What’s the perfect complement to a plate of turkey, stuffing and cranberry sauce? A festive side of Carly Rae Jepsen, of course.

The “Call Me Maybe” singer is just one of the pop stars set to appear during the 86th annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. As millions tune across America, the Today show’s Matt Lauer, Al Roker and Savannah Guthrie will host the world-famous spectacle’s festivities, which will include boyband The Wanted, rapper Flo Rida, pop-rockers Neon Trees, singer-songwriter Colbie Caillat, pop duo Karmin and many more in its star-studded lineup.

“Since the first broadcast in 1948, the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade has become a tradition for families across America,” said Doug Vaughan, Senior Vice President of NBC’s Special Programs and Late Night, in a press release. “This year we are thrilled to once again celebrate with some of the nation’s best performers.”

Marching down Broadway in Manhattan on Nov. 22, the parade will kick of the holiday season with plenty of giant bouncing balloons, built-up floats, marching bands, cheerleaders and the one-and-only Santa Claus.

In addition to the pop artists, the revelry will also feature on-the-street performances from some of Broadway’s top musicals, such as Annie, Bring It On, Cinderella, and Elf. Additional big names slated to appear include Jimmy Fallon & The Roots, Whoopi Goldberg, Sandra Lee, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and classic acts like the Big Apple Circus and the Radio City Rockettes.

Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade will air Thursday, Nov. 22, on NBC from 9AM – 12 PM, all time zones.

It was the tweet heard ’round the world.

No big deal, just Justin Bieber telling his fans last December that a song he’d heard on the radio while visiting his native Canada – Carly Rae Jepsen’s “Call Me Maybe” — was “possibly the catchiest song I’ve ever heard.” And that Twitter blast, just 84 characters long, was enough to make Jepsen famous. Well, that and a funny video that lent itself to countless imitations and parodies, along with that initial catchy tune, eventually the anthem of the summer of 2012.

And then there was Psy, the other seemingly out-of-nowhere sensation, whose tune “Gangnam Style” also had an eye-grabbing video, featuring funny scenes and you-can-do-this-too dance moves. In the space of a few weeks, the South Korean rapper has gone from zero to nearly 300 million “likes,” making his clip the most popular YouTube video of all time.

Is there a formula for using viral video and social media to become a pop star? Not necessarily; as Psy’s oddball, largely Korean-language clip proves, there’s no telling what the public will embrace. Still, there are a few concrete steps you can take. As Psy, Jepsen, and other viral stars have discovered, one of those steps is befriending Justin Bieber.

What else does it take to become a social media singing star? Here are some of the steps.

1. Be original. “There’s no formula,” Hollywood Reporter Music Editor Shirley Halperin told Celebuzz. “Once it’s been done, there’s a challenge to find the next cool thing.” Of “Gangnam Style,” she noted, “The foreignness makes it really attractive because it’s a culture with which we’re not really familiar.” The novelty factor has been turning YouTube stars into viral hitmakers at least since OK Go’s treadmill dance on 2006′s “Here It Goes Again,” Halperin said. It worked for Jepsen, too, with “Call Me Maybe”‘s narrative clip about an endearingly awkward girl (Jepsen) trying to catch a guy’s attention, only to have him give his number to one of her male bandmates.

2. But not too original. Pop duo Karmin rose to fame on the strength of its videos of cover versions of current hits. With an eye toward what was trending in Google searches, the band’s carefully tagged videos became hits among viewers looking for familiar songs. “We were uploading originals at first,” Karmin’s Nick Noonan told Forbes. “No one was watching them.”

3. Have a Danceable Beat. Jepsen’s “Call Me Maybe” seems custom-built for dancefloor fun, from its almost percussive string hook to its chorus about a gal giving a guy she just met her phone number. Same with “Gangnam Style,” featuring the kind of moves that could launch a new dance craze. “When it first came out, I think the big discussion among insiders was, is it the dance or the song? The video or the music? The consensus was that it was the dance, the look, the visuals, that made it just so much fun to watch,” Halperin said. “The other thing is that it reminded me right away of MC Hammer’s ‘U Can’t Touch This.’ We forget how huge that was. The album sold 18 million copies. That and the Macarena are big records because people can dance to them. So ['Gangnam Style'] is the digital version of ‘U Can’t Touch This.’ I’ve heard a lot of dance DJs incorporate this into their mixes in cool ways. It doesn’t sound as hokey mixed with a cool beat.”

