We all want to boost and increase our blog traffic, no matter what we’re currently tracking.  Real Time Marketer is a very new blog and so far I am happy with the results.  After about a week, I have 100 people subscribing via Feedburner and for only a few posts, that’s not bad.  However, you can always do more.  I have no intention of making money from this blog so pure traffic, although tracked, is not an immediate goal.

I am much more concerned with reaching and influencing more people outside of my current circle and networks.  A creative way to do that, is to rank higher on the social networks Digg and StumbleUpon.  Although Digg is a wonderful and worthwhile network, StumbleUpon is what I will focus on right now.

So I’m creating a twitter hashtag experiment called #StumbleMe . Here’s how I envision it to work:
When you write a new post from your blog and tweet the link, attach #stumbleme to the end of your tweet.  When I and others see the #stumbleme hashtag on Twitter, we’ll use the StumbleUpon tool bar to rate your post.  That’s it.  I’ll stumble your posts, you stumble mine, we all stumble each other.

How #StumbleMe Will Help Your Blog:

• Your website / blog will be listed on StumbleUpon.com

• Once your website gets stumbled, they’ll often receive visitors from all over the world.  The more people who are participating in #StumbleMe rating your posts, the more people who will potentially see it on StumbleUpon, thus increasing your audience and influence.

• Establish a new reader base for your blog very quickly.

• Gain backlinks from StumbleUpon visitors with websites.

Challenges:

1. You’ll Need a StumbleUpon Account: Sign Up for an account at StumbleUpon here (this should take about 90 sec).  Use the Internet Explorer or Firefox addon located in the upper right hand corner of the homepage (this is the easiest way and how I will use the experiment)
2. You’ll Need To See The Hashtag #StumbleMe: You can either keep a look out for it during the day while you’re on Twitter.  Search the hashtag using Twitter Search . Search the hashtag on Hashtag.org
3. People need to know the hashtag exists: This can only be done by spreading the word.  So either RT this post, or tell others about it, and let folks know you’re participating.
4. People need to act:  Changing other peoples behavior is often the most difficult task to do, just ask any dietitian.  But I’m hoping this experiment is easy and helps others enough where they will participate.  I will do a daily search for the Hashtag and stumble on any post that uses the hashtag, I am hoping others will as well.  When the community participates, we all win.

Will this hashtag experiment prove to be a success?  Only time will tell, but its certainly worth a shot and I think it will be fun to track.

Do you have any ideas to make this experiment better?  Thoughts?  Leave a comment below.

Happy Stumbling

Scott S. Bishop is editor for Real Time Marketer and a social media and marketing strategist.  He also blogs about social media communities at AxeroPulse.com. He is @thescottbishop on Twitter

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