1. Make sure your website is up to par. Since people will be “stumbling upon” your site, you want to make sure it looks good as soon as they click on the link.
2. Just like Twitter, StumbleUpon is a social networking website, so be sure to get as many contacts and networking friends as possible.
3. Complete your profile as thoroughly as possible before linking. This way, when people click on your information, they get an idea of who you are or who your business is.
4. Cover as many bases as possible in the profile. Try not to leave too many stones unturned, so people know exactly what you’re about from the get go.
5. Leave links on as many sites as possible. You want people to link right back to you, so link up!
6. Be careful where you stumble. Remember that people can see the path of links that you’ve followed, and they will have gotten to you by following a particular path. Don’t link to places or people you do not want to be associated with, or you will turn visitors off.
7. Utilize those keywords! Use an SEO service or writer to help you place the best and most effective keywords possible. This is truly the key to getting your information stumbled upon.
8. Tag the most essential elements. StumbleUpon uses tags, which are a lot like keywords. Be sure to tag your site using the most effective, power packing tags possible. Try to pick nouns and use ones that will pique peoples’ interest immediately. While you must use one topic on the site, you can use multiple tags and change them up as needed.
9. Use your friends for help. The website has a feature that lets you contact your friends and inform them of your topic. They will see a notification on their toolbar. While this is fun and a good way to gather up more people, do not abuse it or else you may end up annoying people rather than informing them.
10. Do not focus so much on becoming a huge “stumbler”, but rather focus on the quality of your topics and posts. If you worry too much about your followers or your rating, you may end up neglecting the content, which is really what’s important.
11. Decide right away that you’re going to be an important part of the StumbleUpon web community, and then stick with it. Feeble posters or people who are fly by night are easy to detect, and most people will stay away from that.
12. Review and rate as many others’ sites as possible, so that you are an active member and not just standing on the sidelines.
13. Try to create long posts with as many links as possible. This garners you more content, more referrals, and more chances to get noticed.
14. Try not to “kill” your page with ads or spam. This is usually an automatic turn off for people who might stumble upon your page. Keep those pesky ads at bay if at all possible!
15. Think about your target audience. Then, create customized content just for them. By putting information out there that caters to your audience and your customer base, you will get solid followers who should turn into sales or referrals.
16. Make sure you write a captivating and effective title, and a good introductory paragraph. Most people look at the title first and foremost, so make sure it is one that will grab their attention and make them want to read more.
17. Thank the people who stumble to you. This has a very positive effect and usually gets people to recommend your page to others.
18. Join communities that are in relation to your business. You just might learn something, and by getting involved in communities with like-minded people, you might discover some really useful contacts.
19. Keep it fresh. Try to post new articles daily, if not weekly. You want the content to stay fresh and informative, and make sure your readers stick around.
20. Go for the gold. Try to get your StumbleUpon page featured on the site. If you get to this level, you’ll be amazed at how many more contacts and thumbs up
you will get.
21. Multimedia helps, so integrate video and audio as much as you can.
22. Do not just link to other sites’ home page. Instead, link to specific pages that feature pictures, articles, or other things that are more specific to your topic.
23. Mention StumbleUpon in your postings. True followers of the site really love it, so by mentioning it somehow within your topic, you’re making people feel right
at home and comfortable.
24. Make sure the people who stumble end up being regular visitors or customers. You can do this by adding an RSS button at the bottom of our page, an email subscription link, or any other method that will bring interested people in even closer.
25. Be interesting without selling. I other words, you want the content to sound good and thorough but not like a sales letter or an infomercial.
26. Stay away from the automated tools if possible, since they will end up causing problems in some cases, like creating spam-like postings and will give your pages the overall feel of a robot behind the keyboard instead of a human being.
27. Make the content more social. Try to achieve a feeling of updating friends and customers instead of a plain informational page. This will make people stay
interested and want to know more as things with your business changes.
28. Edit your posts often, and have another pair of eyes take a look at them as well. Sometimes, someone else might catch errors or suggest room for improvement that you may not be aware of.
29. Blog about your StumbleUpon page. Talk about your page on other websites and in other places, so more traffic is led there.
30. Choose tags carefully, and only use the ones that have the most impact.
31. You can generate article ideas and brainstorm concepts by buzzing around the web and finding the hottest topics and other blogs. Take from them as much inspiration as possible.
32. Try not to use commas and apostrophes in your title. It’s been shown to scare people away & indicate to them that the topic will be boring.
33. Use the most up to date tracking software possible, so you can get an accurate hit count and you’ll know how many people have visited the site.
34. Make the most of photos, and strive to use the most visually appealing and interesting ones you can that are pertaining to your topics.
35. Show off some recent pages on the sidebar, so people can easily see the other postings you’ve comprised.
36. Relate your articles to common emotions such as happiness, excitement and even fear to get the point across and garner interest.
37. Diversify. Don’t just stick to one niche topic, but instead broaden your base by writing a number of different things.
38. Try to be the first to discover new sites and link to them, so that people consider you a reliable, interesting source.
39. Do not expect success to be overnight. Remember that this website takes time to build up a base of people and ratings, so allow it to happen naturally.
40. Make sure you comment on other peoples’ pages and review them as well. This shows you’re an active user who cares about what others are saying.
41. Use StumbleUpon itself as a case study to find the best Internet websites out there, and then expand on it by making it even better with new links.
42. Humor really does help with this site, so use it freely.
43. Keep your friends list up to date and only use active members as top friends, so people know you’re paying attention to what is going on.
44. Enable search views. This will help you get more hits in Google and Yahoo.
45. Watch the number of ads that you incorporate and make sure they’re going with the topic at hand. Poorly blended ads can turn people off and confuse them.
46. Utilize as many tools and tutorials you can. There are plenty of great tools and add-ons available, many free of charge, for use with StumbleUpon.
47. Remember that traffic can last a long time. Even if you gain a lot of stumbles in the beginning and then it dies off, the traffic will still be generated as long
as your page is up. Just make sure it’s current including your contact information.
48. Be exclusive. Try to feature only certain parts of the bigger picture of your website. This encourages visitors to actually go there instead.
49. Fill up your page with as much content as possible. Some people might skim over the page, some might actually sit and read it all and digest it. Either way, the more information, the better.
50. Branding is essential, so be sure to have a memorable URL or basic title that people will not forget.
