Are Social Bookmarking Sites Dying? Which Ones Are Still Working in 2024

by Daniel in 41 Comments — Updated Reading Time: 11 minutes

Social bookmarking sites have been a game-changer in the online world, presenting an innovative way to manage, share, and discover web content. Whether you’re a digital marketer, a blogger, or simply an Internet enthusiast, these sites offer countless benefits.

For SEO, they can be a goldmine. By sharing your website on these platforms, you generate backlinks, which search engines like Google love. This, in turn, improves your website’s SEO ranking. But that’s not all – social bookmarking sites can also drive a significant amount of traffic to your website. When you share engaging content, other users may just be intrigued enough to visit your site, thereby increasing your website traffic. So, if you haven’t explored social bookmarking sites yet, now’s the time!

Are Social Bookmarking Sites Dying? Which Ones Are Still Working In Yyyy Photo

Social bookmarking sites have evolved into a pivotal digital strategy. Remember the buzz around platforms like Digg, StumbleUpon, and Delicious? The scenario has seen a dramatic shift. Let’s walk down memory lane, reminisce, and uncover the mystery behind their current status.

What is Social Bookmarking?

Social bookmarking is when users save and organize web pages for future reference. You can tag websites with keywords or phrases to make them easy to find on the bookmarking platform. We use social bookmarking to easily save and find online resources. Users can save web pages for easy access, without needing to remember long URLs or search again. Furthermore, social bookmarking allows users to find and share content with like-minded people.

This promotes collaboration and facilitates knowledge sharing within online communities. Users on social bookmarking sites can rate and comment on content to find reliable sources. You can use these platforms to organize content. You can make your own collections of bookmarks. This helps users reflect their expertise and interests. Social bookmarking is important today. It helps us store, organize, and share online resources.

What are Social Bookmarking Sites?

Imagine a virtual place where you can store, classify, share, and search links through practice-based groundings. That’s what a social bookmarking site is in a nutshell! These sites allow users to bookmark their favorite web pages, which they can later access from any device, anywhere. You might think of them as a more public, interactive version of your browser’s bookmark feature.

Benefits of Using Social Bookmarking Sites

  • Boosts Website Traffic: One of the major benefits is the surge in website traffic. Sharing content on these platforms exposes it to a wider audience, bringing in new visitors to your website.
  • Enhances Online Visibility: Being active on social bookmarking sites increases your online presence. It can make you or your brand more noticeable, building a digital reputation.
  • Improves SEO Ranking: Search engines like Google take into account the number of backlinks to a website when determining its ranking. Sharing your website on these platforms can generate backlinks and improve your SEO.
  • Facilitates Content Discovery: Lastly, these platforms are fantastic for discovering new content. They’re a treasure trove of information, with users constantly adding new, interesting links.

The 2010 Era: The Reign of Digg, StumbleUpon, and Delicious

Cast your mind back to 2010. Social bookmarking platforms like Digg, StumbleUpon, and Delicious were everyone’s talk of the town. They were a dream come true for website owners as the traffic and engagement they brought were overwhelming. Digg’s top stories could snag as much as 3,000 diggs!

However, Digg’s misfortune began with the introduction of a new version. The platform nosedived as loyal users abandoned ship, claiming the site had lost its essence. What was once a stronghold of engagement became a ghost town.

And what about Delicious, the pioneer of social bookmarking sites? Loved by a huge user base, the platform was deemed incredibly useful. However, in a shocking turn of events, Yahoo!, the company that bought Delicious in 2005, announced the platform’s potential shutdown or sale. That was a heartbreaking moment for many.

StumbleUpon had a similar fate. Once a significant traffic source for numerous websites, its importance dwindled over time. Webmasters started noticing a distinct drop in traffic from the platform, hinting at a downward spiral.

Enter the new kids on the block – Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok, and Reddit. With their rising popularity, the social bookmarking landscape underwent a drastic transformation. Instagram’s visually engaging platform, LinkedIn’s professional networking charm, TikTok’s short and snappy video content, and Reddit’s dynamic community-based discussions all diverted users’ attention from traditional bookmarking sites.

