Stumbling along with Stumbleupon

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What do we usually do when we want to know more about something? We google it right? We always turn to search engine giants like Yahoo! and Google to satisfy our online searching needs. But the downside to this is that you get so many hits, it is like finding a needle in a haystack. This is where Stumbleupon comes in. Basically, it offers net surfers a new way of browsing through the web, looking for new and unique content.

Stumbleupon, according to wikipedia, “is an Internet community that allows its users to discover and rate Web pages, photos, and videos. It is a personalized recommendation engine which uses peer and social-networking principles.” Bought by eBay last May of 2007 for a whopping $75M, it also allow users to choose from a dozens of categories of interests with almost 500 topics to produce relevant content for them which is made easy by the stumbleupon toolbar.

As you click on the stumble button, you will get high-quality pages, rated by like-minded Stumbleupon users that match your personal interests. Rating a page automatically updates the personal profile so a stumbler or user doesn’t necessarily have to go to his profile page to “refresh” it. Stumblers can rate a site by the thumbs up or down button found on the toolbar, allowing the social network to record your preferences and connect you to other users with similar taste. They can also leave additional comments on the webpage as they surf. What makes leaving a comment on Stumbleupon different from others is that you can hide any comment by ignoring the user who posted a comment. Also, it is integrated with a stumbleupon profile thru the review counter. The toolbar makes it easy to build a blog of the commentaries you made and these are logged on the Reviews page of your profile. Bloggers can also conveniently fuse Stumbleupon blog entries or rated pages into another blog or news feed.

As all stumblers know, the site IS used for its ability to drive traffic to a specific website or webpage that has been stumbled. For non-stumblers, stumbled simply means bookmarked. We have to admit, once we write an article and post it on the internet; we want as many people as possible to read it. Once your site has been stumbled, you’ll immediately notice an influx of visitors to your site. For a businessman or a person looking for a job using his or her website as a tool to market himself or his or her products, a strong media presence is essential and what better way to do it but by SU. One fine example is Dave Saunders and his websites, DaveSaunders.net and Yoursocialbrand.

Stumblers are generally attracted to cool graphics and interesting and unique content so it depends on the person to ensure repeat visits to his website. For example a site can experience a spike in feed subscription but more than half of the readers unsubscribed over the next few days. So in order to attract visitors and to ensure repeat visits, a couple of elements must all be present to ensure a thumbs up rating by users stumbling through your website and they are the following:

Branding. Dave Saunders made and easy-to-remember URL for one of his websites: his own name.

Content. The website should be full of information that cannot be digested in one reading.

Visual Appeal. Stumblers are a visual lot so it’ll help if your website has a kick-ass graphics.

Professional façade. The site should be not look like it was done by a 10-year-old computer geek-wannabe. Remember that you are marketing yourself and your products. Think of yourself an extension of yourself. You don’t go to a job interview wearing your house clothes, do you?

One-of-a-kind on-site materials. Your site should offer information or tools that can only be provided by you. Like Dave Saunder’s Social Manifesto.

Subscriptions. Notice that popular sites have prominent tabs asking visitors to subscribe. You don’t have to scroll down to see them.

Most people see social media sites as a form of entertainment; something to while away the time. Well, why not use them like SU to create an opportunity to be marketed to millions of users worldwide.

Go to Stumbleupon and be a stumbler like millions of people all over the world.

View and download Dave Saunder’s the Social manifesto.

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