Sphinn Home » News Sites
Avatar Went Hot: November 29, 2007 - 3:45 am
Posted By: christographer 220 days ago
Topic Type: News Story (Jump to http://searchengineland.com)
Category: News Sites
Most people think Digg is just a popularity contest - the more votes your content gets, the better chance of getting promoted on the home page. Not so! Digg uses a sophisticated algorithm to determine what content gets promoted, and Muhammad Saleem has a great analysis of how it works (along with some common misconceptions, too).
3 Comments     

Comments

from DoshDosh 220 days ago #
Votes: 2 | Vote:
+ -

Great article by Mu and I'll just like to add two points which were covered by his article but not specifically highlighted:

1. New Digg accounts can more easily get stories to the frontpage. I have had stories reach the frontpage with only 40 diggs. In fact, the combination of mass shouting and weak accounts has resulted in a lot of crap hitting the frontpage since the new Digg changes.

2. The time or day matters. Weekend stories require a lot less diggs to get frontpaged because Saturday or Sunday are slow news day. The volume of submissions drop and because less users are digging, the overall number of Diggs needed are lesser as well. While an account of mine normally requires at least 100 diggs on weekends, it'll only need 70+ on weekends.

It is true that a power account is not essential for getting stories to the frontpage because there are a lot of strategies you can take to circumvent that. Fresh accounts can be used equally well if you have a discreet network and know how to acquire enough 'natural diggs'.

I have marketed through Digg for some time and have come to the realization that a power user + a network is most powerful and consistent way to get your story to the frontpage.

A power user gets the story to the first page of Upcoming and you can get your network to tip it over to the frontpage. Usually 10 votes or so is enough.

Of course, your content must be pretty damn awesome and should be angled for the Digg crowd....that goes without saying.

from Eavesy 219 days ago #
Votes: 0 | Vote:
+ -

Great write up!

from pylemountain 219 days ago #
Votes: 0 | Vote:
+ -

Good stuff - a lot of people have misunderstandings of Digg (just as I had).  One additional thing I have no way of proving but firmly believe is that Digg "hand edits" certain stories (in addition to the algo.) to make sure they don't make the front page.

Why?  Money from ads.  Digg has certain types of stories they want on the front page and others they want to make sure don't end up on the front page - they want stories that will facilitate the most advertisement revenue.  No algo. is good enough to accomplish this objective 100% so why not hand edit? 

If I ran Digg - I would do it too.  The only thing that bothers me about it is that Digg sort of advertises itself as this democratic site where more votes equals more success - where the "Digg Community" has all the power - but in reality it's more like a dictatorship in the end.


Log in to comment or register here.

Top 10 Most Sphunn
In What's New

  1. How to Analyze and Improve the ‘Bou... (21)
  2. Why eCommerce is a Lot Like ICanHas... (20)
  3. Adobe trying to marginalise Silverl... (17)
  4. Catch the brainwaves of Jeff Quipp (17)
  5. Let Me Count The Ways: Enumerated S... (15)
  6. Running Micro-Sites and Reducing Ho... (14)
  7. SEO Superlatives Winners for 2008 (14)
  8. What’s Better : Long Copy Versus Se... (10)
  9. Judge Orders YouTube to Give All Us... (10)
  10. Google Uses 613 Words About Adding ... (9)

Latest Comments

Search Marketing Expo

Save the date for:
• SMX Local & Mobile - San Francisco, CA (July 24-25) See the agenda, and register now!
• SMX Sao Paolo - Brazil - (Aug. 7-8)
• SMX China - September 23 & 24, 2008
• SMX Stockholm - September 23 & 24, 2008
• SMX East - NYC - (Oct. 6-8) Registration is now open.
• SMX London - November 4 & 5, 2008