4. Get Bieber on Board. Bieber, of course, may be YouTube’s biggest musical success story. It helps that he’s had savvy management, in the form of Scooter Braun. It also helps that he’s willing to leverage his own social-media popularity to help artists he likes. For Jepsen, there was not only his epic tweet, but also an ad hoc video Bieber made of himself and girlfriend Selena Gomez lip-synching “Call Me Maybe.” And he also signed her to his Schoolboy label, run by Braun. Braun was quick to sign Psy, too, when he started breaking stateside this summer. Even Karmin got some advice from Braun, who’s been able to convince the industry that there are more Biebers out there on YouTube, waiting to be turned into lucrative hitmakers. “We got a chance to talk to Scooter Braun, Justin Bieber’s manager, and he was saying he had a hard time getting Justin Bieber signed because a lot of labels didn’t believe in views translating into sales,” Karmin manager Nils Gums told Forbes. “Now, that has actually been a proven model.” Said Halperin, “Scooter Braun, hats off to that guy for making the most of the moment. He’s like Simon Cowell.”

5. Hit the road, and hit iTunes. Granted, having 300,000,000 likes on YouTube doesn’t necessarily earn you a penny. What makes money is touring and digital downloads. Karmin used YouTube to develop an e-mail list of potential customers for iTunes singles. Psy, too, has been able to translate YouTube fame into iTunes sales. And touring, as always, is where musicians make real money, without having to give the lion’s share back to their labels. Plus, it’s where they prove to fans that they’re not just manufactured video stars. Another revenue stream likely to earn big bucks for the likes of Psy and Jepsen: licensing, as advertisers, movies, and shows like Glee seek to borrow some cool points by using their hot-right-now tunes.

6. Be good. Remember the cautionary tale of Rebecca Black. She became a viral sensation out of novelty — because no one could get over how uniquely awful the song “Friday” and its clip were. To be fair, she was a 13-year-old girl, and no one expected her to have the depth and refined talent necessary for long-term staying power. We’ll see if 26-year-old Jepsen and 34-year-old Psy have more than one hit apiece in them, depending on whether they can write more songs as good as their initial hits. It’s not even necessary to have enough good songs for a whole album, just a handful that can be released over time. Of Psy, Halperin said, “Will the guy be able to sell albums because of this fluke hit? There’s no guarantee. But it’s a singles market these days. You sell the song while it’s hot.”

It’s been quite the year for cover song singing duo, Karmin!

After their cover of Chris Brown‘s “Look at Me Now” went viral on YouTube (it has over 65 million views!), the world took notice of this musical couple, otherwise known as Amy Heidemann and Nick Noonan. Since then, they’ve performed on Ellen, won an American Music Award for new media, rocked Saturday Night Live, and of course, released their very first album, Hello.

Celebuzz caught up with the duo, and talked to them about “living the YouTube dream,” what they have in the works for their wedding (live streaming, anyone?) and who they’re dying to work with.

So, who would they like to get in the studio?

Kanye West! Nick told us:

“Kanye sits on the top for us as far as both musical, and we just love his stuff.” Amy added, “Nick loves Coldplay. I do too, but I think that would be really fun because he does lots of production and it could be a really fun collaboration.”

When we asked about what inspiration was behind their album, Nick said “a lot of it was kind of like driving music. We’ve been in the car a lot lately since we moved to LA, so a lot was like, what’s going to sound good in the car?”

Amy added, “And what can you groove out to in the club, additionally. There was a lot of thought that went into it we were like, this needs to be a fun album. We covered subjects like life, love, determination, it’s very positive, I would say. And there’s a lot of rapping. So those were the things we knew had to be in it, and then what came by the end of it was Karmin, Hello.”

Take a listen to their first single from Hello titled “Brokenhearted,” below:

The two are engaged, but their wedding has taken a bit of a backseat to their booming music career:

“We didn’t want to take an entire week off and skip some of these life-changing opportunities. We realized that we want a bigger wedding where our fans can maybe be involved. We’re brainstorming ways we can make it more of a public thing.” Nick then quipped, “Maybe like UStream it or something? Has anyone UStreamed a wedding before?”

We think that sounds like a great idea!

For even more, watch the video above, and make sure you pick up Karmin’s debut album, Hello, in stores now!