Pro Blogger Guide

Well, I never really was a big fan of Digg…..Until yesterday when I finally cracked how to get consistent diggs to the front page.

I spent a lot of time analysing what works on Digg & what doesn’t. However what a lot of people fail to notice is that 99% of the stories that are submitted rarely make it beyond 1 digg (from the user themselves).

The reason for this is the mentality of the submitter. They think that creating an account then submitting their stories is enough for the story to hit the front page. However, it’s just not that simple.

Here’s an account of how exactly I created a profile & became a power user that had 4 stories front paged with no help from any IM friends, within 48 hours of creating the Digg Account:

1. Create a Digg Account
2. Choose a memorable name & a good picture (picture is vitally important, notice how the top user supernova17 has a bright image ). Make the name memorable. Bear in mind you’re not trying to deceive here but merely some extra persuasion which will help with initial diggs.
3. Start by digging stories from users in the “upcoming section” make sure & leave a nice comment on each.
4. Add friends & digg their stories regularly. Adding friends is key to making this work.
5. Check for people that have added you as a friend using the “See who befriended you” tab.
6. Start submitting stories from places like reddit & stumbleupon to get an idea of how many initial diggs you are going to get. If you’re getting less that 10 diggs from friends then you need to do more digging & building.
7. Try to comment first on stories you think will hit the front page, this increases your exposure & increases your chances of acquiring friends.
8. You’ll instantly get a feel for what’s working & what’s not working. Now it’s time to tweak things.
9. Don’t submit into the general category. Things scroll off too quickly & don’t linger enough to get that initial “boost.”
10. I added anyone that dugg my stories as a friend. If they check their “befriended” tab they’ll probably add me too. This works well with newer users who have less friends. Make them feel wanted :p
11. Create a huge list of resources to scour for stories. 50-100 is good, tech blogs, apple news all that sort of stuff you want right in your feed reader.
12. I Created google alerts so that I’m getting info on hot topics right to your email inbox.
13. Don’t post your own stories until you’re sure you can get that initial 10-20 diggs to get your story noticed. If you’re posting your own stories you need to make sure they’re professional, not spammy otherwise you’ll get buried & the blog will get banned.
14. I now have a Digg account that will automatically get 15-30 Digg’s from my friends as soon as I submit a story, depending on what the story is about. For example they’ll probably not digg SEO or Affiliate Marketing related stories.
15. Have fun digging, remember it’s a game. It’s not difficult. You just need to network & build relationships then you’ll be rewarded