Sphinn: In Depth Traffic Analysis And Advice

After being banned from digg I have been experimenting with Sphinn, which I heard was a great traffic source and networking site for bloggers. The results have been very interesting.4 posts Blogging Fingers have hit the front page of Sphinn. The variation in results has been tremendous.

The Stats

• Biggest Sphinn, with 38 Sphinns = How To Get A Free PR4 Link With EVERY Comment Your Blog Receives. According to Google Analytics this page 1 on Sphinn sent 321 visits (160 on the first day then gradually less and less).
• 2nd Biggest Sphinn with 34 Sphinns = Top 5 Blogging Success Stories: Exclusive Quotes From John Chow, Yaro Starak And More. Despite having only 4 less Sphinns than the top story only 89 visits were received.
• 3rd Biggest Sphinn with 22 Sphinns = Pink Hat Method To Get Social Voting Users To Click Your Title. This story sent 47 visits.
• 4th and worst Sphinn ever with 26 Sphinns = Statsisfaction: Wear Protection At Stats Checking Orgies. This sent a measly 32 visits.

Reasons For Variation

1. The post title obviously has a massive impact. Everyone wants to know about getting free valuable links, but few people view Stats checking the way I do.
2. The day and date of submission. The post which received the least traffic went hot on Sept 11th, when many people would have been paying their respects to the victims of the terrorists.
3. Who submitted it is important. While I did submit the most and 3rd most popular stories, I am of the belief that the title of the 3rd let it down, although it did encourage votes. It is hard to quantify but more traffic may have been sent if I had submitted the other stories as well (at the risk of appearing spammy).

How To Get More Traffic From A Page 1 Sphinn

Most of these tips apply to simply getting on page 1 as well.

Use Titles that make people want to read the story, not just vote it up because it catches their eye.

I hate to admit it but I have on occasion voted up stories after only reading the title because they caught my eye. It is fairly well known that writing list posts with a number in the title catches attention, but a ‘Top 10 list of something boring’ is only enough to squeeze a few votes out of lazy users and doesn’t always bait people strongly enough for them to want to read the whole story. Is your list actually useful or entertaining?

What is so great about Sphinn is it is full of bloggers and so if you are in the blogging, make money online, SEO or social media niches you don’t need to dramatically change your title to suit the audience which saves you from alienating your loyal readership, which is what digg often requires.

Become known as a source of good stories.

Just like any other social voting site it is very important to submit plenty of good stories other than your own. The reason is not only to appease the moderators, but to build a reputation as a quality story submitter. When large numbers of titles and avatars are on a page, scanning down the list until you see a avatar you associate with good content is part of what is going on when people chose which title to click.

You don’t need to go out of your way to find good stories. I simply submit suitable posts from my RSS reader. Submitting a post from another site that goes hot is just like doing that person a favor so they are inclined to vote on your stories in the future because they feel indebted to you. (Mafia mobs here we come).

Side Benefits Of Sphinn

Much like me you may have expected Sphinn traffic to convert wonderfully. However, it has a Pages/Visit ratio of only 1.29 and an average time on site of almost half my over all average. An excuse I use to combat this is that many Sphinners are bloggers and as a result are scanners. I.e. they are very efficient information collectors who scan a page, get what they want and leave.

So What Are The Side Benefits?

The word is networking. Many Sphinners are also StubleUpon users and I have found that StumbleUpon traffic has increased after meeting new friends on Sphinn who have also become active SU friends.

Conclusion

If you are a blogger in a relevant niche I highly recommend joining Sphinn. It is still in Beta and there is a strong sense of community. Now is a great time to start building your profile there and driving traffic.You can stalk me on Sphinn here.