By Steven Roll
ASBPE President

After completing the "about" page of the blog I was about to launch, I noticed something funny. I had almost 70 page views for the day even though I hadn't written a single post yet. What happened? Someone "Stumbled" my "about" page and sent it to some friends on the social bookmarking Website StumbleUpon.

At the time, I had heard about StumbleUpon, but didn't understand the point of it. I had downloaded the SU tool bar on my Web browser. The tool bar's most prominent feature is a button that says "Stumble!" When you click on the button it takes you to a random Web page. I still don't see the point of this.

Sudden Spike in Page Views Got My Attention. But I gave SU a second look when I saw the spike in Web traffic to my blog after someone Stumbled it. You "Stumble" a site by clicking on the "thumbs up" sign on the SU toolbar. To really make an impression, you need to designate sites as your "favorites" and write reviews.

You can start out by giving a "thumbs up" to your own Web site, favoriting it, and writing a review. But here's the catch: You can only Stumble your own site so many times. Endorse your own stuff too often and you'll be locked out of the system.

What you need to do is to build a community of friends on SU. Do this by favoriting and reviewing Web pages and blogs that you like. Eventually, you'll notice that the same people are reviewing many of the same pages you are depending on your particular interests. Send friend requests to these people.

Twitter and Stumble Upon. Another way to meet people on SU is through Twitter. If someone Tweets with a link to a blog post they just wrote, reply back letting them know that you just Stumbled it.

If they don't know what SU is, send the link to their Web site to a few of your SU friends. More often than not, they'll be so impressed by the increased page views that they'll become a devoted friend and SU user.

Once you've acquired some friends on SU, you can use the tool bar to send them your Web page or latest blog post along with a request to Stumble it. SU users know Stumbling is a two-way street so most of these requests are enthusiastically accepted.

Acquire enough friends and you'll be a pretty influential person on the Web. Not only will this help generate page views on your own Web site or blog, but it will give you the ability to send traffic to your friends' sites.

The creators of SU are pretty clever. I think most people -- myself included -- start using SU by trying to game the system. All we really want is more Web traffic. But to make friends on SU, you need to "favorite" the sites you like. What I've found is that I've come across some worthwhile content and interesting people in the process.

Connect with me on SU at b2beditor.stumbleupon.com.

Labels: Digital, Social Media, Steven Roll