Traffic from other sites

1. 72

   William F. Torpeyposted 16 years ago

   One of my hubs recently got a small flurry of hits from stumbleupon.com. Can someone tell me how and why that occurred on that hub -- and not on any other? Are you supposed to be signed up such groups to draw their readers?

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2. 65

   C.M. Vanderlindenposted 16 years ago

   William,
   
   With StumbleUpon, users submit individual web pages...so it's likely that someone came across one of your hubs and submitted it to StumbleUpon....since they only submit the URL associated with whichever hub it was that they liked, you'll only see a jump in SU traffic to that one hub. The hope is, of course, that once other StumbleUpon users click on your hub, they'll visit your other hubs as well, but more often than not, they stick with the hub that was originally submitted.
   
   Hope this helps!
   --Colleen

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3. 72

   William F. Torpeyposted 16 years ago

   Thank you very much for your thorough answer. I learn a lot on this site every day.

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4. 61

   retireyoungposted 16 years ago

   You should sign up with stumbled upon and get the tool bar to see how it all works.  I have had a lot of success with it.

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5. 59

   Mark Knowlesposted 16 years ago

   I am finding Stumbleupon traffic to be of a very low quality. Very low click through rates  to advertisements, no looking at other hubs. It certainly generates an awful lot of traffic ( I got 60,000 page views on one of my pages in a week - not a hubpage - and almost no ad clicks) I think traffic from Digg or reddit is better quality. What does anyone else think?

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   1. 60

      thecounterpunchposted 16 years agoin reply to this

      60000 ? that seems strange it must be some kind of joker who did that with a robot

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   2. 67

      darksideposted 16 years agoin reply to this

      Where did most of the traffic come from? (Geographically speaking).
      
      I had a site get tens of thousands of vistors (it was around the 60,000+ mark in about 2 days) and the clicks were decidedly lacking.
      
      But the traffic came from Japan mostly. I was getting around 4,500 uniques a day before that big spike, and the number of clicks stayed constant so my CTR plummeted.

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6. 70

   Stacie Naczelnikposted 16 years ago

   I agree that StumbleUpon will get you a lot of traffic, but not traffic that sticks around.  The StumbleUpon toolbar seems to promote bouncing around.  My best traffic comes from search engines.

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7. 72

   William F. Torpeyposted 16 years ago

   Thanks, folks. If I sign up with stumbleupon, retireyoung, what am I required to do for them?

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8. 75

   Lissieposted 16 years ago

   William you don't have to do anything for them  -but its a good idea not to just stumble your own hubs/sites - they will catch on after 4 or 5 - make sure yo stumble others too.  Adding others as friends on SU is good too - I am sowerb over there

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9. 72

   William F. Torpeyposted 16 years ago

   Thanks, again. Does Digg and Reddit work about the same as stumbleupon, or are you required to do something for them? Also, does HubPages look favorably upon its hubbers signing up with these groups?

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   1. 0

      El Rayposted 16 years agoin reply to this

      Yes, Digg and Reddit work the same way as StumbleUpon. Unless you were spamming those sites with your hubs, I can't see why HubPages would have a problem with you joining/submitting any social bookmarking site.
      
      The keys to getting traffic from these sites depends upon the level of interest in your topic and your ability to write a bookmarking post that draws clicks.

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10. STAFF

    pauldeedsposted 16 years ago

    We don't mind you using digg, reddit, or any of the other social bookmarking platforms.  When used responsibly they are fun sites in their own right, and also a good way to get more readers to your hubs.
    
    But please keep in mind, just like HubPages those sites are trying to build a community, and just like HubPages they spend a lot of time dealing with all manner of people that are trying to take (traffic and backlinks) without contributing anything positive.  Don't be one of those people.  Be sure to follow the letter and the spirit of the rules they have set up.
    
