Slightly Shady SEO | Blackhat is Back, Baby.

I’m going to admit something to all of you. I suck at having things go viral. If I think something will go through the roof on digg, it seems to be an almost impassable handicap for it in the rankings. So awhile ago, I decided something[in all matters not this blog].
I’m done with crossing my fingers, and hoping that my sites go Viral. If they won’t go viral, I will do my best to force them viral.
This is the method I came up with. It performed well during it’s beta test(which was not a slightlyshadyseo article btw), and since then I have refined it a lot. Some are still in development.
Hope you enjoy. It’s a long post, but come on, did you really think that there’s a secret keyword or something that will frontpage/go viral(Aside from “Ron Paul”)?

Note: I consider social news sites that absolute key to going viral. The users you see there are active in the internet community. They post on forums, know more social news/bookmarking sites than you, and frequently own their own websites where they can post links. So this post will concentrate on them.

The Basics
Ok, so for any successful viral setup, you need to have a multi-pronged approach. Multi social news sites, multiple social networks, multiple message boards. We’re going to select these carefully, using each social news site to leverage the others that we use. We will use our social connections within each site to give us the approach we need. This will be explained in detail now. Side Note: Through all of this, only submit to relevant places, or you’ll piss people off and get “buried” even if every other step in this works.

Using Social News Site Crossover
Many people shoot straight for digg/propeller/reddit, and the other super networks. This is not how we are going to do it. Remember that nearly every single person who goes on one of the smaller-medium size sites(sphinn, shoutwire, newsvine, seoyak, plugim, etc) has an account at at least one of the biggies, and generally at a few more of the smaller sites. These small-medium site users are our bread and butter. Remember that 100 fast votes off digg is more than enough to frontpage you, so long as they are the proper users.
Here’s some common crossovers I’ve noticed.
Sphinn->Digg, Stumbleupon, PlugIM, SeoYak(although SeoYak has few voters)->Personal Blogs
Mixx->Reddit, Digg, Streamy(still in beta, but sending lots of traffic love..thanks guys! Even if you won’t let me join yet)
Reddit->Message Boards, Propeller
Newsvine->Shoutwire
So any traffic we can gain from any of the sites listed here can easily translate into votes on the other sites. By focusing our efforts not on the large sites, but on the smaller ones, we can gather rapid votes in the larger sites themselves.

Using Social News Velocity
Ok. I’ll use this blog as an example for this one. SlightlyShadySEO quite frequently frontpages Sphinn. If I have an article that looks like it’s about to frontpage, I will push a post previously meant to go out later to go out immediately. The reason for this is approximately 40% of the people that visit my blog view more than 1 article. Many view 10+. So when they visit my site FROM sphinn, I like to have a new post up for them to look at showing up in the “Recent Posts” section. Sometimes, they will cross over and vote for that as well. Once again, in a medium to small sized social community, these votes can make all the difference. If only 4 people do that, out of the several hundred viewers that visit during a frontpage, that new article already has one third of the total number it needs to hit the “Most Votes in Upcoming” section.
This stays true for any social network. By promoting an article ahead of your real link bait, and having that do as good as possible, you pick up residual traffic from it that may very well crossover. Beyond that, who knows, maybe your first article will go hot!

Using a Social News Subscriber Base
I hate to use SlightlyShadySEO and Sphinn as an example again(PS: I love you guys!), but it’s a great way to explain this. Since a large piece of my subscribers (maybe 250-300 of them) come from Sphinn.com, it gets easier over time to frontpage. People checking their RSS feed probably have an account, and may very well sphinn the article. Not getting into the “Most Votes in Upcoming” is not the death sentence it normally is.
Now, on that note consider trying to diversify your reader base. Concentrate on different social networks over time, prior to your  super-mega-I-want-this-to-go-viral post. By picking up people from different social news sites over time as subscribers, you can give yourself that needed bump to get your site out there for all to see.

Viewer Snatching: Grabbing Users from Someone Else’s Front Page
Setup a separate RSS reader that is nothing but social news sites that you’re targetting. Monitor and search them for especially promising articles that are picking up votes quickly, and are related to your own link bait. Reference them in your article, and submit a trackback or comment pointing back to your own site. With any luck, you’ll be first, and can get some traffic from those social news sites via your post. If there’s a site that frequently frontpages within your niche, comment beforehand so that you can skip the moderator queue next time.
Hint: By making that first comment, prior to a trackback using your server IP/domain/e-mail, some versions of different software will allow the trackback itself to go through without question.

