Why Viral Videos Get You Zero Leads (and the Fix)

By Leland Redfield & DJ WillinghamUpdated Oct 19, 20265 min read

A dancing TikTok video might get lots of views. It's going to get you zero leads. We've lived the views-with-no-buyers thing on our own yoga channel. Here's what we do about it now.

Watch on YouTube: Why Viral Videos Get You Zero Leads (and What to Track Instead)

Why do viral videos get zero leads?

Because views and leads aren't the same thing. A viral video pulls in people who were entertained, not people who want what you sell. And if the video doesn't point anywhere, they watch and they're gone. More views only means more leads when the path from video to your offer already works.

Leland puts it this way: "A dancing TikTok video might get lots of views. It's going to get you zero leads and it's going to destroy your brand." Meanwhile, "a carousel might get very few of everything, but the people who click on it are probably buyers."

What's the difference between a view and a lead?

A view is someone watching. A lead is someone who joins your email list or takes action. Every business defines it a little differently, but leads are what you want. Views should point to leads. When your business is broken, more views doesn't mean more leads. That's the trap.

Does every video need a call to action?

We think so. If it blows up, it blows up. And if you don't have a place for them to go, they're gone forever. Leland's math: "that video that pops off might get you a million views, but if you don't have a call to action, it's worth a tenth the amount of money that it will make."

We learned this the hard way. Our early yoga videos had no calls to action. A bunch of them popped off, millions of views. Our best evergreen videos still don't have them. "I know how much money that costs us."

DJ hit the same wall around 40,000 to 50,000 followers. "I didn't know what I didn't know." Now his on-foot sneaker videos get a pinned comment: socks available here. Soft sell. It just sits there and works.

And the call to action itself matters. HubSpot compared more than 330,000 calls to action over six months and found personalized ones converted 202% better than basic ones. So it's not a throwaway line at the end. Make it fit the person watching.

There's a spectrum. Some people never want to talk about buying anything, ever. We're on the "heavy call to action" end. You got to figure out where you are. Just don't leave a winning video with nowhere to go.

Free training

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Want every video to point somewhere?

We show how we set up the one place every post points to.

Watch the training→

What is a business scorecard and what should be on it?

A scorecard is 5 to 15 numbers that tell you if your business is healthy. Here's the test. You're stuck on an island. A bird flies you a little piece of paper with those numbers. Can you tell if your business is healthy? Everybody knows they should have one. Most don't.

Here's what ours looks like for a YouTube business:

Start with one platform. Then add the hop that matters to you, like "how many people go from Instagram to our community each week."

How does a scorecard help you pick content?

Over time you see trends. That number moved up because of this post. That one moved down because of that post. Now you can filter your content by what moves the business, not by views. A video might win one number and ruin all the other ones. The scorecard catches it.

Which content is worth your time: build once or treadmill?

Leland's favorite chart ranks about 100 traffic activities by reach and compounding. Build once is up top. The treadmill is at the bottom. Instagram comments can be a good strategy, but it's a treadmill. "A YouTube long form video can make you money forever." So that's where we put most of our focus.

Put two build-once pieces together and you've got this: "They watch a YouTube video... At the end, they enter their email, they get five emails that sell your thing. That's an entire business."

DJ's patience reminder: "Sometimes you have videos, it takes three years to pop off... This video used to have 4,000 views. Now it's at 300,000."

How do you start this week?

1. Pick one platform to go all in on.
2. Write down 5 to 15 numbers from view to paying customer.
3. Add one call to action to every post, all pointing to one place.
4. Check the scorecard weekly and note which posts moved which number.
5. Put most of your focus on one build-once asset.

FAQ

Can a viral video hurt my business?

It can. If it attracts the wrong audience, you get views from people who'll never buy, and it can pull your brand away from what you sell.

How many numbers should a scorecard have?

Usually 5 to 15. Enough to see the whole path from view to paying customer, few enough to check every week.

Should I add a call to action to old videos?

Yes, where you can. On Instagram you can edit the caption. Anywhere, you can add a pinned comment that points to your one destination.

What's a "build once" activity?

Something you make one time that keeps bringing people in, like a long-form YouTube video, a short book, or an email sequence. The opposite is a treadmill you have to keep running.

Free training

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Ready to fix the path from views to buyers?

The business should free you up to do what you love, more coaching or more running the business, your choice.

Watch the training→

About the authors

Leland Redfield

Leland co-hosts The Bottleneck Breakdown with DJ Willingham and helped build SarahBethYoga on YouTube. We've been constantly improving this since 2020, and since AI came out we keep refining and finding better ways to free you up.

DJ Willingham

DJ co-runs The Bottleneck Breakdown with Leland Redfield. He built his YouTube channel to 400K subscribers and has been making sneaker and fashion content since his first sneaker page in 2010.

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