Built on the backbone of the largest blog index and search engine in the world, Technorati’s Where’s The Fire (WTF) seems to be an anomaly that doesn’t fit in any preconceived model. Is it primarily a social news website (ala Reddit/Digg) that focuses on each user’s editorial power? Or is it simply a meme-tracker which groups and connects search topics on a deeper level with Technorati-indexed blogs?
My initial experiment on WTF was aimed at uncovering the potential of WTF as a marketing/promotional tool because no one had ever done so in detail until now. The lack of statistical information or analysis on WTF makes understanding WTF’s role in social media/blogging harder to discern.
As promised in my previous post, here’s my detailed report on WTF. I’ve waited three days before publishing this, in order to collect sufficient data for analysis. The aim of this is to examine the amount of traffic that would result from being on WTF’s frontpage and top spot.
I want to first say thanks to all who have voted so far. Your votes have allowed my blurb to stay on the frontpage for the past few days and gave me a chance to study its impact on an individual blog.
I was pleasantly surprised to note that Dave Sifry, Founder and CEO of Technorati voted for the blurb as well (Thanks, Dave!). Perhaps this reflects the importance of having more analysis and information on how WTF can affect each individual blogger or contributer.
The blurb I’ve submitted to WTF reached the Top spot under the Today’s Hottest Blurbs section and stayed there for three whole days while alternating between second and third place alongside several other submitted blurbs when they were voted up as well.
Currently, the blurb has received 41 votes in total as of this moment and is still at the top spot.
I’ve collected all the traffic data for the past three days and have written this little report on my findings. I’m sure the question on everyone’s mind is how much traffic came from staying on the WTF frontpage and top three spots for the past 3 days.
Another possible question of importance: Is Technorati WTF a social website you should use to promote your blog and content?
My answer to this is a simple yes. Technorati WTF is a social tool you should explore if you’re interested in getting more exposure to your blog. My reasons for saying so are indicated in this article, so please read on for more information.
Revealing the Potential of WTF: Issues of Usability and Growth
A commenter in my previous post suggested that revealing traffic details and encouraging others to get on the WTF frontpage will lead negative repercussions, mainly in the form of overcrowding on WTF, heavy competition and a drop in content blurb quality.
Perhaps so. I would expect that some bloggers after reading this post will start to use WTF has a marketing tool to promote their blogs. This will indeed intensify the competition, making it more crowded with possible junk content that results from mob voting.
Self-promotion is fine in my opinion, at long as you offer unique content on a specific topic and add to the discussion. Dave Sifry’s post on WTF gives an example of the blurbs you can write:
You can write a WTF on any topic that someone would search for, and provide information and resources to them about that topic or subject. So, you might want to write a WTF about yourself or your friends names, or your company (or maybe even your competition!)
Dave is also pretty explicit on the issues of vote gathering:
If you think that you’ve got a better explanation than the one that shows up on top of Technorati search results for a term, no worries, just go and write your own, and get your friends to vote for it. When you write something great, tell your friends to go and vote for it.. and the voting system will take care of the rest.
My goal in publishing this mini-report is to ultimately encourage more discussion on the purpose of WTF and also more usage of WTF to share quality information on a variety of topics.
For most bloggers, proof of WTF’s ability to send traffic is validation for its worth as a social website. If you’ve never used Technorati’s WTF before, this report will probably give you some reason to start today.
A Look at the Traffic Statistics
According to Google Analytics, I’ve received 425 visitors in the span of three days from being at the top or second and third spots in WTF’s Hottest Blurbs section. The blurb was submitted on Sunday, 1st April and received around 18 visitors an hour after it was voted to the top spot of WTF.
The next day, it received more votes as well as 160 visitors before slowing down to 140 on Tuesday and 107 on Wednesday. However, the article continues to remain at the top of WTF and I should expect a similar flow of visitors for today and Friday.
As you can clearly tell, the traffic is puny by the standards of other social websites like Digg or Reddit. Note that blurbs on other popular topics might do much better but I guess we can safely assume that this should be minimum amount of traffic you’ll get from being on the WTF frontpage.
The additional benefit of using WTF is that you’ll get prime position on top of Technorati search results pages. For example, if you do a search for ‘Technorati’, you’ll see that my WTF blurb shows up right on top because it has gathered the greatest number of votes among all other blurbs.
This might bring long term traffic if the topic is fairly popular. I can imagine that topics such as Paris Hilton or American Idol will have much larger search volumes.
Observations on the Nature of Traffic from WTF
- Visitors consist of Bloggers. This is the number one point about Technorati’s WTF. Unlike other social networks the people visiting your blog are very likely to be bloggers instead of your casual web surfer.
