Stumble Upon, Stumble, Stumbled: The User Guide to Stumbling

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Right off the bat, I am going to say that this is a user guide for new and experienced users alike. So if you are new to Stumble Upon, read the Intro. If not, scroll down for the advanced class and a list of resources at the bottom.

Intro:

What is stumble upon? Basically, stumble upon is a cool web service that allows you to find some of the best websites on the web.

How does it do that? Stumble Upon is a community of people who surf the web and give things they are reading, seeing, or watching, a thumbs up or down. If you subscribe to someone’s favorite’s or just randomly stumble you will see these user submitted sites. When enough people visit a site and give it a thumbs up Stumble Upon starts featuring those sites and they can gain a lot of visits very quickly.

Why should I use it? Both to find cool new things on the internet and to promote your own site.

How do I use it? First, you sign up. Next, you put in your profile information. (Similar to facebook and other social networking sites.) Then you install the toolbar for Firefox, or install the toolbar for Internet Explorer. Most other browsers, including Chrome, are unfortunately not currently supported. Once that is done, you are ready to start stumbling…

But how do I really use it? I would suggest playing around with it. Once you install the toolbar try giving an article you read a thumbs up. It will take you to the stumble upon site and you can choose to write a review about it. If you are the first to give it a thumbs up a pop up window will appear and you can then choose to write a review or cancel it.

If you are bored and want to randomly stumble pages then just hit the button called “Stumble!” Or like I said, find some friends, subscribe to their stumbles, and they will help you find the coolest sites on the net.

How do I make friends, and why do I want to do this? Many people feature a stumble upon profile on there website. Mine is jeremymday. You can click on my name and it will take you to my profile. From there, you can friend me and subscribe to my favorites. I do find some pretty awesome stuff you will probably enjoy!

So friends are people who you can network with in the stumble upon world. This is really good for website owners which we will talk about later.

You can also find friends after you stumble a site. It will show other people who liked the same stuff. This is where stumble upon gets really cool. When you find people who like the same stuff you do you should befriend them AND subscribe to their favorites. This will help you discover similar content that you like reading that you otherwise wouldn’t have found. Pretty cool, huh?

After you subscribe to someone’s favorites you will start seeing them every time you go to your stumble upon page called “What’s New”. Not your profile page or your actual home page, the “What’s New” page.

What else can you do with Stumble Upon? You can also browse websites by category or by interest. (You can setup your interests in your profile.) I like to sometimes browse the “self-improvement” category because that is where my interest lies. I have found a ton of great content that way.

I’m still confused? Well if you are, you can use my contact page or comment below to ask me any other specific question you might like.

Now, The Advanced Class

So how do I use Stumble Upon to Promote my Site? Good question. I would say, add lots of friends, subscribe to people who stumble similar content, join the discussion boards, and discover what is popular at Stumble Upon.

Realize that not every article you write is Stumble-worthy. You should only really promote one of your articles a week, and let your other ones get stumbled only if people really like them. With practice you will discover what people really like.

Should I review or give my own article a thumbs up? No and never is my first response. However, I have broken that rule and I am unsure how it has helped me or hurt me. But from my research it is generally not good to stumble your own stuff.

So how do I promote my stuff then? Give before you receive! Make other people look good. If you want to know how, check out Barbara’s blog @ Blogging Without a Blog. She really knows how to make others look good. And she is always featuring new blogs.

But really, go and find worthy content on the net. Befriend bloggers you like, stumble their stuff, subscribe to their favorites, and then stumble their favorites if you like them. Once you have a relationship established, use that little “Send to” button on the toolbar and ask them politely to check your newest post out and see if they want to stumble it. If you have been helping them out, most likely they will want to help you out.

How do I become a power user? First ask yourself why you want to be a power user. Its not really necessary to get a lot of traffic from stumble, but it sure can be fun. Tina from Think Simple Now decided to become a power user of stumble upon and it seems to have helped her promotion efforts tremendously. You may think about it too, but it does take a lot of time.

