On average, a story making it to the front page of Digg.com gleans 129 links and generates over 10,000 visitors per hour to a website, or so say the experts at the SMX Social Media event in New York.
Neil Patel, Chris Winfield, and Tamar Weinberg presented their methods for getting noticed on social news sites like Digg, Reddit, and Netscape. Though there’s no sure-fire method for getting to the front page (only 0.7 percent of all stories make it), there are at least patterns for success.
In large part, using Digg as our measuring stick, that involves getting chummy with the top 100 contributors, who control about 56 percent of what makes to the front page. Not an exact science, but here’s what our experts recommend:
1. Lists, games, controversy, tools, breaking news, pictures, videos, and anything having to do with technology or science will win their attention.
2. A solid title and description are critical.
3. Make yourself identifiable; get an avatar.
4. Provide contact information in your bio.
5. Befriend users and Digg their stories early (before they get popular).
6. Comment on stories (snarky comments win on Digg).
7. Get to know their language.
8. Get to know what they like.
9. Know what they don’t like (They don’t like SEO, for example).
10. Don’t fake it.
11. Use numeric symbols, not the words.
12. Have good hosting.
murdok Video anchor Kara Ratliff contributed to this article.
