Steve Zilberman: The Man Responsible For Several Top Artist’s Virality

By: Shirley Ju

In a world where digital and social media are at an all-time high, it’s important to recognize the movers and shakers in the field. Insert Steve Zilberman, the viral marketing engineer and creative director you undoubtedly want on your team when it comes to having a presence online. 

Born in the Ukraine but spending most of his life in Chicago, Zilberman is the genius behind the content from some of your favorite artists to date, including famed producer Benny Blanco, the third biggest TikToker in the world Bella Poarch, and pop artist Oliver Tree, the latter of whom he played a detrimental role in launching his career from the underground into the mainstream. 

Steve describes himself as a “viral engineer,” a term he made up to encompass the multitude of tasks he takes on at any given moment. From artist relations to artist development, Steve’s expertise lies in creating content, whether it’s filming, editing, then marketing that content. He states, “I can’t call myself a creative director because a lot of the time, I’m co-creative directing or maybe I’m not the main creative director.” 

Remember the height of Tyga’s “Macarena” challenge on TikTok (currently at over 836 million videos and counting)? Yup, that was Steve also. His undisclosed sauce or formula has resulted in launching online accounts from zero to millions of followers in just months, a phenomenon people spend years and years attempting to achieve.

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Meet The Disruptors: Steve Zilberman of Lucky Touch On The Three Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry

NEVER GIVE UP!!! This is the most cliche but arguably the most important. It can take you 1 year to be valued, 5 years, 10, maybe 20! Stone Temple Pilots weren’t even a band until they were 30 years old. Age is a number and time is relative. Don’t give up.

Asa part of our series about business leaders who are shaking things up in their industry, I had the pleasure of interviewing Steve Zilberman.

With well over 1.5 billion video views under his belt, viral engineer Steve Zilberman has gained a deep understanding of what will perform well online. While helping build Atlantic Records artist Oliver Tree from 10K followers on Instagram to over 1 million in the course of 16 months, he was able to keep Oliver’s engagement at an average high of 28%. Steve specializes as a cinematographer, video editor, creative director, Photoshop expert, producer, project manager, content marketer, & photographer. He has worked with countless celebrities & has won multiple awards for his work. Steve has had his hands in several viral moments on the internet and will continue guiding both new & old influencers on how to maximize their online reach.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?

I’ll try to keep my story as congested as possible because I can fill a novel of information. I moved to Chicago with my mom from a poor area in Odessa, Ukraine when I was 6 years old. Throughout high school I never knew what I wanted. After graduating, my friends got signed to a metal band & since I wasn’t good at any instruments I decided to learn how to film & edit media. Going from tour to tour, I would learn the ropes pretty quickly. Whenever I would be off tour, I would be doing music videos for local Chicago-area artists. Eventually my jobs started getting bigger; I did several commercials for businesses and even somehow landed a DP position for a McDonald’s documentary at their headquarters. I met my ex GF in Canada on tour and that led me into living in Toronto, Denmark, and eventually Los Angeles while simultaneously building a clientele and network in all of those countries………..

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Interview with Steve Zilberman – The Wizard of Going Viral

By Randy

The influence of social media surpasses the understanding of most people, which is why brands seek out influencers.

Going viral is the goal of most influencers. And the wizard of virality is Steve Zilberman, who has taken influencers and social media personalities from zero to millions of followers almost overnight.

Steve Zilberman started out filming and directing documentaries, followed by moving into social media and music. He’s worked with Stone Temple Pilots, Bria & Chrissy, Cherdleys, Oliver Tree, Bella Poarch, and Benny Blanco, as well as Tyga. Steve’s magic touch has amassed more than 1.5 billion views, along with attracting hundreds of millions of followers.

Steve Zilberman refers to TikTok as the “ultimate social media,” which is an interesting statement. Intrigued by those words, as well as Steve’s apparent wizardry, bordering on sorcery, CelebMix spoke with Steve Zilberman to find out more about what he does and how he does it.

How did you get started as a viral engineer/creative director?

I started off as a cinematographer and editor. I slowly moved into social media, and then music, and now music marketing. After many years of A/B testing content to attain the highest engagement, I’ve gotten my success rate high enough to get interviewed about it.

How did you hook up with people like Benny Blanco, Bella Poarch, and Oliver Tree?

It essentially started with Oliver. Oliver found me when I was making YouTube skits with Cherdleys and he reached out to collab. He introduced me to the music industry and I began networking up from there. His ex-manager and I began working together often and then he ended up on the team that manages Bella Poarch. Benny Blanco knew about Oliver Tree and now Bella so he brought me on board to build his TikTok from the ground floor. 

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Fans speculate that James Charles was originally in Bella Poarch's 'Build a B*tch' music video, but cut after his sexting scandal

Palmer Haasch

Fans are speculating that James Charles was cut from the "Build a B*tch" music video. @zilbersteve/TikTok; Bella Poarch/YouTube

• Some people think James Charles was removed from Bella Poarch's "Build a B*tch" music video.

• A TikTok seems to show Charles in costume, and fans spotted someone who looks like him in the video.

• Charles has been embroiled in controversy due to accusations that he sexted underage boys.

