How to Make a Photo Go Viral

December 10, 2014

By Laura Brauer

Every day, billions of photos are posted to the Internet and social networks around the world, but only a select few “go viral.” According to a new e-book commissioned by the memory card maker Eye-Fi, there’s a science, of sorts, behind why some photos go viral.

Deconstructing recent viral hits, Eye-Fi was able to offer up some general guidance to shape your social media activity:

1. Put people in them. It’s no guarantee, but “pictures with lively people are far more stimulating and shareable.”

2. If you do go the nature photo route, make it dramatic. Floods, tornados, dramatic vistas and landscapes are all likely to be shared more often.

3. Emotions rule. According to Eye Fi, “bringing life and feeling into your shot means the masses will elicit a much greater response.”

4. A selfie is boring. “Static selfies rarely go viral,” Eye Fi advises.

Screen-Shot-2013-03-05-at-8.43.29-AM If you’re looking for something a bit more empirical to guide your social networking, here’s a research paper by MIT’s Aditya Khosla exploring (in great academic detail) the science behind what makes a popular image. Some of the findings validate Eye-Fi’s advice, especially emphasizing people over objects and keeping image composition dynamic.

Studying a huge set of Flickr images, Khosla also found that an image’s popularity hinged not simply on the content (though that was quite important) but the social context in which the image is uploaded (i.e. who the photographer was connected with online, how many images they’ve posted, etc.).

Regarding image content, Khosla found that the color red was more closely associated with popular pics than blues and greens. Images with laptops, spatulas, plungers and golf carts also tended to have a more negative impact with viewers (what people have against spatulas was, sadly, not addressed). Photo content that includes revolvers, perfumes, bras and miniskirts tended to be elicit more positive feelings. Who knew?