StumbleUpon is Stumbling Downward
by Frank Jovine on 07/07/2009 in Social Networking
The popular social network StumbleUpon has lost a lot of steam when it comes to referral traffic. Since January 2009, Stumble Referral traffic is down by more than 66% according to Google Analytics. Back in January 2009, our friends and subscribers were close to the same numbers today, but under a different account.
I know some people may say that your friends hardly have any subscribers, but that is not the case. Of the 100 friends, more than 30% have more than 150 subscribers and 20% have at least 50 to 100 subscribers.
Why has the referral traffic from StumbleUpon fallen off? I know this has nothing to do with the original owners buying back StumbleUpon from eBay. It’s hard to figure out why the referral traffic has dropped off, but it has significantly. Here are actual analytics from January 2009 compared to June 2009.
January – stumbleupon.com (referral) 15,524
June – stumbleupon.com (referral) 5,007
The chart below suggests that StumbleUpon Unique Visits is up 16.7% over the last 3 months.
I am not concerned that StumbleUpon traffic has slowed because our Google Organic traffic now makes up more than 48% of our total traffic. This means we are doing well when it comes to search engine traffic.
I was excited when StumbleUpon created the share tool, but it really hasn’t made an impact when it comes to referral traffic. The share tool really makes it easy to share a link with all your friends with a couple of clicks.
There’s no way I am giving up on SU as it brings in more than 5,000 visits per month, but I wish I knew why the referral traffic has dropped off. Did StumbleUpon make a change in their system? Who knows, but I am sure someone will figure out what’s going on.
HART (aka PetLvr)
Jul 7th, 2009
During that same time – SU introduced SUv2.0 .. it’s very likely that the changes to their algorythm also affects a lot of things. I could post some of my theories, but then it would just be like me opening my mouth and proving how stupid I am ;D // I know nothing! I see nothing! I do nothing!
Frank J
Jul 7th, 2009
Hart,
It could be they changed the algorithm, but that will never be revealed by SU or any other site for that matter.
Jonathan - Advanced Life Skills
Jul 7th, 2009
Hey Frank,
Perhaps it’s seasonal as traffic slows for the summer. Another possibility is that busy people are getting tired of so many stumble requests eating into their time. I dropped several friends who insisted on sending countless “cute but useless” requests. When you turn on your computer and the red toolbar number is 40-60 it can wear you out after awhile. A little fine tuning made a huge difference.
Frank J
Jul 7th, 2009
Jonathan,
The tread is over 6 months so I am not buying into a seasonal drop off.
Kikolani
Jul 7th, 2009
I can’t remember when they implemented the “Share All” feature, but I know that several of my subscribers messaged me directly and said they were leaving SU because they were receiving more shares than they could handle. Plus, do the new su.pr show as SU referrals? I’ve noticed that, for example, I can have an article clicked 200+ times with a bit.ly URL, but my Twitter referrals show much less.
Those are the only things I can think of that would decrease the number of SU referrals.
~ Kristi
Brian
Jul 7th, 2009
Does SU have some kind of sandbox like google – may be your site has taken a penalty for having too many stumbles.
Frank J
Jul 7th, 2009
Brian,
I am not sure if they do, but I will investigate and test Jason’s theory next week to see if the referral traffic trends upward.
madhollywood
Jul 7th, 2009
One thing that I have anectodotally noticed about the SU algorithm is that the effectiveness of an individual thumbs up seems inversely proportional to the number of times that url has been thumbed by a particular user. Could this be effecting your referrals do you think?
My brother’s site has had tens of thousands of stumble referrals in a single day more than once in the last couple of months alone, but what I notice is that a post only really does well when people who I don’t know are thumbing it up in large numbers. From that standpoint content is still king and the wider the appeal the better.
In general, I have notice no drop off in referrals, but rather a noticeable increase without really changing much on our end.
Anyway, no doubt you will have all this sorted out soon. Here’s a thumbs up going your way.
