Hi,
I’m a Level 7 Local Guide from Toronto.
I took a pic a couple of years ago of a small greasy spoon and it’s had a crazy number of views - over 4.5 million…
The pic is good, but nothing crazy, and the restaurant is a small place that’s not particularly well known.
Is there any way to determine how it’s driven this kind of traffic or why? I’d love to know so that I can try to replicate it.
Thanks!
E
Hi @EamonW
Your starphoto is showing the front of a restaurant. The algorithm or the owner selected your photo as the cover photo for the [restaurant](http://The%20Grapefruit Moon +1 416-534-9056 https://maps.app.goo.gl/E5h9eDpXPWnmELi36).
Cover photos get shown way more often than other photos. That is when only one photos is used to represent the place.
Knowing and reproducing the photo qualities the algorithm is looking for will increase your chances to get more of your pix become cover photos.
Here are some of the criteria I have noticed:
Your star photos is a bit unusual as it is taken at night.
If you are interested I might be able to share more links on this topic. A good starting point is to check the leaderboards for star photos. And generally start noticing what images are selected as cover photos in your area.
Cheers
Morten
Thank you for responding, @MortenCopenhagen …
You’re right - I’ve tried to incorporate all of those elements that make for an effective pic, but there has to be something else going on here, like the business or some other website using it somehow. I’m not complaining, but I’d love to know what has got this night-time pic of a small restaurant so many views - even if it is their profile pic. I feel like I’m missing something. Doesn’t it seem like a unusual number of views for a neighbourhood spot?
Hi @EamonW
I had the same question as you and posted about it back in January 2020 just before heading overseas (see Your most viewed single photo?). While overseas I continued to ponder about this phenomenon. Well when I returned from overseas in mid-March, the COVID pandemic hit hard so much so that I found myself locked down in what was to become the most locked down city in the world.
While staring at the internal walls and eating lots of chocolates and consuming more coffee than ever before, during this lockdown my thoughts on this most viewed photo grew so much so that in mid-June I decided to create another post about, what I termed star photos. The interest in this topic was such that I continued posting about star photos each month since then and you can see the latest, the August 2022 post here. I believe that you can learn a lot about the answer to your question from these posts based on the collective wisdom and sharing of Local Guides’ star photos.
@EamonW I asked the same question too, but there’s no easy answer. I’ve started tracking the performance of some of my photos, and am certainly getting some surprises.
The details will not become available to you. Sorry.
If you check the leaderboards I shared a link to you will see that 4 million views us not that unusual.
In the Terms of Service Google made clear that they reserve the right to reuse our photos in other applications / services.
I suspect my star photo (also of a restaurant storefront) with 28 million views have been used in paid advertising by the restaurant.
Also, I’m aware of several popular lists on Google Maps leading people to gourmet restaurants.
Cheers
Morten
Not much to report yet @MortenCopenhagen
I have just over 450 photos and chose to monitor all which have more than 20,000 views. I find it fascinating to see photos reach the 20,000 threshold and the list has now grown to 41 including one which was taken just a few weeks ago. There are a few others which leapfrog over previously higher listed entries as well so I adjust the spreadsheet each time I review.
PS: This response was typed this morning just before my computer crashed. Now this evening I’m looking at the newly launched tracking feature by @AdamGT but getting errors when I try to add photos.