The Present Scenario: Who’s Wearing the Crown in 2024?

Fast forward to the current digital era. Platforms like Reddit, Mix, and Scoop.it are dominating the social bookmarking realm. Reddit, aptly named “the front page of the internet,” provides a unique platform where users can share links and start discussions on countless topics.

Scoop.it is another platform winning hearts, particularly among professionals. It allows users to curate and share content to their own private ‘topic’ pages, contributing to information sharing and thought leadership.

Bookmarking Site
Pros
Cons
Highly active community, potential for high visibility.
Strict rules, potential for backlash if content isn’t well-received.
Digg
No longer a bookmarking site. It’s more of a content blog now that covers tech/science content.
Less active user base than some other platforms.
StumbleUpon
No longer a bookmarking site. Instead it was rebranded as Mix. Used to be good for content discovery, chance for high traffic with well-received content.
Limited control over content visibility.
Great for visual content, drives traffic to site.
Limited to visual content, not as effective for text-heavy content.
Good for saving long-form articles, high quality backlinks.
Lesser social interaction as it’s more of a save-for-later service.

Role of Social Bookmarking in Today’s SEO and Digital Marketing

In the realm of SEO, social bookmarking is an invaluable tool for enhancing visibility, driving traffic, and improving rankings. It’s no longer about just posting links; it’s about engaging with the community and offering high-quality, meaningful content. Social bookmarking can help build backlinks, contribute to brand awareness, and even aid in reputation management.

However, just like every other digital marketing strategy, the ‘how’ matters. Here are a few best practices:

  • Create and share compelling content that adds value.
  • Engage with the community by participating in discussions.
  • Build relationships with other users and influencers in your niche.
  • Don’t spam. Respect the rules of each platform and post responsibly.

The Future of Social Bookmarking

While the rapid changes in technology, user behavior, and online marketing trends make it challenging to predict with certainty, we can confidently say that social bookmarking is here to stay. The adoption of AI and machine learning in content creation, coupled with the trend of personalized content, will likely influence the future of social bookmarking.

The introduction of AI-based algorithms and predictive analytics in social media platforms

allows them to better understand user behavior and preferences. This, in turn, can improve the user experience by delivering content that matches their preferences.

But with the power of AI comes responsibility. Users will demand transparency in how their data is used and will expect better control over their information. This could bring about new user-focused features in social bookmarking platforms, further enhancing the user experience.

In conclusion, social bookmarking is a tool that has evolved and adapted to the changing digital landscape. It continues to play a vital role in digital marketing and SEO strategies. The future holds exciting possibilities, with the potential for new technologies to influence its trajectory. As we move forward, social bookmarking is expected to become even more user-centric and personalized, making it an exciting space to watch.

Here’s a comparison table highlighting the differences that lead to the rise and fall of the various social bookmarking platforms.

Site
Main Features
Benefits
Downsides
Digg (2010)
User-curated news and stories
High user engagement, could drive significant traffic
The introduction of a new version led to user dissatisfaction and decreased activity
StumbleUpon (2010)
Content discovery and rating system
Drove significant traffic to websites, diverse content
Decrease in user activity over time, less traffic driven to sites
Delicious (2010)
User-curated and categorized web bookmarks
Useful for organizing and discovering web content, high user engagement
Uncertain future after announcement of potential shutdown or sale
Instagram
Photo and video sharing, stories, and live streaming
High user engagement, good for brand exposure and influencer marketing
Primarily visual, not traditionally considered a bookmarking site
LinkedIn
Professional networking, job postings, and content sharing
Good for B2B marketing and professional networking
Less suitable for non-business related content
TikTok
Short-form video creation and sharing
High user engagement, good for reaching younger demographics
Limited to video content, demographic may not fit all businesses
Reddit
User-curated content and discussions in dedicated communities (“subreddits”)
Great for niche marketing, community engagement, and backlinks
Strict rules, negative feedback can be public and damaging
Mix
Content discovery and sharing across various interests
Helps discover, save and recommend web content
Smaller user base compared to other platforms
Scoop.it
Content curation and sharing on private ‘topic’ pages
Supports thought leadership and information sharing, good for B2B marketing
Premium features require paid plan
Tumblr
Microblogging and multimedia sharing platform
Encourages creativity, has a unique and engaged community, supports multiple post types
Content visibility can be impacted by platform’s algorithm

