For most people and most pictures, sharing it on Facebook or Twitter is enough. It may be a quick snapshot of you and your friends out on the town or a cool sunset from a mountaintop and sharing it with our friends and family is enough. Other times, we’re able to capture something amazing, stunning, hilarious, or otherwise important enough to want to expose it to the rest of the world.

With those, we want to go viral. Here’s a (relatively) quick way to maximize the exposure of your perfectly-timed, once-in-a-lifetime shot.

To do this, you’ll need to be on several different social networks. It may seem like a large list but once you’re signed up the actual posting of this and future pics is a breeze.

You’ll need accounts here:

• Chime
• Pinterest
• Tumblr
• Buzzfeed
• Digg
• Reddit
• StumbleUpon
• Facebook
• Twitter

Wow! That’s a lot, right? Not really. If you’re into social media at all these are all sites that you should be frequenting monthly, weekly, or even daily. They’re the only social sites you’ll need if you’re into photography, laughs, tech, offbeat, or just about anything else.

There are some notable exclusions, here, for those who have been in social photo sharing for a while. Flickr comes to mind as the first place that many people think of when wanting to share images, but there are challenges. First, it breaks frames, an announcing on sites like Digg, Reddit, and StumbleUpon where sharing is often done from with a toolbar. The results for those who click on a Flickr link is that it will not display the image but rather an obnoxious message telling you they don’t support frames.

Okay, once you have your accounts created, it’s time to start exposing it to the world.

My Unfortunate Choice of Pictures

As fate would have it, I’m not in a position to go take an amazing picture (it’s 2am right now) and this is the only thing on my camera with even a remote chance of going viral. It’s a picture I took while at the mall with my family and the sign struck me as being funny because of the wording of the message. In retrospect, it wasn’t that funny, but it’s the best I’ve got right now.

No matter – I love a challenge. If I can make this particular image go viral, your masterful piece of photography should be able to use the same techniques to spread around the world.

Once you have it on your computer, it’s time to get to work…

Chime It

Our first destination is Chime.in. The social network that was formerly Mixx before being grabbed up (and dramatically improved) by Uber Media hit the scene last year and is making a big splash. It’s the place we start for several reasons:

• It resizes large pictures for you automatically. in the world of sharing pics, it’s great to have a 10mb 2500px-wide image from your iPhone, but it’s hard to share. Uploading to Chime reduces the size to make it manageable and sharable.
• You can easily upload multiple images into a single gallery. Be sure that the primary image you want visible is the one that is uploaded last.
• The domain does well on the social sharing sites (discussed below).
• Unlike many of the photo sites, it allows you to write long descriptions with line breaks and links.

Again, I’m working with a challenging image to make viral, so I chose a headline that I thought would draw attention. It’s borderline offensive (the concept of eating kids is, well, sick and takes a depraved mind to think of it) but hopefully won’t be so bad that people won’t get the joke.

Be sure to use descriptive tags; you can post up to 7.

Pin It

Once you have it on Chime, use your “Pin It” bookmarklet to pin the image to a Pinterest board.

Don’t upload the original image. Using the bookmarklet will allow you to grab the image directly from your Chime. This links it back to the original Chime while making a separate instance of the image available on Pinterest.

The site is growing just like Chime and is getting plenty of positive press, so getting started early on these two sites will give you geek cred – like a hipster, you were on Chime and Pinterest before they went mainstream.

Pinterest does not allow you to title images per se, but you’ll be able to put in a short description. Unlike Chime, Pinterest does not do long descriptions very well and does not allow line breaks or links, so you’ll want to keep it short.

Tumbl It

Tumblr is a hybrid of many social functions. It’s decent for blogging, good for microblogging, and great for sharing image and videos.

It’s a bit more complicated than Chime or Pinterest, but it’s much bigger as well and gives you a nice venue for more than just pictures if you choose to use it or such things.

If you aren’t already on Tumblr, you can skip this step if you don’t want to invest the time into personalizing your blog with a theme, URL, etc.

