Gregg H. Hawkins

I’ve looked into registering at StumbleUpon for quite some time now. I never really knew what kind of effect it could have when an article of yours is in the rotation for being “stumbled,” until yesterday. I logged into my Google Analytics account and noticed that I received about 75 unique visits (UV) for the day and almost 200 page views. I didn’t know what to think at first considering I’ve been averaging only about 20-30 unique visits a day. I thought that receiving traffic from Stumble Upon was quite odd, because I wasn’t even a registered user yet. I’m guessing someone submitted one of my articles yesterday and I greatly appreciate whoever it was for taking the time to do so. Stumble Upon is definitely a service I think most blogs or websites should use, it’s basically free advertising. I am now a registered user as of today.

Advantages and Disadvantages with Stumble Upon
There are some obvious advantages and disadvantages with the use of Stumble Upon. Some advantages that I think come with using the Stumble Upon service is that you’re blog or website may see an increase in traffic, such as me. Depending on what kind of ads you run on your website, the increase in traffic could probably increase your revenues for the day. Another advantage I see with using Stumble Upon is that your blog or website gets viewed by people who are interested in your niche or specific category. You can hopefully gain a larger and stronger reader base if they “stumble” across your website and enjoy reading your content.

With advantages come disadvantages. Don’t get me wrong, Stumble Upon is a great plugin for FireFox. The only disadvantage I see with the plugin is that registered users just click “Stumble!” and you land on a random website depending on the categories you checked when you registered. I’m assuming that many registered users just click “Stumble!” over and over without really looking at some of the sites content. Sure, your blog or website is getting advertised and viewed by more people, but I’d rather gain a loyal readership rather than people just stumbling upon my blog for a split second then leaving.

I’m still a new user at StumbleUpon, but you can view my profile if you wish. Also, feel free to add me as a friend if you’d like. I’m still trying to figure out how to edit some of my settings and what not, but I’m sure I’ll get used to it within a few days.