I Love Diggin'

Right now, I am addicted to digg and I really don't know why. I haven't tried all the great services of digg. I have only explored the basics and what can I say? So far, So good! I also love reading articles in several genres, especially if it's all about tennis, health, gaining weight and other psychological issues.

What I really love with digg is: the site is well-organized. I like their idea of posting your own stories there, comment on other digg entries, add them to my "favorites" and just tour the digg community. A week ago, I do have some problems with digg, that is, I couldn't understand why I can't log in on their site. I keep on signing in but nothing happened still. It always say I have the wrong username and password but, a huge thanks to their friendly contact services and the problem is now solved. The problem is with the IP address of my unit.

Because I am now a digg addict, I'll post here a portion of an article I've got in Ezine that is written by Vishal Lamba. The title of the article is "How To Use Digg To Get More Traffic." Enjoy reading as much as I enjoy it too.

What is Digg?

Digg is a free "social media" website where the news on its pages is controlled by the community of users (over 500,000+ at this point of time). There is no central governing body that decides which news to report and which news makes it to the front page. The community of users submit the sotries and "vote" on them by clicking the "digg this" icons besides each story listed on its pages. Digg was originally for geeks only and had mostly technology related articles but has since grown to include a whole range of categories that cover almost any topic.

If you are a blogger or a site that writes news stuff and is looking for extra traffic, you can possibly look at Digg to get this for you. It is difficult - and eventually only stories that are unique get large number of "votes" or "diggs" from the community of users and make it to the front page.

If your blog post or story is unqiue and good enough, and the community picks it up and begins digging it - you can rest be assured that once you get to the front page you will get over 10,000 unique visitors to your site in one day... and that gradually tapers off in a few days. This is known as the "digg effect" and achieving this should be one of your goals.

There are a few handfull of ways to get on to the front page of Digg. These are power methods for power users" and I will discuss them below. I won't go into the how to use Digg.com in detail. You can get that on the help area and FAQ area of the website... see the footer/bottom of the website, under the heading "all about digg".



Making your strategy on Digg

If you are new to Dig, then hang out around the site, for about a week and read and see how people are commenting and what kind of stories are getting popular. Participate in threaded comments and discussions.

. . . "Just Make New Friends!"

This is the key. You need to connect with other users and thus have many friends on Digg. Why? Because, when you submit a story - you can invite your friends to Digg it. You can even legally setup a reciprocal digg exchange...

"you digg my story, i digg your story". You can do this by sending a private message, known as a "shout" to your friends. Just digg their story first and then tell them - I dugg you, please digg my story now ... and include the link of your story that is on the digg site (not the offsite link that is on your website or blog).

Another way you can invite them to digg, instead of shouting (private messaging) them - is by directly clicking on the "share this news" with all my friends link that appears under the story post on digg. This is quick but not as effective as a personal shout. Use it once you have over, say 200 friends on digg....

Yes, you heard that right. 200 friends. That should be your target. Why? Simple - because you can invite them to digg your story. The more friends, the more diggs.

Now, for the secret...

There is a tool available, that can automatically keep adding random friends to your digg network. Its called Digg Friend Adding Automator. Its simple to use. All you need to configure is one file, with your username and password on Digg. Then run it the software (no install needed - just a simple double click). Then take your shoes off and sit back - while it adds friends to your profile at the rate of one every 5 seconds.

There is a precaution here. Do not add more than around 20 friends in one shot. This may alert the digg admins and you can get banned permanently. Add 20 friends... then shut down the software for about 15 minutes or so.. and then re-run it for another 20 friends and so on. Dont add more than around 50 per day, and stop at around 200 to 250 for about a week. Then rinse and repeat.

If you cant get hold of this great tool - you can still quickly randomly add friends on digg by simply clicking on the "add as friend" link besides their names, next to articles they have submitted.

Now, when you have soooo many friends, you can invite them to come vote on your story. Of course the key here is to firstly make sure that your story is unique and will arise the interest of over around 70% of readers. That should be enough. Once you invite them and share your story with your friends, after a day - start contacting friends who have sent your shouts (private messages) to digg their story -and start digging their story and in return ask them to digg yours.

It is extremely important that your story gets popular (large number of diggs) at a fast rate - and before a lot of time passes by (probably around 10 to 20 days). Why? Because, by then it could become stale news! Also, dont submit irrelevant and boring news, or stuff thats already been submitted. It will only be "burried" out by the community.

Commenting on Digg for traffic

Another easier way to get traffic (although in much lower numbers and probably a very very low fractional amount) is by posting comments on popular stories with high diggs. Just make sure what you write is relevant to the story and then leave a catchy phrase and link (signature) at the end of your comment.

The Onsite "Digg This" Button

If you have a fairly large number of readers to your blog, you can submit your blog posts to Digg and then insert a "digg this" button in near your blog post ... as an onsite "digg this" link. This way visitors or readers of your blog can vote your story up the Digg ranks. This works only on blogs that have a large number of readers and visitors - so its only powerful then.

End of the article - - - - -

Now, do you now understand why I am addicted to digg? My digg page has still no PR and I still have to digg, digg and digg to be a well-known digger.

Keep diggin'