Public
“The more public something is, the more likely people will imitate it.” Visibility breeds adoption. Berger calls the residue that makes private behaviour visible “behavioural residue” — the trace that lets others copy what they see. For brands, this means designing content and campaigns to be observable: shareable assets, embeddable graphics, distinctive visual signatures and coverage in places your audience already looks. Aim for longevity, too — ideas that stay visible keep recruiting new sharers long after the initial push.
Practical value
Solve a real problem. This is the most durable element of the six because useful content is useful forever. People share genuinely helpful information because it makes them look generous and considerate — a how-to that saves time, a calculator, a checklist, a definitive guide that settles an argument. Packaging matters: a clearly framed, easy-to-digest tip is more shareable than the same advice buried in a wall of text. Practical value is also the element most likely to earn links and citations, because other publishers and AI systems reference content that demonstrably answers a question.
Stories
“Build a Trojan horse.” People rarely share product features; they share stories. Berger’s insight is to wrap your message inside a narrative compelling enough that people repeat it for its own sake — and to make sure the brand or benefit is woven so tightly into the story that it cannot be retold without it. Think about the “pub factor”: would someone actually recount this to a friend? If the brand can be stripped out and the story still works, the message will not survive the retelling. The best digital-PR campaigns are memorable narratives that happen to carry a brand inside them.
Why STEPPS still matters in 2024 and beyond
What has changed since 2014 is not the psychology — it is the surface area. Content now spreads through closed channels we cannot fully measure (group chats, DMs, “dark social”) and is increasingly summarised by AI systems that decide which sources to cite. STEPPS holds up against both. Social currency and practical value are precisely what earns a citation in an AI answer; emotion and stories are what survive a forward into a private chat. The framework is a useful checklist precisely because it is platform-agnostic.
- Score every idea against all six elements before you commit budget — the strongest campaigns hit at least three.
- Lead with original data: it manufactures social currency and practical value at the same time.
- Tie the idea to a recurring trigger so it keeps earning attention beyond launch week.
- Make the brand inseparable from the story, or the retelling drops it.
Turning the science of sharing into results
This thinking has long underpinned the content and digital-PR work that began at Search Laboratory, now part of Havas Market. Applying STEPPS rigorously — and pairing it with the data that proves what actually resonates with an audience — is how we build campaigns that earn shares, links and reach rather than hoping for them. If you want content that works on purpose, not by accident, our team can help.