    One other important point, the way many of those sites deal with spammers is to punish the entire domain of the bad links being submitted.  This means that not only can bad behavior cause problems for your own account and submissions, but you may end up punishing the entire HubPages community by taking that site away as a resource for everyone.  (I'm pretty sure both netscape and my personal favorite reddit have been destroyed for hubpages.com links in that way).

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    1. 86

       Marisa Wrightposted 16 years agoin reply to this

       Paul is right.  At one point, all Helium content was banned from Digg for that reason.
       
       If you actually read the terms & conditions of most of these sites (including Stumbleupon and Digg), they EXPRESSLY FORBID submitting your own website or blog.  But read any article or site about how to promote your work and you'll be told to do exactly that!   
       
       So even if we all submit only one or two of our own articles, that means thousands and thousands of people breaking the rules of these sites.  No wonder they get s^!((% about it. 
       
       I know some people can't see it, but I sympathise with places like Digg and Stumble.  Their selling point is that they skim the cream of the internet - use their sites and you won't have to wade through poor quality rubbish, as you do when you surf the net independently.  If people start submitting sites regardless of quality, the site's reputation suffers and ultimately it will lose readers and fail.  That's why we have to be careful - we don't want to kill the golden goose.

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11. 72

    William F. Torpeyposted 16 years ago

    Thanks, everybody, for all your help. It wasn't easy for me, but I managed to sign up with stumbleupon. Unfortunately, I'm so unfamiliar with all the computer lingo that I can't do much more than read what the stories they list. They say to give a thumbs up if you like it, but I read the stories and I don't see any place to hit a thumbs up. Also, I haven't the foggiest idea how to write something original there. But then it's all new to me. Hopefully, I'll catch on -- but the vocabulary is foreign to me.

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12. 60

    casparposted 16 years ago

    William, have you installed the Stumble toolbar?  That's what you need in order to give a site a thumbs up.  If you go to www.stumbleupon.com, you can get the toolbar:
    
    
    
    Once you have the toolbar installed in your browser, you will see some new buttons - these are the only ones that I use:
    
    
    
    You can click the thumb up on the toolbar when you are viewing any site which you like.
    
    I also use the Stumble! button when I'm bored or in need of inspiration.  When you click this button on the toolbar, Stumbleupon will show you a website which it thinks you might like, based on the interests you have indicated in your profile.  Repeatedly clicking the button is a great way to kill 5 minutes, which can easily turn into an hour.

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13. 72

    William F. Torpeyposted 16 years ago

    Caspar, I can't thank you enough for your help. I'll be visiting stumbleupon very soon, and this time I won't be whistling past the graveyard. You've made it as clear as possible, and I'm confident I won't have much trouble now. On top of that, I've been trying to understand how Google tracking works and, checking your profile, I just took a look at your hub on the subject. It's magnificent. I will be following your directions, step by step. Thanks.

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14. 59

    Mark Knowlesposted 16 years ago

    I am still getting traffic to this post. Most of it comes from the USA. It seems to be genuine Stumbleupon traffic rather than a robot, as the referer is Stumbleupon. Several stumblers have added it to their favorites. Lots and lots of low quality traffic to the point where it has messed up my stats completely This is the page:
    
    
    http://internationalpropertyinvestment. … s-for-sale
    
    But, as I said, it's really poor quality traffic. They come, theyr look, they click I like it and they hit the stumble button. I am seriously beginning to doubt the value of this type of traffic.

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15. 63

    Mishaposted 16 years ago

    Yeah, I have similar experience   Stumble is probably the worst out of social stes in that sense. However, there are quite a few of webmasters over there, and I bet you gained at least few backlinks

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16. 63

    stubbsposted 16 years ago

    I was just about to say what Misha has said, yes stumbleupon provides low quality traffic but it does however build up backlinks from some people if someone who stumbles upon it and really likes it then they may add it to their site which will get you better quality traffic.

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17. 59

    Mark Knowlesposted 16 years ago

    True, I do have a lot of incoming links from this, so I will wait and see if that turns into better traffic  I can but hope.

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