Key points

Researchers identified factors that make content stand out online.

Focus on keeping a talk simple and going in-depth on only a handful of topics.

If a message must cover a significant amount of topics, consider using a written medium.

Written by Amir Sepehri, assistant professor of marketing at ESSEC Business School

Why do some TED talks go viral—and others flop? Amir Sepehri, assistant professor of marketing at ESSEC Business School, Dr. Rod Duclos (Western University), and Nasir Haghighi (University of Washington at Tacoma) found that it comes down to the amount of information contained in a talk. When a talk is chock-full of content, broaching several topics, we tend to get information overload, leading us to disengage from the video. So, how can communicators make sur

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