Are you a new blogger or, perhaps, one of the bottom dwellers that comprise the majority of the blogosphere (like me)? What are your chances of hitting the front page of digg, you may ask? Well, I have no exact numbers for that; but if you’re no social media genius then most probably it’s next to impossible. You can submit all your posts to digg but I can guarantee you that all your efforts will just go to waste. I am not trying to deter you from submitting your posts but for expecting to land on the front page, although not completely impossible, you should be realistic about it. What then can we expect from digg? I did some research before I temporarily vacated this blog for three weeks at most and I found out that it’s possible to get traffic from digg without necessarily hitting the front page. It might not be as massive as thousands a day but I can guarantee you that it will definitely be worth the effort. All you need is time and a focused effort to do it.
DIGG?
For beginners, digg is a social media site that churns out what’s cool and popular in and around the net at the moment. Submitted stories are voted upon by digg users and, based on the quality of those votes, the fate of these stories to get more exposure are determined. It has witnessed several reformatting in its algorithms to avoid its users from spamming, gaming, and monopolizing the system to project an image of diversity and democracy in its voting system which somehow unintentionally (according to some) stripped its top users of their vote’s weight just recently. Your submitted stories are first seen in the upcoming section which is easily buried from sight as more users also submit their stories later on. Now, your story’s fate depends on the hands of the entire digg community if they will bury it, never to be seen again on the face of digg universe, or be carried up to the front page where you get your much coveted massive traffic.
HOW TO GET THAT TRAFFIC?
About Your Story
Diggable content
Basically, you have to understand what kinds of stories or materials digg community like to dig. Judging from its popular archives here are some examples of blog posts that work well in digg:
- Lists
- How to guides
- Tech related (internet, games, Google, Microsoft, Linux, Mac, gadgets, get it?)
- Any fact stranger than fiction that a lot of people don’t know about and haven’t been dugg before
- Extremely outrageous, weird, funny, or amazing things
- Important newsworthy events that big news sites haven’t covered yet (because if they were they’d be in digg and it’s pointless to resubmit the same story)
- Global warming, oil prices (recent), and alternative fuel sources
Diggable buttons
Not necessarily a part of driving traffic to your blog but installing digg buttons in each of your posts makes it easier for people to digg it and be exposed to a greater digg audience.
Diggable headline
When you submit a story, this is the first thing you fill out. Usually, by default, your post’s title appears here. You can change it for a specific purpose if you want. Your headlines must be catchy but related to your original. The title must be interesting enough to convince its readers to click and read your story, or better yet, digg it. Words like “top, first, new, how, best, greatest, and free” are perfect examples which you can add to your headlines as long as they are applicable. Tip: It’s a good habit to make your post title “digg oriented” before publishing it.
Diggable description
After the headline or title, this is the next people read. It’s short so you have to be able to engage their thoughts fast. It could be information to support your title, or additional reasons/info on why they have to read further. Give them what they want to know about your story that will make them want to actually read it. A lot of digg how to guides say that it’s okay to give false promises to get people digging which turns to traffic, but digg community is also known to be a dangerous crowd when angered which could haunt your blogging existence forever. So be careful if you’re going to use this kind of writing tactic.
About Your Digg Profile
Be an active digger
It’s really no secret that if you want traffic from digg and wants your content to be seen, you should really be active in promoting it but not necessarily submitting it. Submit your blog post (not all the time), submit other stories you really dig, digg other’s submissions (or what they dugg), get friends - it’s one of digg’s essential part, and take time to read the messages or shouts your friends are throwing at you unless they’re spam. Act and be part of the community. It is in being active that your profile gain more exposure to other digg users for them to also take a look and digg your submissions.
Use an avatar
Get some picture to represent your digg profile. Without one, it will be hard to remember you by and digg people just find it hard to trust profiles with generic identity even in pictures.
The Rules of the Game
Don’t submit your posts all the time
Digg users hate spamming along with shameless self-promotion. And if you always submit your posts in the system, it will be easy for them to brand you as a spammer. The key here is moderation or complete avoidance. If you think your post has that “digg appeal”, don’t push your luck by submitting it yourself as it will almost always be ignored except by your friends. The best way is always to get others to submit it unless there’s no one willing.
Submit other stories
Some digg users devote their time submitting up to100 or greater stories a day to gain authority and attention in digg. Clearly, I would say, it would take someone without a life to do this sort of activity, be it automated or not, since you have to enter some description and authentication code for each which would really take time. For us bloggers who are constantly brewing new ideas (or recycling old concepts) and tweaking our blog’s performance, we don’t have that much time at our disposal. So, I think it would be better and a lot more efficient if you’ll be submitting 2 to 3 stories a day, preferably those related to your niche or chosen digg topic (this thing I’m yet to do). The best way to find new stories to digg is through subscribing to well-known news sources. Alternatively, you can also submit your favorite or idol bloggers’ posts if you want. Just think of it as your contribution to the community, even if they don’t show that much appreciation.
Submit original stories
Don’t resubmit the same story as your own original article (also known as blog spamming). It’s just useless and considered gaming by the system. If it’s just a recap or a short summary of the original, just digg or submit the source. Of course there are times when it’s really time consuming trying to know if it’s the original, but do try to avoid it as much as possible.