As with Chime, tags are extremely important on Tumblr. Without them or a lot of followers, you won’t get natural views of your image. Don’t forget to set your click-thru link to either your Pin or your Chime.

Buzz It

Buzzfeed is one of the best-operated social networks out there right now from a sheer business perspective. They are aggressive and have a very clear understanding of how to drive traffic to their own site, reward their users, and get advertising dollars in ways that Twitter and others have failed at thus far. If they were as large as Facebook, they’d be making as much money as Google.

Unfortunately for you, it can be challenging to get to the front page. If you aren’t on the front page, you’re not going to get views from Buzzfeed itself which is why quality of content and promotion of your image is extremely important.

The good news is that Buzzfeed does very well on the social sharing sites, so even if you don’t make the front page of Buzzfeed initially, you’ll still be able to get visitors to it through the other networks, particularly StumbleUpon.

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It’s a rare thing. Normally, when a social media site makes major changes, users hate the changes. That’s actually universal – it would be hard to find a site that made major changes that wasn’t met with anything other than absolute disdain from the users.

Facebook faces it all the time but has the clout to not be affected. Smaller sites like MySpace, Digg, Propeller, and Delicious faced tremendous push back from users after major changes. Some didn’t survive. Others may die sooner than later.

StumbleUpon’s changes have been met with mixed reactions, but compared to other sites making changes at the degree they have, this has been a hugely successful transition. There will always be users who have issues, but this particular batch of changes – the first in nearly a decade – are pushing the site in a positive direction.

There’s a new focus on mobile beyond anything else. This is smart, of course, because they see the writing on the wall that people really want everything to be accessible and easily usable from mobile devices when it comes to social media.

Their business element is enhanced. Now, they have “Channels” that better highlight their partner sites. This is an extremely important element because giving large brands the ability to acquire followers and have their content stumbled directly will help promote the value that SU brings to the table.

Channels aren’t just about big brands or large publications. Celebrities have channels as well. From Jim Carrey to Gary Vaynerchuk, StumbleUpon people channels offer a limited but diverse range of people who may be interesting to stumblers.

The profile pages are completely different. They announced that they would be pulling down content over a month ago, which for those using StumbleUpon as a blog (yes, there were a few) it is a disappointment, but overall it makes for a much cleaner look and interface. One omission that we don’t like – profile visitors. You used to be able to see who’s clicking on your profile. That feature is gone.

Overall, this is a step in the right direction for StumbleUpon, a company that has stayed below the radar considering that they send more traffic on a regular basis to websites across the internet than Facebook. We’ll see if this is enough to bring them more into the mainstream spotlight.

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Read more about StumbleUpon on this Social Media Blog.

It was an odd thing, really. A couple of weeks ago, StumbleUpon released a feature that we didn’t know they didn’t have. We didn’t really want it, but we tried it because, well, trying things on social media sites is what we do.

After thorough testing, we give 2 thumbs up to the StumbleUpon Explore Box.

When I say that we “didn’t know they didn’t have” it, I mean that one of the editors and I both thought there was a way to Stumble through different subjects that weren’t part of categories. Call me dumb, but I assumed that it was a feature that I simply never explored. You see, I enjoy StumbleUpon as a blind discovery tool. I have my interests set properly and after hundreds of thousands of pages Stumbled, the recommendation engine knows me well.

For two weeks, I’ve done very little Stumbling with anything other than the Explore Box.

It has become a research tool better in many ways than even Google (not every way, but many). The pages presented when I Stumble “Infographic” or “Israel” are much more focused than when Stumbling normally. Regarding research and Google, I am able to find things that aren’t properly optimized or recent news – two things that Google dominates. I’m able to find interesting content that often has stood the test of time to remain relevant. When I come across something from 2009 that is no longer relevant, I help out the algorithm with a thumbs down. No offense intended, but old news is old news.

Here’s what it looks like with StumbleUpon doing the describing.

This comprehensive guide is as true as can be. What does it take to be successful on StumbleUpon? Pictures. That’s it.

Maybe I’m just ranting, but it bugs me.

