What It Felt Like To “Go Viral”

As we near the end of the year I want to take some time for reflections. 

2023 ended up being the year of the viral belly flop. Back in June, my cat Roger took a leap of faith from our inflatable dinghy thinking she could make it to our boat, Phoenix. As many people saw, she fell short, and took an unexpected swim in Lake Champlain. In the moment, it was terrifying for me. I scooped her out of the water and couldn’t bear to think about how things could’ve gone wrong. But after rewatching the video I couldn’t help but laugh. 

The fact that I was filming this whole debacle was seemingly fate. I was feeling such low energy that day that I almost didn’t go back to the boat at all, tempted to just spend another night at my partner’s house. On top of that, my phone battery was on 1% and I had definitely not expected anything out of the ordinary to happen. 

But somehow, on the dinghy ride out to Phoenix it was flat calm and beautiful out so I decided to let Roger out of her backpack and film her walking around in her curiosity. I knew she hated the water, but what I didn’t realize was how much she hated the dinghy. She wanted to be home aboard Phoenix so bad that she was willing to make a risky jump. 

I gave myself a couple days of space before posting the video online. My mom had predicted that it would go viral, but I had no preparation for how viral it went or what that would mean. 

Over the prior year and a half I had been working to grow my art business. I began selling my work online in the fall of 2021 after sailing down to Maryland to live aboard through the winter. It was a really beautiful winter where I laid the foundations for my business and deepened my relationship with my boat, my art, and myself. 

After sailing back to Vermont I started selling my art at in-person markets. It was scary at first, but I found that I loved participating in these events. That first summer I applied for every market/show/fair I could, just trying to get my foot in the door of the artist community in Burlington. 

All the while I was trying to grow my presence online. I knew that instagram could be a great tool for creators to sell their work. And with the goal of working for myself full time and being more nomadic I knew this was a tool I wanted to use. I posted a mix of boat life and art content, and of course occasional Roger content. I did tons of research, reading articles and books, watching videos and taking online courses, about how to grow your online presence and market on social media. 

By June 2023 I had been putting lots of time and energy into online platforms. I’d just launched a YouTube channel, a Patreon account, and a free sustainability guide designed to grow my email list. My Instagram had been slowly growing, but that wasn’t leading to many online art sales. Even so, I was determined to keep trying. And in the process I was able to connect with people all over the world doing cool art and living adventurous lives. 

This was the context of my social media and business when I posted the silly video of Roger jumping into the water and it began to take off. A thousand views, then 5, then 10, up and up the view count kept climbing. I woke up the following morning with over 10 times the follower count. And that number kept rising. I was getting hundreds of DMs and emails. And then the sales started coming in. 

When I first began selling my art online I remember my dad expressing his concern in regards to my baby business. He said “Hannah, what happens when suddenly your art takes off and you have a thousand sales? You won’t be able to keep up and you’ll be screwed!” I laughed at his optimism but felt warmed by his support. 

Surprisingly, he was right. Only it wasn’t any kind of social media marketing trick or networking event – it was dumb luck. 

Within a week I gained 100k followers on Instagram, a surge that was helping my Etsy get attention. The “Cha-Ching” notification pinged my phone over and over. I didn’t quite wake up to a thousand sales, but I was getting enough to make it feel that way. All the work I’d put in was paying off. It felt both amazing and overwhelming.

Now, 6 months later, I get to look back and reflect on what it meant for my video to go viral, how it changed my life and business, and what I think about all of that. 

One of the most prevalent feelings that I remember from July and August was a feeling that I wasn’t doing things right. I wasn’t capitalizing on the attention enough, or I wasn’t doing it in the correct way. I was desperately trying to figure out how to make the most of the surge of attention and stay aligned with my values. 

Almost overnight I had gone from the position of wanting growth to having growth (and massive growth at that) which opened so many doors. Companies started reaching out to me for partnerships and affiliations. Some of these opportunities were obviously not aligned. I knew that I didn’t want to advertise for a litter box brand. But an ocean/lake safe sunscreen brand? That felt different… But then again, wasn’t it still just all advocating for consumerism? And further…wasn’t advertising and selling my own art advocating for consumerism? It was (and still is) all pretty confusing.

And speaking of my art, there was suddenly a huge demand for prints. All of my art is made by hand, so each print that sold needed to be inked, pressed and dried on the boat. The process takes time. I started to think about options to make it more efficient. Should I outsource the design so that it’s not made by hand? Should I downgrade the paper I use so I can get it more easily? Should I put my designs on hats, t-shirts, mugs, and other stuff?

Beyond figuring out how to use this attention, I also had to figure out how to maintain it. I was told I needed to keep posting more and better Roger content or else people would get bored and unfollow. 

With all of this –  the sudden ‘influencer’ status my account had achieved and the boom in demand for my art, I was feeling a strong sense of forced urgency. And it wasn’t just a general sense of it, I was actively being told by people (who were right by the way) that if I didn’t take advantage NOW then I’d lose these opportunities.

During the craziness of the summer I was thinking and acting in a pretty reactionary way. And I think that makes sense; I was stretching myself thin but also trying to hold onto values. I did and didn’t do things based on gut feeling, which has thankfully landed me in a place with no regret. But now with some distance I can start to explore why my gut led me as it did.

The core of it is that I don’t love living in a culture that has such an obsession with making as much money as possible. The narrative of constant growth and false urgency don’t sit right with me when everything else on the planet operates in cyclical, deliberate ways. The need for constant growth is quite literally devastating our planet. The false urgency that I felt with capitalizing on an instagram page is a distraction from the real urgency of addressing the climate crisis.

Overall, I am so so grateful that Rogers’ silly little jump propelled my online presence as it did. Because of it, I’m able to work for myself as an artist full time, and that’s something I really love. I love working with my hands, I love creating beautiful things, and I love connecting with people. Even more, I love that my funny little cat art can bring people joy. Fun, happy, silly, beautiful art is – in and of itself – vital. But for me it’s not quite enough. Where exactly that will take me I still have to find out. 

In the world we now live in – a world of online platforms and an economy of attention – it’s imperative that we think critically and act deliberately. If I’ve managed to hang onto your attention this far, thank you. And  if you want to read more fun and thought provoking stuff from a 20-something girl with a famous cat who lives a (relatively) alternative lifestyle and just wants to clear thoughts out of her head by writing them out – make sure you subscribe to my newsletter so you don’t miss a post.

Fair winds