A top Digg user with a popular ratio of 34% has been getting paid well for promoting articles on Digg. His/her popularity has allowed numerous stories to reach the Digg Home Page, and when that happens he/she gets paid even more.
Invesp scored an interview with this person (who wishes to remain anonymous; for the purpose of this article, let’s call them “Digg Throat”), and provides quite an interesting look into the behind-the-scenes world of Digg marketing and social media marketing in general.
“I have worked for many popular blogs and I know most top users do,” explains Digg Throat. “As of now I am involved with three blogs/companies that I regularly help with social media promotion, especially on Digg. To put it in short : my status and reach within the community allows me to help businesses leverage their opportunities by reaching a different crowd and a large crowd for that matter.”
Digg Throat has been charging up to $700 per article for his/her promotion, and if a particular item reaches Digg’s home page, he/she gets another $500. Now that’s some easy money. Too bad it’s frowned upon by Digg, and Digg users alike. However, paid promotion is just a fact of Digg. It’s not a surprise, and users who have a real problem with it, will likely just find another site to read. Besides, is this really that much different than paying PR staff to push your message?
What is Digg to do though?
“Digg should strongly consider placing clearly labeled advertisements within the news stories,” says TechCrunch’s Michael Arrington. “Even as paid ads they’ll get a ton of traffic and Digg can charge accordingly. TechMeme, a tiny site in comparison, has done this successfully for some time. If Digg can’t stop its users from making a little money on the side, they may as well get in on the game.”
Something like this could work for Digg. It could incorporate spots into ad campaigns with existing clients like YouTube allegedly does with its promoted videos. Digg users may not be too enthusiastic about such a scenario though.
Something tells me Digg is going to be doing some investigating. They ought to be able to at least narrow down the number of possible suspects for Digg Throat’s identity. He/she may have wished to remain anonymous, but may have still given enough information away for Digg to figure out who they are. This may not do much to combat that problem of what some would refer to as “Digg Spam”, but I’m sure they would like to at least get closer to the bottom of it.
