Articles About Happy News, Sex Shared More on Facebook

May 3, 2010 at 11:00 am PT

Negative news, from crime to the shaky financial system, might grab the most headlines. But in the world of Facebook sharing, it seems that positive stories trump negative ones–and sex still sells.

Articles with positive headlines get a boost in sharing of more than 30 percent compared with the average, while ones with negative headlines fall below the average by about 10 percent, according to Dan Zarrella, a social-media consultant at Boston marketing firm HubSpot. By far the biggest jump in sharing comes from content with sexual overtones, which is nearly 90 percent more likely to be shared than average in Mr. Zarrella’s preliminary analysis.

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Tagged with: Dan Zarrella, digital, Facebook, frontpage, headlines, HubSpot, Internet, Jennifer Valentino-DeVries, posts, sex, sharing, The Wall Street Journal

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