- Traffic comes in a steady stream. There is no surge of visitors to your website and I particularly like the fact that the number of visitors doesn’t seem to wear out over the span of a few hours.I’ve been receiving visitors from WTF ever since I’ve submitted my blurb and it does seem like it will continue as long as the blurb remains on the front page.
How does traffic from WTF benefit my blog or website?
The most ostensible and apparent benefit from visitors from WTF is the fact that they are very likely to be bloggers, which means that:
- Your subscriber/reader base will increase . I’ve seen a rise in feed subscribers in the past three days. Although I can’t confirm that most of it was due to visitors from WTF, I’m very certain it had something to do with it.Bloggers are feed-savvy and are likely to subscribe easily when presented with content they like.
- It might generate incoming inks to your website. Bloggers are part of the linkerati, a group of individuals that are web-savvy and link-friendly.I’ve only received two incoming links for my blurb but that’s probably because the topic might not be interesting for everyone. I’m sure intriguing pop culture, tech or political topics might perform better.
How do I get on the Technorati WTF frontpage?
WTF operates through a voting system which designates blurbs as popular or hot according to both the freshness and number of votes. These factors ensure that blurbs will gradually fall off the front page once it stops receiving votes and more blurbs are submitted.
Getting on the Technorati WTF frontpage is relatively easy. Let’s start by looking at some of the characteristics of the Technorati WTF frontpage:
- Lack of other WTF submissions. There doesn’t seem to be many Technorati members actively using WTF and I’ve only seen several new submissions which joust for position on the frontpage. Most of them received 5 to 12 votes and remained on the frontpage alongside my blurb.
- Longetivity. Links can remain on the top spot or front page for several days as long as it receives a small number of votes everyday. After getting on the frontpage, 2 to 5 votes a day will ensure that your blurb continues to maintain or improve its position.
- Ease of getting listed: It’s actually very easy to get on the WTF front page. Approximately 5 quick votes after your blurb has been published will easily get you to the top spot, and you’ll need around 14 votes over the next day to hit the top spot.
- Votes are absolute: Unlike Digg, your blurb cannot be buried and your vote counts for perpetuity. You don’t have the chance to unvote a specific story and group behavior from other members cannot influence your position. This ensures that votes are the ultimate deciding factor when it comes to being on the WTF frontpage.
- User profiles do not matter. It doesn’t matter if you’re a power user who’s submitted many blurbs with high votes. Each vote will count as a positive recommendation which pushes it towards the top. There is absolutely no correlation or relationship between user profiles and blurb voting or submission power.
- Lack of user interaction. There’s no option to ‘friend’ other Technorati users or send them private messages, nor is there the ability to comment on a blurb. Likewise, there is no way to easily track stories submitted by specific WTF users although there is the option of subscribing to their WTF RSS feeds. This means that vote gathering has to be done through alternative means like post requests, IM or email.
- Freshness matters. As shown by the following screenshot, blurbs with votes lesser than mine can still reach the top spot. I’m assuming that the newness of both blurbs and user votes are a factor in determining the hottest blurb for the day. To remain in the top spot, you’ll need fresh votes everyday.
Of course, all these factors might change once more bloggers start to use Technorati WTF. However, the basic principle remains the same: you need votes and nothing else to get to the frontpage.
Steps to take..
- After you’ve published a specific post on a topic, create a WTF blurb.
- Go back to your post and insert a link to the WTF blurb and ask your readers to vote for it.
- Email/IM other bloggers you know and ask them to vote for your story.
- Encourage fellow bloggers or friends to subscribe to your WTF feed for future stories.
These four steps should be adequate enough to ensure that your blurb hits the front page. Getting regular votes over the next few days will depend on the strength of your audience and traction it receives over on WTF.
- Using Technorati’s WTF as a Promotional Strategy for Your Blog : An Experiment
- Technorati Establishes an ‘Authority’ Ranking System and Gets a New Look
- Sphinn Launches: A New Social Voting Community for Search Marketers
- Are Social Bookmarking Buttons Useless?
I think you discovered a new and still “not polluted” social service.
2nd: Content that is useful to some, but generally banal
3rd: Carefully masked ads
4th: Spam
As soon as the popularity causes submissions to reache the 3rd or 4th stage, the social site starts putting up blockades to getting your content listed/front-paged. If WTF becomes popular, I expect the same, although something tells me it won’t ever become THAT popular.
It’s sad, but true…that’s the reason I said “still not polluted”
Very interesting idea.
I have been getting some new traffic that is looking for what I wrote about! I also pointed to this post for my readers to check out:)