Stumbleupon vs Digg - Page layouts

Like our Previous Stumbleupon vs Digg article this is based on statistics gathered from various sources, including clients, ourselves and friends and just about any one we could beg. However unlike our previous piece we had a much smaller data set as we only counted stumbles and Digg that brough 200 or more unique visits. Further more the data set was reduced simply by the fact we didn’t have the mouse tracking scripts enabled during the majority of our experiments however the data set is large enough to use so here goes…

Page Layouts and how Diggers and Stumblers interact with a site

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Site name

Digg
Diggers really don’t notice names of blogs or appear to care, nor do diggers gravitate to one blog particularly. Longer names did marginally and we are talk a small margin worse for traffic then sites with shorter names, but little difference in length of time stayed on the site or number of links clicked.

Site Name 1/5 - Not sure that Diggers even read it

Stumbleupon
Stumblers seem to take more interest in names, and notably several stumblers returned to sites from other referrers who don’t normally provide traffic, but did have the site name as an anchor. Not proof in itself that Titles are being noticed but more then occurred for Diggers.

Site Name 2/5 - Blog or Site names don’t make a site

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Post Title

Digg
Since most posts on Digg keep the same title as the post, it is one of the most important attribute, however once on the page the title has in many ways done its job, and indeed it is a second reference as they have in most cases already read it, so while its importance should not be diminished as the tool that got them their as, part of the overall page it adds little.

Site Name 4/5 - Diggers need the title without it they won’t get to the site

Stumbleupon
Stumblers come in to the site blind, and need to absorb as much information as possible, therefore short and concise titles are more preferable to long winded ones. However the title is often ignored in preference for more visual clues or taken as part of the overall page layout.

Site Name 3/5 -Make it big, bold and short you can’t go wrong

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Visual Aids

Digg
Diggers like technical articles but also need a quick fix, so with that in mind a picture is worth a thousand words. Big bold and bright seems to be the norm for getting the attention of diggers, and keep it simple, when showing statistics use block bar charts or pie, anything more complicated results in comments about accountants.

Picture 4/5 - Diggers like things simple and pictures are about the right level

Stumbleupon
Stumblers come in to the site blind, and need to absorb as much information as possible, a picture is the perfect way to guide them and let them know what’s happening on the page. Stumbleupon are slightly more capable of looking at complex diagrams and prefer their statistics to Diggers. Still big bold and simple still works best.

Picture 5/5 - A picture is worth a 1000 words and takes less then a second to process

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Call to Action

Digg
Getting Diggers to do anything is hard but simple call to action such as subscribing to an rss feed, joining a mailing list etc is particularly difficult anything that they think will tie them to a site, or passing of information is instantly rejected. If your looking to increase subscriptions the only way is to make it easy and ask for it, nice big buttons and graphics work better then text.

Call to Action 2/5 -Call to action, needs a really big horn

Stumbleupon
Stumblers are similar to their Digg counterparts and require some subtle and unsubtle goading to follow a call to action, however the RSS button icon is a real hit with Stumblers and a much higher percentage of stumblers add to feed readers through these buttons.

Call to Action 2/5 - make it big and bold and use familiar icons

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Other Posts

Digg
Contrary to popular belief diggers do visit more then one page on the site, after any digging the number of visits overall will raise, Diggers tend to follow top posts more often then following normal navigation patterns, though the most common link they follow is to the home page.

Other posts 3/5 -Top posts interest Diggers, but they can only take so much on a single subject

Stumbleupon
Other posts and related content got the same amount of attention as each other, though stumblers are more likely to visit the home page, they also use the traditional navigation menus within a site far more then their Digg counterparts

Other Posts 2/5 - They do follow them, but only as much as they follow normal links

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Widgets

Digg
Like adverts Diggers seem to be widget blind, and don’t appear to care or use widgets very often. Mybloglog and blog catalog style widgets are occasionally clicked overall however they appear to be limited, noticeably Diggers appear to not be users of such services on the whole.

Widgets 1/5 -Widge what?

Stumbleupon
Stumblers love gadgets, and widgets seem to fascinate them, a very high percentage of stumblers also use services such as Mybloglog, and the number of click through from these widgets was also higher then normal. This of course can be considered a negative as opposed to the positive.

Widget 2/5 - Watch out or you will loose your visitors to a pretty face

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