In social media, traffic is everything. While most use sites like Facebook and Twitter for socializing, there is a growing number of people who use them and other social sites for content and news discovery. StumbleUpon has been able to capitalize on this trend beautifully because of their affinity to bring us what we didn’t know we wanted to see.

It’s not the first time it happened, though if you look at the last time we covered StumbleUpon back in January and compare it to the image above, it doesn’t quite say the same thing. This time, the lead is strong enough that we can assume even discrepancies in data won’t change the outcome.

If you compare the number of users, it’s not even close. Facebook is 30X larger in sheer user base. The philosophy and infrastructure of Facebook keeps it from being a true traffic-generator relative to its size – they are building a walled garden. The goal is to get you to Facebook and keep you there as long as possible.

Many “stumblers” use the service passionately and often without visiting the actual StumbleUpon website for anything other than writing reviews. The toolbar-based system is designed to keep you on the move, never knowing exactly where you’re going to land but always aware that the next click could take you to someplace amazing.

“The Freshness Factor” keeps StumbleUpon going strong, sending thousands (in some cases, millions) of unique visitors to high-quality, lucky individual web pages daily. It’s a long-running joke within the community that avid users need to “go outside” or “take a pee break” away from their addiction. Spam is quickly eliminated more easily than on any other true social voting site other than Reddit. There are issues – the service is down more often than most – but the upside is strong.

How powerful is a single “I like it!” on StumbleUpon? For some, it’s like putting the power of a hundred thousand page views into the power of a click.

When it come to generating traffic for a website or blog, StumbleUpon is one of the best tools you can lean on. However, not every link you share on the site is guaranteed to send visitors pouring your way. With the simple click of the conveniently accessible thumbs down button, your content could easily find itself buried and never to be seen.

Point blank – the more thumbs down you rack up, the harder it becomes for your content to generate the traffic you seek. In this article, we will examine some of the factors that could cause StumbleUpon users to reject your content.

LackLuster Titles

If you yourself have ever used StumbleUpon to discover content online, you know that the first thing users see upon following a link is the title of the page they have decided to view. The purpose of the title is to summarize what your content is all about, so if it doesn’t appeal to the user right off the bat, they may decide to give you a thumbs down on move onto the next page without even taking the time to digest your content in full.

Your page titles are crucial for appealing to visitors, and even more important if you are to effectively leverage StumbleUpon as a traffic generator.

Slow Loading Pages

Some people are using the newest devices with the latest technical specifications, at the fastest internet speeds. Others are stuck with older hardware running on dial-up connectivity, or access that isn’t exactly high speed. There are numerous factors that impact performance, but no matter which come into play, your site must always perform at an optimal level.

A page that takes forever to load is among the fastest ways to tally up thumbs downs for your content on StumbleUpon. The dynamic coding technologies that make your content more visually appealing and interactive may be serving their purpose, but are they really worth all the lost visitors and potential sales?

Useless Content

Whether it’s tangible goods, digital services, or just a fabulous idea, many of us are online to sell something and profit for our efforts. There is nothing wrong with this, but if you are selling something online, you need to be careful with how you approach StumbleUpon. Unless you are a big name brand offering a big name product, directing people to sales content probably isn’t going to result in the traffic you’re after.

Instead of driving StumbleUpon users to content that is asking them to spend money, focus on content that delivers value. It doesn’t always have to be your own content. Just something that is worth checking out and passing along to others.

Conclusion

StumbleUpon can be a great traffic generating tool when used the right way. While this is a process that generally entails several methods, avoiding the dreaded thumbs down should definitely be a part of your plan. It is another example of how the power has shifted to the user’s hand, so if you want to make the most of StumbleUpon, give them a reason to endorse your content, not bury it.

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Author Bio:
Nan King, a tech geek and environmentalist at heart, is an advocate of business email marketing strategies that encompass the use of an email marketing company which is permission based.

What do people think social media professionals do for a living? They are not wizards like Gandalf. They can’t raise their staff and command visitors to become permanent residents of a site.