So what’s the final word on Stumble Upon? Use it if you like it, and don’t use it if you don’t. Simple as that. You want to get noticed? Write good content, stumble good content. Too simple? Perhaps. But sometimes the simple answers are the best. 😉

Good luck with using Stumble Upon. Feel free to add me as a friend, and ask me any questions if you have them. And use the other resources below…

Cheers,

Jeremy

List of Resources:

  1. The Definitive StumbleUpon Resource List
  2. How To Write Posts That Set StumbleUpon on Fire
  3. 2,208 Reasons Why StumbleUpon is Your Friend
  4. How to Grow a Young Blog With Stumble Upon
  5. Stumble Upon Do’s and Dont’s
  6. A Comprehensive Guide To Stumbleupon: How to Build Massive Traffic To Your Website And Monetize It – My Favorite of the List!
  7. Build Super Links and Traffic With Stumble Upon
  8. How to Use Stumble Upon for Your Business: The Definitive Guide

19 thoughts on “Stumble Upon, Stumble, Stumbled: The User Guide to Stumbling”

  1. Binwah

    Your title – Stumble Upon, Stumble, Stumbled: The User Guide to Stumbling | Insight Writer – caught my eye on the google blogsearch page. Just goes to show you how important good titles are! 😉 I’ve added http://www.insightwriter.com to my reader, so I can see what else you come up with

  6. Lance

    Nice review of StumbleUpon Jeremy! I find I get a lot of traffic when my pages get stumbled. Maybe twice I have given my own page a thumbs up, and that was a while ago – before I had much of a feel for SU. I haven’t went the route of asking for help in stumbling pages – I know some do, and are successful at it. So far, I’ve let it all happen pretty organically. Good stuff here Jeremey (and I’ve added you as a friend in SU).

  8. Michele

    Great guide, Jeremy! I admit, I’ve broken that rule, too (about stumbling my own stuff). I didn’t at first, but then I noticed tons of my writer friends doing it, so I thought I’d give it a try. I’ve only received negative feedback twice. 🙂 The way I see it (which is probably wrong! LOL) is we’re promoting ourselves (much like we would passing out business cards, fliers, etc.), right?

    This post is definitely stumble-worthy, though!

    *smiles*
    Michele

    Michele’s last blog post..Guest Post: Don’t Lose the Joy!

  9. Barbara Swafford - Blogging Without A Blog

    Hi Jeremy – First, thank you for the mention. I truly appreciate it.

    When I first started Stumbling I didn’t know self Stumbling was a no-no, and did it a few times. Although I belong to SU, I don’t have a lot of time to utilize all they offer. If I remember to slow down while visiting other blogs I will stop to Stumble posts and write a review. Just like now, this deserves a Stumble. 🙂

    Barbara Swafford – Blogging Without A Blog’s last blog post..When The Green Eyed Monster Strikes In Blogosphere

  10. Jeremy Day

    @ Barbara – You are most welcome Barbara! Thanks for the Stumble!

    @ Michele – Too bad Stumble doesn’t like you promoting your own stuff but I see your point. Thanks for the Stumble!

    Cheers,
    jeremy

  11. Mike King

    Great stuff Jeremy and all good tips. I’ve definitely seen a big impact in my traffic from using stumble upon. I have helped to thumb up some of my articles after a few days of slow down and they often get a big boost again so I’m not sure if it hinders or not. I generally don’t often submit my own stuff first though so I’m not sure if that makes a difference. Anyway, thanks for the tips, I’ve stumble this myself…

  14. Pingback: Stumble Upon Redux: Proper Categories & Tags | Insight Writer

  18. Jeremy Day

    Hi Juliet,

    I would say just add me. I’ll go to your profile. See if we are at least 50% alike. Then Ill add you. I have very few friends that stumble less than 50% of the things I want to see. There is just no point. There is also no point in adding a friend that doesn’t “chat” and use the send to button. Im a very active stumbler and I send articles to the majority of my friends. If you don’t plan on doing that friends are kinda pointless.
    If you want to benefit from other people’s good finds just subscribe to their favorites. You will see them in your home page. I find a lot of great articles this way.
    Juliet, since we are in the same field of self-improvement I would say add me. I can help you out from there. We can communicate using the SU email system. Hope this helps!

    Cheers,
    Jeremy

    p.s. I added you to my MEGA list. 😉

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