Get many friends
Digg is a social media and has the word “social” all over it so having “friends” is part of its features. These friends will be the core source of your diggs which will help you get a bit of an exposure, and the core source of traffic because they will check out your submitted story if diggworthy or not. Add as many friends as possible. Of course, don’t expect all of them to friend you back so that your shouts will reach them. Just think of them as your allies in your mini-battles inside the digg universe.
Send shouts
Don’t forget to inform your friends about your recent stories. Shout them your new submission and let them digg it on their own volition. Don’t force them, they’re your friends. Don’t send shouts all the time if you’re making a lot of submissions. If there’s one thing a lot of digg users hate, it’s becoming too annoying to the point that they want to report you as a spammer.
Digg your friends’ dugg content and submitted stories
You don’t have to digg it all. Just show that you pay attention to their activity and you help them out with their submissions too. It’s like do unto others what you want others to do to you. Digg what they’re shouting unless you’re strongly convinced that it’s a useless piece of crap. But don’t bury their story too, they’re your friends, remember?
Pay attention to who’s digging your story
These are your friends to whom you owe a reciprocal digg. Those who don’t digg you, well, you can forget about their submissions occasionally. Befriend those who dugg it but aren’t your friends yet.
Digg stories from the upcoming section
This is the part where a lot of users forget to venture into simply because it’s hard to get a hold of this page as it changes fast each minute due to massive submissions. Try to look for some interesting submissions and digg. This is an opportunity to get more friends. I’m not sure if it’s true for all, but I got some of my digg friends from digging their pathetic (lol) submissions in the upcoming section. Just kidding with the pathetic part.
Leave comments
This is the hidden gem that can give you extra traffic besides submission. It’s like commenting on blogs. Leave useful information if you’re dropping a url, and make sure that the url will contribute to the story, or else the community will see it as just spam and will appear hidden as default from the others who will care to read the comments. Also it’s not wise to leave comments in the popular section as there will be more comments in that particular story before yours which makes it harder to get yours read by interested parties but easier for troll diggers to vote out of the picture. The upcoming section is always the best source if you wish to be the first. Always make sure too that it’s not always a url to your blog that you’re leaving or it might get banned from digg permanently. It can give great benefits but commenting can also pose some sticky and worrisome situations for your blog. You might want to read this guide (Guide to Traffic from Comment Diggs) before undergoing a commenting spree.
Right timing
This is also one of the key techniques to get better exposure for your submission even if it doesn’t get to the front page. Digg has its low and peak hours. Since majority of digg users are coming from North America, it’s always safe to assume that you should time your submissions based on the usage patterns of this territories. According to this article (A Comprehensive Guide to Going Viral on Digg Part 1), there are time trends where digg submissions shoot up the graphs and hit the front page. These times are: 8:30am-10:30am,1:00pm-3:00pm, 4:00pm-6:00pm, and 8:00pm-10:00pm (Pacific Standard Time). That would be between 11:30pm-1:30am, 4:00-6:00am, 7:00am-9:00am, and 11:00am-1:00pm if here in the Philippines. Basically, if you don’t want your submission to get buried by hundreds of submissions in the upcoming pages these are the right times to send them and get more people to view it.
CONCLUSION
A well-crafted title and description of your submissions will always capture attention, hence traffic. Plus, observing digg’s unwritten rules will make your submission perform a lot better. What more if you time it when more people are able to see it? Like I said earlier, this guide will not help you get to the front page of digg but we cannot always discount the possibility of your submissions ending in the front page if you employed these techniques. After all, it was from articles that will teach you how to get to the front page. Even so, there’s no guarantee of terrific traffic since, obviously, it all depends on the quality of your submissions even how much you time, play fair, or promote it. But then, even if you don’t have that great a content, there will still be traffic coming from your friends (that’s why it’s important to get many), those really interested in what you have to offer, and from the comments you’ve been making. But always remember to play it right and avoid getting it beyond what the digg community can tolerate.
technorati tags: digg, traffic, smo
8 comments:
Cheers! I had to giggle at the 'Z-List Bloggers' quip in your post's title - and I'm always grateful for a laugh! :-)
It's an excellent article, and has given me a kick up the jacksy to pull my finger out and really get to grips with the social networks and bookmarking sites. So, again, cheers!
One last thing, it's nice to see someone really customising a Blogger site. Big thumbs up. ;-)
Thanks for dropping by. Yep, it's better to have your blogger comment box attached in your page rather than having it popping-up in a different page. It makes commenting a lot easier that way.
Great post nepspeed. I think you highlighted a lot of things I was doing right on digg and a lot of things that i was doing wrong.
Great article! And guess where I found it? Digg! I am new to Digg and was instructed to start playing around with it for some blog promo and had no idea what was going on there...thanks for breaking it down in such a clean and concise manner! And yes... I dugg this!
Doc
I'm definitely a Z-list blogger, so these tips are definitely helpful, even if I have seen a few of them thrown around before. It's still nice having them all in one place like this.
I would also completely agree with layne in the first comment. Your site is awesome for being a blogger blog, it's probably the best one that I've ever seen. I wish that I knew how to make my blog look half as good as this.
@sogeshirts
Actually a lot of things I wrote here I'm only starting to do. :)
@dr nicole
It's always my pleasure to help
@charles lumia
About this blog's design, I have acquired quite a handful of html knowledge in my two years of blogging and it took me 2 months to finally comeup with a design like this. If you're interested in blogger customizations, there's a lot of blogspot people willing to help. Just google "blogger hacks" or "blogger custom templates".
Nice and comprehensive guide! Well done!
Thanks for dropping by.