Bloggers and webmasters are discovering and capitalizing on the potential of Web 2.0 social networking applications for the series of benefit they can offer. From the countless applications and networks popping up everywhere there are some that ‘stand-out’ in terms of the results they can bring. I started using StumbleUpon a few weeks ago and I am still impressed with its effectiveness in bringing in traffic. Not any kind of traffic, highly targeted traffic, visitors that are interested in your topics, read more than just one post and sometimes subscribe. I wrote a general post of the benefits of using StumbleUpon a few weeks back; if you are new to the concept feel free to read my StumbleUpon Guide. Now, having been using it for a while, I would like to write a few things I have been doing to maximize the StumbleUpon potential.

Tips for using StumbleUpon

Good Content
Sometimes it goes without saying, that the better the content you stumble the better the results will be. When Stumbling your own posts, make sure you stumble the good ones, the lengthy interesting ones that you think people might find interesting. Be informative, comprehensive, and honest and you will pretty much already have outperformed millions of other sites in your niche.

Tagging
When you submit an article, a post, or a website you need to make sure that it is tagged properly. That will ensure it gets categorized properly and allow targeted Stumblers to find it. Try to tag your submission with keywords that are relevant to the content but at the same time will allow your submission to be viewed by a lot of people. Try adding a few broad and a few specific tags.

Headlines
The headlines as well as the description of what you stumble is your chance to get someone’s attentions in the few seconds they are reading through vast lists of content. Be descriptive, make sure they are short and sweet but also give an idea to the reader on what to expect. Too short and too long might not be as effective. Don’t write your life story in the description, think of it as a teaser to your content, something that will make the reader, want to read more. Avoid writing short descriptions like: Good Post, Great Info, Great advice.

Keep Backlinks in Mind
This is something that not that many stumblers realize. When a web page gets stumbled, you automatically get a backlink. Make sure that for every stumbled page you use the desired keywords for both the title and the description. Aside from providing the right description to your stumblers you get a one way backlink that in the long run can and will help your site rank better in search engine result pages.

Make Friends
Add as many “StumbleUpon” friends as possible. Keep in mind that just going in there and adding anybody and everybody might not be the greatest idea. You can add a maximum of 250 friends, so you have to pick and choose. Make sure they have similar interests as you and they have strong StumbleUpon profiles with clout.

Support your friends
When you give thumbs up to someone in your network of friends, they get more clout. The more clout your friends have the more visitors you will get when they stumble your posts and pages.

Support Each Other
Stumble your friend’s posts and they should stumble yours. Plain and simple networking and a message to each other once in a while can help create the necessary rapport between stumblers that will down the line be detrimental in bringing more traffic per stumble.

Do this even when someone that is not added to your list of friends stumbles your post. Stumblers appreciate stumbles and will reciprocate. The more stumbles they receive the more traffic you will get when you get stumbled by them.

Stumble sites that link to you

You can find out which sites link to yours by checking out the dashboard of any traffic analysis application you might be using. If you think that those pages are stumble worthy, Stumble them. You can also find out which pages link to yours by searching in any search engine. Use Yahoo and/or Google and type in

“Link: your site’s domain name”

In my case I would write link: ideasandmoney. The idea behind this is that as you stumble one of these pages, they should get traffic that might spill out to your site. Do this once in while so you can also get an understanding on how your backlink building is coming along.

Discover New Sites

Try to stumble site that haven’t been stumbled before. Surf the web for new, interesting and informative content. Keep in touch with what’s going on in the world, stumble fresh news, that somehow relate to your topics of interest.

Here are a few reasons why stumbling new content can be beneficial:

You are providing new content

Because you discovered the content your profile picture and link will be seen when people add comments, for ever….

You will eventually become a credible and popular Stumbler, get more review and move up in ranking. (Your stumbles have more weight)

People will also add you to their friend list

If your Stumble becomes a top pick your profile will be seen by a lot more people.

Getting the most out of StumbleUpon
Making money directly with StumbleUpon is difficult due to the fact that it brings in visitors that are reluctant to click on advertisements because they can always go to the next page with the StumbleUpon button. I don’t recommend relaying on this kind of traffic to make money. When using StumbleUpon do it for the other benefits it offers:

Increase traffic
Increase readership
Get more subscribers
Get Backlinks

….just to name a few. Once you get all this monetization will be easier.

Notes: Make sure that your RSS button is in a prominent place. My subscribers almost double after a few good stumbles.

You can also give your StumbleUpon readers incentives to join your RSS by, for example, writing an e-book and making it available to your RSS readers.

Provide incentives to your StumbleUpon visitors to come back; incentives such as contests, free stuff and Great info.

Subscribe to my feed if you like.