I just started reading Invisible Influence by Jonah Berger, a very interesting read so far that has made me think about how our own behavior is shaped by the influence of others, and how some of those ideas might apply to photography.

One of them is the idea that we are more likely to check out a bestselling book -after all, so many people can't be wrong- than one from an author no one knows.

After her success with Harry Potter, Rowling decided to write a detective novel called The Cuckoo’s Calling [...] She wanted to let the writing speak for itself. So she released The Cuckoo’s Calling as Robert Galbraith [...] [it] had mixed success. Almost every person who read The Cuckoo’s Calling liked it. They called it “inspired” and “an engaging read.” Unfortunately, however, there just weren’t that many of them. Readers were few and far between. The Cuckoo’s Calling was released with little fanfare and sold only 1,500 hardcover copies in the first three months of being on sale.

While the writing was good and 1,500 copies sound pretty good to me -for a new and unknown writer, at least-, it wasn't catching on.

Then one day the book surged from 4,709th to become the best-selling book on Amazon. Soon, hundreds of thousands of copies had been sold. [...] Someone had simply unmasked Rowling as the book’s actual author. Without J. K. Rowling, The Cuckoo’s Calling was merely one of the thousands of well-written detective novels competing for attention. With J. K. Rowling, it had a 450-million-copy seal of approval that made potential readers take a look.

This goes to show -once again- that arts, including photography, are not a meritocracy. The artist definitely needs to be good at what they do, but that alone is not enough. The timing might not be ideal, and they might not be reaching the right audience.

I've talked about why I believe photography is something that should be done everyday. This is even more important when we are just starting out: making and sharing images as often as we can, until we eventually hit the timing right and with the right people.

For Rowling, that was a publisher's daugther who kept telling her dad how good that book called Harry Potter was. For a photographer, that could be someone who stumbles upon your work online.

There are a lot of amazing photographers out there, producing amazing pieces that unfortunately might never get the audience they deserve. The key is to not give up, to persist and to have patience.

Success is not guaranteed, but there are 3 things we can do to increase our chances:

Produce consistent good work
Share it and make yourself findable
Repeat steps 1 and 2