I don't think anyone really knows how to do it.
I think your best shot is to get people interested in coming to check out your memes (since people can't upvote what they never see). And it seems like one of the best ways to get people interested in you is to make funny comments on memes where people can see them (i.e., memes in the first few pages of Hot). If people like think your comments are funny, they may come check out your memes (although there's no guarantees).
Besides that, I don't think anyone can predict which memes will make the front page and which ones won't.
So it might be worth not worrying about it at all.