Neothoughts

Every day, more content producers are recognizing the impact that socially edited news sites have on the internet’s consumption of news and they want in on the fun. As a result, one of the questions I am asked most frequently about social news sites is “how can I get my article onto the front page?”

Good Content

It starts with good content. Without that you will get nowhere. People will tell you that you can rally enough people to vote your content to the front-page on these sites, but if it isn’t grade-A quality then it will either be ignored or get knocked off the front page fast enough to make your head spin.

Know The Audience

One audience’s quality content is another’s Garfield The Movie. Don’t expect to be successful with brilliantly written political op-eds on a social news site that is ga-ga about basket-weaving. The best way to familiarize yourself with the community of one of these sites is to sign up, participate in discussions and socialize with users.

Hint: the first person to write an article titled “Top 10 Videos of the Wii Controller Being Used to Interface With Ubuntu (Article Enhanced in Firefox)” will be crowned the King of Digg.

Educate Your Audience

Make sure your website’s audience is down with social bookmarking. They will be the most willing to support you on social news sites. Make use of social bookmarking sites’ content integration tools. Digg provides tools to easily integrate a submission button and a “digg it??? button into your content. Netscape has similar tools as well. Integrate these tools into your content. Write an article that gives your users an overview of what these new-fangled buttons they are seeing on your content are and how fun it is to participate.

Submitting Your Own Content

I’m not going to absolutely forbid anyone from submitting their own content to social news sites. If you’ve got great stuff, there isn’t a reason why you shouldn’t submit it (especially if you’re a brand new source of information on the internet and are still trying to get exposure). Almost all of the big social news sites encourage people to submit their own things.

That being said, I would advise you to avoid it if at all possible. There is a stigma on self-promotion on many of these sites that makes it much more desirable to have other people submit your content for you. Fortunately, if you have good content and you educate your audience in the art of social bookmarking, you will likely have many people who are eager to contribute links to your content for you.

Socialize

They don’t call them socially driven content sites for nothing. Engage in conversations that arise from your articles and related topics. Befriend people who submit your articles and related ones. Let them know you appreciate them submitting your content. Make sure people on your website know your username on social bookmarking sites.

Spot Your Content

Keep tabs on your content’s adventures in social bookmarking. Most of the major sites provide ways to search for content by URL. Once someone has submitted something of yours to Digg, you can add the “digg it” button to your content referring back to the submission. The sooner you add that button after a submission has been made, the better, because submissions on Digg only have a 24-hour shelf life before they are removed from the queue. This lets people vote on your article while they are on your site.

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