The Obvious: Social News Widgets
Most already know this, but you really need a widget for any social news site you’re submitting to that allows them to vote within your site. Remember, 90% of the tactics draw people to your site, not the voting page. So without the widget, you’re dead in the water. If you think they clutter too much, use referrer based cloaking to decide which widgets to show.

Benefiting From Your Social Media Saavy Friends
You don’t need to submit everything yourself. Go through everyone within your industry you know. Chances are, you have at least one user who can (semi)frequently frontpage digg. Perhaps you have a propeller guru? A sphinn aficionado? A Stumbleupon DDOSer? Don’t just ask them to submit your stuff. Ask them to view it ahead of time. Get their input, and modify it. After they’ve had some input in it, perhaps they’d be willing to do you that favor. Don’t do this too often, and don’t be obnoxious about it. Remember, they’re your friends, not a tool. Do them a favor when they ask. But they’re still an awesome way to get ahead, especially in algorithms like Digg’s/Stumbupon’s, where the user’s reputation greatly affects how the submission does.
If you’re missing a social network, go into the social networks, and chat. Find people who frontpage commonly in your niche, and send them a message. NOT a message asking them to submit your stuff. Point out that they’re obviously knowledgeable within your niche. Say that you’re launching a site within that niche, and want to make it as good as you can. That their input would be greatly valued. Get some instant messenger information, and chat. Remember, this is not just a for-business relationship. You legitimately have things in common with them. Shoot the shit, talk about business, talk about life, just like you would with anyone else. They’ll be a valuable asset, and perhaps a good friend.

Timing out the Posts
This is a basic point again, but something that’s worth mentioning. Try and post every that approximately the same time. You need that sudden burst to have a chance at making it. Saturation is your best bet. Especially since the holy grail of social news(digg) gives credit for rapid diggs.

YouTube
YouTube is something I’m still experimenting with. My advice at this point is to if possible, include a video somewhere in your viral post. Don’t make it mandatory(many are at work/don’t want to sit around watching a video), but supplemental. Host it on youtube, and watch the “View” count stack up. Select your title/tag keywords carefully, trying to make it conceivable people would search for it on their own. Who knows, maybe you can get onto the “Featured” videos section!

Google News: Love it or Hate it, Use it!
This part takes some effort. But there’s a LOT of newswire/press release sites on Google News that take submissions. Dig through the additional links in there, and try to find them. Submit your site, even if not the exact article. By using multiple of em, Google may detect they’re similar and bump you up the importance queue of Google news, gaining you some decent traffic. I’m still working on even being proficient at this one, so I’m going to shut up until I work out more details.

Message Boards: Faking it Until You Make It
Message boards are a tricky place to market. A very tricky place. But everyone has a few message boards they used to frequent. For me, it was the CTRL+ALT+DEL Comic Forums(no, I don’t use that for marketing even now, you cannot find my link bait in there). But either way, most have a general chat, or random web links section. Go there, and drop your links. Be legitimate about it though, don’t over-hype. Most users can smell marketers a mile away. You’re only surviving due to your old post count. You can try this on a new message board, but be careful. Most will hate you for that “1 Post” next to your name.
Make sure to use sites that might be interested in your niche, not just random ones you used to go to.

Making Use of Quirky Aunt Millie - Note: This only works if your “viral” media has broad appeal. That is to say, it’s something like a flash video of kittens doing the hula or something. I almost didn’t mention this, because honestly I think it’s dumb. But it’s still functional.
I don’t know about you guys, but I have an e-mail address out there that I eventually abandoned and never told anyone I left. Why was this? Not spam, but stupid e-mail forwarded jokes. Courtesy of Aunt Millie, and whoever else the hell got that e-mail. Why not go back, and take a look around? You have a bunch of people there that partake in the original viral marketing. Obnoxious arse chain letters. In addition, they don’t use the BCC(blind carbon copy) option, so you have a list of the other people that forwarded the message going back 5-20 generations sometimes. Don’t piss everyone off by using the entire TO: list, but notice who actually FORWARDED it, and let them do the work for you.
Hope these tips got you thinking! There’s no 100% guarantee for viral media. There’s not even a 1% guarantee.  But this will give you a fighting chance in the social news networks, hopefully getting you that edge you needed.

Adios,
-XMCP

Posted on Saturday, December 29th, 2007 at 3:02 pm in the category:Web 2.0, seo. Comment RSS 2.0 feed. Comment it , or trackback this post.