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The Winning Formula – Steve Zilberman Talks Viral Engineering for Oliver Tree and More

by Marilyn Reles

With well over 1.5 billion video views under his belt, viral engineer Steve Zilberman has gained a deep understanding of what will perform well online. While helping build Atlantic Records artist Oliver Tree from 10K followers on Instagram to over 1 million in the course of 16 months, he was able to keep Oliver’s engagement at an average high of 28%. Steve specializes as a cinematographer, video editor, creative director, photoshop expert, producer, project manager, content marketer, & photographer. He has worked with countless celebrities & has won multiple awards for his work. Steve has had his hands in several viral moments on the internet and will continue guiding both new & old influencers on how to maximize their online reach. We sat down with Steve to learn more…

What are some of the things you look for in a video’s potential to go viral? And does this differ from platform to platform? How?

The psychology behind what goes viral is one of the most fascinating things because it’s not always explainable. Personally I look at 3 things. Have I seen this before? Does this have my attention? If I have seen this before, has this been viral? Lastly, is there something to talk about (negative or positive)? I’ll give you an example. The other day I saw a video on tiktok that did very well, which was cheese being thrown at a baby’s face. The cheese sticks on and the baby has a funny look. I’ve seen videos go viral before of cheese being thrown on faces, walls, etc. On top of that you have a baby. Babies go viral often. So now you have a formula for what could go “viral”. (Side note: when I say viral, I’m saying 1 million views+). This isn’t ever guaranteed however, I’m no magician! But I am putting the odds strongly in my favor by using formulas that have worked for me in the past.

Virality differs platform to platform. Youtube is a whole other animal compared to Instagram, Twitter, or TikTok. That’s the toughest nut to crack because people go on there with a longer attention span; it’s because YouTube is meant for long form content. Now sprinkle in some of those formulas that I spoke about above….you have “how to make a million dollar music video” that I made with Oliver Tree. That’s a 30 minute video that has memeable things happening constantly. It’s essentially one long “viral” video. Twitter is pretty tough as well. I’m no master on that but I’ve had a few things work out for me there. Instagram was my forte! With Oliver, we were averaging out 28% engagement and I’ve even seen 32/33% at our max. This is average engagement. So on a video we might get 1 million plays and have 500k followers, but the average factors comments as well which is why it stays lower. Right now, because of tiktok, all these tiktokers are getting insane engagement on Instagram. Pretty wild to see because if you compare them to mega celebs like Kim Kardashian, they’re crushing them. Tiktok is the most predictable platform to go viral by far. The algorithm is made to reach a lot of people at the same time so if you’re confident in your content piece, your chances for going viral are exponentially larger…….

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Balancing the Grind with Steve Zilberman, Viral Marketing Engineer at Lucky Touch

Written by HAO

Steve Zilberman is a Viral Marketing Engineer at Lucky Touch, where he works as Benny Blanco’s lead creative director as well as TikTok creator Bella Poarch

1) To kick things off, could you tell us a little about your career background and current role?

I started my career off solely as a cinematographer and editor. I worked on music videos, documentaries, promotional videos, and commercials. I’m currently working as a social media consultant, creative director, on artist marketing, and artist development.

I’ve coined the term “viral engineer” because my job title encompasses cinematography/editing as well as the jobs I’ve listed that I’m currently doing. It is a combination of all of this that goes into creating a purposeful piece of viral content, hence the term viral engineer!

My personal full time clientele are Bella Poarch and Benny Blanco; via the company I’ve formed, Lucky Touch, I’ve been working with other artists and companies as well. I do one-off campaigns for artists as well as one-off videos that bring more traffic to music that the artist has released. 

2) What does a day in the life look like for you? Can you take us through a recent workday?

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Viral content creator Steve Zilberman joins WW to talk about the state of social media and the art of making viral videos.

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I spent close to three evenings with Oliver, and each time I walked away confident I had figured out everything about him, only to collapse into a paranoid state of bewilderment and despair, second-guessing everything he had told me. His inner circle acts in much the same manner, and his approach appears to rub off on those close to him. Take Steve Zilberman, for instance: The 27-year-old DP who’s paid to shoot Oliver’s video content with an iPhone couldn’t help but slip further into the realm he had already fallen into—he also rocks sandals and socks; he has a large earring dangling over his face; and he’s bleach blond, with the remnants of dreadlocks near his neck. (Zilberman informed the group, with no supporting evidence, that if you get dreadlocks, and then shave your head, much of your hair will grow back as dreadlocks.)

Steve Zilberman (center) receives Audience Award from Short Film Competition sponors EÜS (Jaan Roos) and Tartu College (Jaan Meri). Photo: Peeter Põldre

La estrella brasileña reveló además en su cuenta de Instagram quiénes más los acompañaron en esta escapada por tierras japonesas. La cantante compartió una foto grupa etiquetando a su amigo, el maquillista Renner Souza, la actriz y modelo Gaby Lopes, la cantautora Lexa y Steve Zilberman, especialista en marketing viral y edición de video.

A cantora brasileira está curtindo a sexta-feira (25) ao lado de amigos como Lele Pons, Lexa, Gabi Lopes, Steve Zilberman e Renner Souza