SEO Zeitgeist

Is Digg the Google of Social News Sites?

Wednesday, 10. 7. 2009  –  Category: SEO

BusinessInsider.com has a chart stating that Digg received 17.4 million unique visitors in August 2009, easily eclipsing other social news sites. Its dominance in the social news sphere brings to mind another company…

Top Search Engines According to a July 2009 comScore Search Report:

1. Google (65% market share)
2. Yahoo! (19.6%)
3. Microsoft/Bing (8.4%)
4. Ask (3.9%)
5. AOL (3.1%)

Top Social News Sites Based on Unique Visitors in August 2009:

1. Digg (17.4 million)
2. Yahoo! Buzz (7 million)
3. Propeller (800,000)
4. Reddit (670,000)
5. Mixx (660,000)

Digg’s dominance in the social news sphere is not unlike Google’s dominance in the search sphere. Digg’s strong community and constant roll outs like Facebook Connect, the DiggBar, and constant Digg Dialogues appear to be having a positive impact on the site’s popularity.

Amusingly enough, Yahoo! Buzz is like the Yahoo! Search of social news. Poor Yahoo! — always the bridesmaid, never the bride. Most surprising to me is how disappointingly Reddit appears to be performing — are they the Ask of social news sites? I remember a few years ago when it was all about Digg vs. Reddit, and now this chart depicts Propeller is beating Reddit in unique visitors and Mixx nipping at their heels (though I suspect the unique visitors for Reddit are incorrect–the number seems a bit low for them, don’t you think?). In any case, Digg fans must love seeing their favorite site spanking Reddit while Reddit fanboys are probably scoffing and saying they prefer the site’s “intimate” community.

Love them or loathe them, but clearly Digg is doing something right since they’ve managed to outshine their competition and seem to be establishing themselves as the predominant social news site on the web today. What do you think the other social news sites need to do in order to better compete with Digg and attract more users to their sites, or do you think that, much like with Google, Digg’s only going to get stronger?

Tags: Bing, Digg, dominance, google, million unique visitors, news, poor yahoo, Reddit, Search, Site, social news, top search engines, Yahoo