It’s been a long-held belief that the benefits of the DIGG effect are not usually seen in the short term. For one, most of the DIGG crowd are tech-savvy, and they are not likely to click on your ads (if you primarily earn from CPC advertising programs like AdSense). Secondly, the immediate outcome of the DIGG effect–say you’re frontpaged–is that your server will be hit with severe spikes in traffic. If your web host cannot handle it, then be prepared to see at least half a day’s downtime. If your server can handle the load, you’re most likely going to face some bandwidth surcharges if usage goes beyond your allocation. So usually the net effect is negative–at least in the short term.
The benefits of repeated frontpaging in DIGG, meanwhile, are mostly longer-term, since these involve an increase in mindshare of your site and enhanced credibility (this is mostly based on perception, after all). These will ultimately bring in good traffic, who are likely to be good targets for direct advertising, and probably CPC, too.
But here’s one instance where the DIGG effect can be monetized almost immediately after getting DUGG. Ahmed–whom I know to be very analytical about DIGG and other social news outfits–shares his observations at Tech Soapbox.
I remember seeing the site, BeTheBot.com being linked on Digg’s frontpage. I saw it, shook my head, and moved on. An idea implemented many times over many years, it just seemed like another shot against Digg.
And so when I came across the beforementioned link today I let out a hearty laugh. Basically what happened was as follows:
- Domain registered on Feburary 14, 2007 to Kavi Siegel (cvxdes)
- Website and content put up that very same day.
- Domain gets dugg that same day also.
- Three days later, domain/site gets sold for $500
The really interesting thing about this is because of domain tasting (ie you can get a full refund minus 25 cents on any domain within 5 days) our friend Kavi would have been out only 25 cents (plus some of his time).
In terms of value, a new domain that had been DUGG once would definitely be worth more than the base cost of the domain itself, for the inbound linkages brought about by the frontpage DIGG. If there is good recall value to the domain name, then even better.
I’m just wondering whether other domainers will follow suit with similar business models. This could be one of those snags that can water down (if it hasn’t already done so) the credibility of DIGG.