If Gandalf had his way, all visitors would stay onsite

OK let’s say a digital strategist gets the visitors to a site. Good enough. But at that point, publishers shouldn’t complain because now these new folks who have come aren’t suddenly their biggest fans in the world. They shouldn’t be mad because the bounce rate is high. Keeping the folks who arrive at a site isn’t the social media consultant’s job. It’s their job to shunt people over to the site. The rest is the publisher’s job, not the social media professional’s. (although just ask and they might be happy to help you with that)

People referred to a site from Twitter, Digg, Facebook or StumbleUpon do not stay very long to be sure, but their visits have an ancillary effect that causes a site to grow in the long term.

1.) For instance, Digg has a PR 8. If a post becomes incredibly popular there and reaches the front page, that is noted by Google. Therefore, that post may appear high in search rankings. For months after. For years after. A publisher should be happy with that because it is a nice thing.

2.) The post may be linked to other publications. There is a long history of this occurring. Millions of people use all of these social platforms. When a post goes viral on them, it leads to linkbacks if the content is appealing. Here’s the key thing that can’t be said enough. Publishers have to be consistent over a long period of time with utilizing these digital media strategies in order to reap this benefit. One cannot expect these strategies to make a community a paradise of commenting, clicking and interaction overnight. This stuff takes months and months of building. Be patient.

3.) I remember a story that is relevant here. One popular iPhone blog owner told me his reasoning for using Digg and other social media platforms had more to do with greater visibility in Google search results, particularly in news. When relevant search terms brought up his posts that had done well on Digg, they would often, as a result, appear in the coveted news section of the regular search results page.

Regardless, bringing “permanent” traffic is not what social media professionals do. Nor is it something that anyone can promise. Having said that, what they do does cause more people to “favorite” a site. It causes more people to share a site. It causes more people to place the site on their RSS feeds. It causes more people to come back to the site later. It causes more people to know the site exists. If that isn’t good enough for a publisher, then they don’t understand social media, or maybe even the web in general.

“Permanent” traffic doesn’t exist. Even Drudge Report, the Huffington Post, the New York Times, or the Guardian cannot depend on the same people returning to their site every day. Peoples’ attention spans are too short. And the ongoing love that the communities of those publications have for them is hard-won and hard-built over years. It’s not easy. It takes a long time. Social media is just one part of the strategy. Publishers should not get mad because their bounce-rate is high. Take the folks that come to you and make them want to stay by improving the site in question.

Last month, we chronicled one major milestone when StumbleUpon surpassed Facebook for social media traffic generation. They just reached another major milestone according to CEO Garrett Jones by breaking the half a billion page views mark.

Here is the image he posted on Instagram:

The social news discovery site has built a stronghold in a niche that nobody else has truly been able to crack. Other than a few functionality changes, the basic premise has remained unchanged over the years, which may be…

The Secret to StumbleUpon’s Success

There is a certain allure about mystery. Those who love surprise parties and movies with twist-endings are prime candidates to be one of the millions of avid StumbleUpon fans. To paraphrase Forrest Gump, “StumbleUpon is like a box of chocolates.”

Users click a button and are served pages based upon their preferences and history. The algorithm determines which pages someone is likely to enjoy based upon these two (and other) factors so that they can discover content that they otherwise would not have found. Therein lies the key to StumbleUpon’s success – finding content from sources that users didn’t know or had forgotten about.

Discovery for Business

Few would argue the merits of Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn for business, social news sites like StumbleUpon, Digg, and Reddit have been debatable. With more people flocking to social media to discover new things, the business benefits are becoming more clear.

Exposure is a matter of quality and quantity. The quality of traffic referred by the three major social networks is normally considered high, just a step below search traffic, but social news traffic is one of the lowest-quality forms. That’s not what they’re for. Businesses need to see social news as bulk – a way to get more eyeballs to content, products, and services than the social networks can deliver.

It’s a numbers game. If enough people see your business pages, blog posts, and videos, the chances are strong that some (even a miniscule amount) are interested in learning more. StumbleUpon is the perfect venue for this because it brings people to your pages that would likely never have found you on social networks and probably wouldn’t have looked for you on search.

At 500 million page views per month, businesses must start considering StumbleUpon in their marketing strategies.