-Adam
Frank J
Jul 7th, 2009
Jason,
You could be on to something and I am sure it’s a good start in testing your theory. I appreciate the share and the time you spent here sharing your insight.
Thank you!
David Hopkins
Jul 7th, 2009
Strange. I have been out of the stumbling game for about 2 years. Back then the referrals were always about 1,000 – 2,000 for me, but now its dropped off to more like 100.
madhollywood
Jul 7th, 2009
Hey Frank,
Just wanted to poke my head in again to clear up the confusion. Jay’s my brother and artist of Jay Zuck’s Sketch of the Day fame. My name is Adam. People make the confusion all the time when I drop his links and promote his stuff. Anyway, I will look forward to see how your test goes.
-Adam
Frank J
Jul 7th, 2009
Yes, I know and a great one at that. I just was confused just a tad
BunnygotBlog
Jul 7th, 2009
Hello,
Ok, for one thing, I wouldn’t have received this article if it hadn’t of been for Stumble Upon.
I like SU , I don’t spend all day stumbling and sending articles to my friends, well only a couple that I know or feel I know well enough.
I haven’t taken advantage of the send all function. I do send my recent article to them and they to me.That is much appreciated.As you know while you are working if you look you and see someone has sent you an article you likely will take a break and read it.AND- it is most likely to be read then instead of when I open my feed burner.
I haven’t noticed a down swing to anything.I guess because I figure some have more fun on other sites.
Frank J
Jul 8th, 2009
Bunny,
If you own a blog or website, check you referral traffic from SU back in January and compare that to June. See if there’s a difference.
timethief
Jul 7th, 2009
Yes, I have noticed a significant decline in the number of referrals from stumbleupon since the share this feature was added.
Wayne
Jul 7th, 2009
I’ve quit stumbling also, but I never gained the ground that David says he had. Plus, how do you monetize that traffic? You can’t, or it’s really, really hard.
Or I’m an idiot and haven’t figured it out yet, lol.
Frank J
Jul 8th, 2009
Wayne,
Most of the SU traffic is bounce traffic. The average person may spends less than 1 minute on your site.
Alexander
Jul 7th, 2009
One word: Twitter
It’s just more easy to share and discover through twitter than Digg or StumbleUpon.
Even though it may not be the main reason, I’m sure it still has affected most social networks in some way.
Tracy
Jul 7th, 2009
I’ve noticed the same thing as Adam, I only get crazy SU numbers when somebody I’ve never heard of stumbles it.
Using su.pr, I’ve noticed that if I thumbs up/shorten a link to a post on a site I’ve never stumbled before it seems to send way more traffic than if I do the same to a URL I’ve stumbled many times before. It could be a coincidence, who knows?
I pretty much now use share this as a way to well, share things I’d like my stumble network to see without much expectation of getting a huge wave of traffic.
I also try to make time to just look at random stuff from the stumble button, but honestly so much of what I’m getting that way doesn’t seem worth my time. Maybe a lot of folks are tired of the signal to noise ratio on SU and are using other ways of finding new sites.
Frank J
Jul 8th, 2009
Tracy,
I think it has to do with the same people who stumble your shares has little affect when it comes to traffic. I did notice that yesterday 5 people who I do not have as friends stumble my latest and it received 220 visitors.
Robin Bal
Jul 7th, 2009
@ HART………. I am pretty much the same mate, I know nothing! I see nothing! I do nothing! But I keep Stumbling
James Parker
Jul 7th, 2009
Hi,
My experience with SU is not so disappointing. The referral traffic is drifting with me, sometime it is quite significant and sometimes a bit low. But these days I see that its smooth. Not much decline in referrals traffic.
Yes, I doubt if SU also has some penalty issue like Google!
Dragos Roua
Jul 7th, 2009
I tested SU advertising system during May and it worked pretty well. I think one other possibility for this traffic dip is that the organic traffic is kept a little bit lower in order to “make room” for potential advertising revenue from people who would want to buy stumbles. It sounds legit to me and perhaps there is a lot to be won in this niche. But then again, I can’t be really sure about this.
