Brian Zafron: I Eat Web 2.0 for Breakfast

The redundant title, first of all, is tongue-in-cheek. For me, it calls attention to Digg’s comical interplay between what’s officially a secret and what’s ostensibly public knowledge. This interplay is largely responsible for Digg’s broad coverage on blogs across the Internet, establishing an enigmatic status despite its monolithic size.

Personally, I’ve only used Digg on a smattering of occasions – pre-blog life, all my ventures generated traffic not through democratic voting, but hard work and the expenditure of calculated dollars and cents. Nevertheless, I’ve contacted several top diggers and conducted my own empirical research on the site. There are hundreds upon hundreds of articles written about Digg, the number growing every day, but none of them unveil the following three secrets, each absolutely critical to success on the site. I discovered them simply because I looked in the right places, asked the right questions, and as my physician Dr. Goldstein can verify, I’ve got a brain bigger than a brontosaurus.

• People Are Nice. The most effective way to learn about the community and become effectively integrated is reaching out to other diggers, particularly outside the Digg network. External communication with other diggers supports the establishment of real, meaningful relationships, vastly more valuable than hundreds of superficial ones. Even the top diggers, like mrsaleem, mrbabyman, and tomyboy501, are happy to lend you their time, and potentially, even their friendship. In your travels through Digg profile pages, take note of contact information, especially AIM names. These diggers wouldn’t list this information if they weren’t dedicated to giving back to the community. Don’t be afraid: they don’t bite. They just digg.
• Concentrate On The Tipping Point. You’re wasting your time on Digg if you’re trying to either a) submit quality content and magically reach the front page or b) create a large enough network that “artificially” pushes your content to the front page. They key is discovering the middle ground between these options, therein locating what I term the “Digg tipping point.” Essentially, this tipping point is a level of visibility for your article that will ensure, if the article is truly front page worthy, that it will indeed reach the front page. (Examples of sufficient visibility: making the hot section in any category, the first, second, or third page in general “upcoming,” or getting listed as a “favorite” by a top digger.) The obvious question, I suppose, is how does your article attain this visibility in the first place? My answer: refer to this post’s two other secrets.
• Tap into mob-mentality. Although many bloggers and purported Digg experts suggest that the content of your submitted article must be exceptional to make the front page, the truth is a little bit more complicated. Exceptional content is certainly helpful, but not nearly as effective as content that relates to Digg’s passions of the moment. In some ways, Digg is like an adolescent girl, journeying through high school, obsessing over an idea at one moment, then disregarding it the next. Successful diggers are attuned to these ebbs and flows of interest. Moreover, the average digger, who either is or wants to be integrated into the community, will digg or bury articles they perceive to be in alignment with these ebbs and flows. Thus, when submitting articles with the purpose of hitting the front page, ask yourself whether you’re using Digg’s mob-mentality to your advantage. Careful study of trends amongst popular articles is required.

This post is not intended to be a comprehensive guide to Digg, for there are many, many such guides across the blogosphere. However, these select secrets, for my money, are the most essential elements to success with reaching the front page. Of course, if you have no interest in reaching the front page, and are simply a casual digger, I apologize for wasting your time, and I hope you still love me.

I, of course, love you.

http://brianzafron.com/blog/?p=30