8 Things to Avoid When Sharing on StumbleUpon

StumbleUpon is responsible for the growth and exposure of tens of thousands of websites across the Internet that would not have otherwise been noticed. In many ways, the community is extremely quality-conscious and knows when to thumb things up or down.

Sharing and friendship, both strengths of the site/service, are also its biggest weaknesses. Many (including myself sometimes) are compelled to thumb something up because we want our friends to succeed and for their content to do well. Sometimes, though, they ask too much.

The case in particular that I’m talking about is visualized to the right and received tons of positive reviews and thumbs up. The content itself was probably interesting, but the way the page was laid out made me want to thumb it down. I didn’t, as I do not believe in thumbing down any content based upon the formatting of the page, but I refused to thumb it up or even look at the actual content. Why?

Take a look (click for full image) or refer to my notes below.

1. Asking for Thumbs – I’m not a fan of asking people to thumb something up or review it unless there is a great reason such as a charity or something else that needs exposure badly (even then I normally wouldn’t). Tell people what is interesting about the piece that you are sending them. If it’s something that is important to you, explain why in your request. If it’s just a blog post and you want exposure, describe why your friends may find it interesting. Ask them to take a look. Don’t say “Thumb up and review this.”
2. Pop-ups – When my pop-up blocker kicks in, that’s not a good sign. Why would anyone put a pop-up advertisement on their site in 2009, especially if they’re targeting a tech-savvy social media reader.
3. Pushing Content Down Because of a Banner Ad – Some themes are built without the space for a banner ad. In this case, there’s a ton of wasted ad space in the header. Either put the ad someplace where it can be seen without being a hindrance to the content or don’t put the ad there at all. Wasting space AND pushing content down because of a banner add is, well, wasteful.
4. Misspelled Category – Spelling mistakes happen. I’ve misspelled words in blog posts. I’ve misspelled words in titles, even. A category is important and will be seen on most pages of your site. Don’t misspell those.
5. Big, Huge Adsense at the Top of Every Post – I understand that Google and gurus recommend this (still, I think) as a way to “optimize” the use of Adsense for revenue, but it’s still annoying to a social media cr0wd. If it MUST be up top, use a thin bar, not a 300X250 box.
6. Meaningless Bio Widget – If the author is named Admin, they don’t have a picture, and they don’t have biographical data, there’s no reason to have the “About the Writer” box on top of the sidebar.
7. Lots of Views, Few Comments – When a story has over 5,000 views and no comments, either the author doesn’t approve comments, there were no comments, or all of the comments were bad. All 3 options are bad.
8. Content Below the Fold – Remember the big, huge Adsense? What about the big banner ad pushing down the content? Well, thanks to those layout choices, there is no content above the fold.

Please forgive me for being judgmental. The content may have been incredible. Sadly, I’ll never know.

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Read more StumbleUpon Tips on this blog.

7 Responses to “8 Things to Avoid When Sharing on StumbleUpon”

1. 8 Things to Avoid When Sharing on StumbleUpon says:

   August 17, 2009 at 3:53 am

   [...] post has been moved to “Sharing on StumbleUpon“. Share it. The world should [...]
2. 8 Things to Avoid When Sharing on StumbleUpon says:

   August 18, 2009 at 10:11 pm

   [...] This post has been moved to “Sharing on StumbleUpon“. [...]
3. Tweets that mention 8 Things to Avoid When Sharing on StumbleUpon -- Topsy.com says:

   December 24, 2009 at 3:33 pm

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4. uberVU - social comments says:

   December 24, 2009 at 4:07 pm

   Social comments and analytics for this post…

   This post was mentioned on Twitter by 0boy: 8 Things to Avoid When Sharing on StumbleUpon http://su.pr/2KJdPu...
5. Jarret says:

   December 24, 2009 at 5:27 pm

   Some the these “marketers” make me giggle
6. Karl Foxley says:

   December 24, 2009 at 5:28 pm

   Great post and I totally agree with what you are saying. I would certainly use the term “marketer” very loosely in this case.
7. Kris says:

   December 24, 2009 at 5:28 pm

   Good list of recommendations. I’d have to say, not only does that list apply to using stumbleupon, but other than that first 1 (requesting thumbs up), all of those points can be made for just good web design and content altogether.

   But yeah, I do get a little disheartened when I see those types of pages get a high number or ratings on stumbleupon or digg, etc.