One thing I noticed since January is that the stumbling algorithm has changed.
Frank J
Jul 8th, 2009
Dragos,
I agree, something has changed since January.
Tamal Anwar
Jul 7th, 2009
Back than, adding a friend meant subscribing to his faves. So the 100 friends mean 100 subscribers. Now you also have to click to “Subscribe” button to get his faves.
Back then, the bounce rate from SU traffic was 30-40% in my blog and now it’s over 80%. I think the new algorithm is against bloggers and web promoters like us.
Frank J
Jul 8th, 2009
Tamal,
It would be a great feature if a person adds you as a friend they automatically subscribe to your favorites as well.
Tamal Anwar
Jul 7th, 2009
@Brian
~I feel like that too! Even my friends Stumble a site I recommend, it doesn’t get’s enough SU juice.
Brian D. Hawkins
Jul 8th, 2009
Is it just StumbleUpon or could it be most social networking and bookmarking sites have slowed? I know I have lost interest in many of them including StumbleUpon. Just like Kristi mentioned above, the shares quickly become overwhelming. I don’t even use the toolbar anymore due to the time consuming requests.
irtiza104
Jul 8th, 2009
I didnt notice any changes. maybe that’s because i dont pay much head to SU. but if this is really happening, then it’s definitely a bad news for lots of people.
Frank J
Jul 8th, 2009
I am not sure why the referral traffic is down more than 66%, but I am going to try to get some answers.
Michael Aulia
Jul 8th, 2009
It’s been a while since I get good traffic from StumbleUpon too. Oh well, there are always other social bookmarking sites to focus on
Btw Frank, I think it’s about time you upgrade your theme to allow threaded replies!
Frank J
Jul 8th, 2009
Michael,
I am working on a new theme. I just need some more time to test it and than I can publish it.
Deneil Merritt
Jul 8th, 2009
Sad to hear stumbleupon traffic is going down for you but stumbleupon traffic is growing for me and visitors are staying an average time of 11+ minutes on my blog.
John Sullivan
Jul 8th, 2009
11 minutes
Stumble is just a place to meet hot chicks until you find out it’s some dude from India
Frank J
Jul 8th, 2009
John,
You are so crazy! lol.
Toptenz.net
Jul 13th, 2009
I have seen a huge increase. I started sharing just one page on my site toptenz.net per day, taking off Sundays and some Saturdays.
Jan 2009 – 20,361 visits from SU
June 2009 – 100,219 visits from SU
Sharing has made a big difference in my site’s traffic. SU was 36% of all site traffic for June. Search Engine traffic was 40%.
Frank J
Jul 13th, 2009
Make sure you never discover or thumbs up your own articles or you could be put under review with SU.
Annie @ PhD in Parenting
Jul 14th, 2009
My SU traffic has been up and down. I don’t have good January stats (only started using Google Analytics in February), but here is the percentage of my site visits from SU per month:
Feb 6%
Mar 3%
Apr 15%
May 5%
Jun 9%
Jul (to date) 9%
Frank J
Jul 15th, 2009
Annie,
Google Analytics will truly help you in how well your site is doing when it comes to traffic.
NLP Zine
Jul 20th, 2009
I found your blog on Google. I’ve bookmarked it and will watch out for your next blog post.
Gerald Weber
Aug 12th, 2009
The SU algorithm is a wonder to behold. I’d be willing to place an educated guess that is has something to do with their algo.
.-= Gerald Weber´s last blog ..Louie Baur:How To Be a Power Digger =-.
Frank J
Aug 12th, 2009
Gerald,
I rather know Google’s Algo than any other
serinadruid
Aug 12th, 2009
SU is made up of real people. One month we may find your site super interesting and the next not so much. If you want good referrals from Stumblupon your best bet is to have good and interesting content.
.-= serinadruid´s last blog ..http://Serinadruid.stumbleupon.com/review/35074183/ =-.