This table provides a high-level overview of the mentioned platforms. As the digital landscape is ever-evolving, the specifics and impact of each platform may change over time. It’s always important to keep abreast of these changes to optimize your social bookmarking strategy.

Free People Holding Their Phones Stock Photo

Social Bookmarking Sites Love Blogs, After All

If you wander around Digg and other social bookmarking sites, you will notice a slight discrimination against blogs (or so it appears at first glance). Many blogging-related stories get buried automatically. The ones that make it to the front page often receive harsh comments along the “who cares about blogs anyway” fashion.

Those episodes made me curious, so I decided to dig a little deeper. The question that I wanted to answer was: how popular are blogs within social bookmarking sites? More specifically: what percentage of “popular” stories are coming from blogs? The results were surprising.

The Methodology

First of all I selected three social bookmarking sites to include on the research: Digg, Delicious and Stumble Upon. The next step was to actually define what would be considered a blog, and what would not.

In order to be considered a blog, the website needed to meet 2 out of the 3 criteria that follow:

  • It runs on blogging-specific software
  • It has a comment section
  • Its content is structured chronologically

Obviously there were some gray areas. Some mainstream publications, for instance, are starting to adopt comments on their websites. They also structure the content chronologically, meaning that they could be considered blogs. But they were not.

That said, blogs of mainstream publications were considered as such. While anything coming from www.wired.com, was not considered, stories coming from blogs.wired.com were considered to be blogs.

Diggcount.gif

The actual research consisted of monitoring the top stories (front page stories from Digg, popular stories from Delicious and “stumbled” pages from StumbleUpon) for 10 days. All the URLs of the counted stories were saved.

The number of stories counted each day is variable for the first two social bookmarking sites (since you can not control it) and fixed for StumbleUpon (since you can control how many pages you “stumble” daily). Below you will find the results.

Digg

Surprisingly enough (at least for me) Digg revealed itself to be the most blog-friendly social bookmarking site among the three. Throughout the 10 days, over 54% of the front page stories came from blogs.

This could be explained by the large number of popular blogs (e.g., Gizmodo, Engadget, Lifehacker and TechCrunch) that have a readership very active on Digg.

Alternatively, since Digg is the site that generates more traffic for featured stories, one could argue that bloggers “aim” for Digg when creating and promoting their content.

Day Total Stories Blogs Non-Blogs % of Blogs % of Non-Blogs
1 44 17 27 38,6% 61,4%
2 47 21 26 44,7% 55,3%
3 52 32 20 61,5% 38,5%
4 54 36 18 66,7% 33,3%
5 45 21 24 46,7% 53,3%
6 43 28 15 65,1% 34,9%
7 44 24 20 54,5% 45,5%
8 43 26 17 60,5% 39,5%
9 48 23 25 47,9% 52,1%
10 42 22 20 52,4% 47,6%
Average 46,2 25 21,2 54,1% 45,9%

 

Delicious

Delicious was the most balanced site. Consider that 3 days out of 10 presented more stories coming from blogs. On average, 45,7% of the stories that appeared on the “Popular” page of the social bookmarking site were coming from blogs.

Again, even if this number is not as big as the Digg one, we can say that blogs represent a corner-stone for Delicious users.

Day Total Stories Blogs Non-Blogs % of Blogs % of Non-Blogs
1 40 15 25 37,5% 62,5%
2 34 16 18 47,1% 52,9%
3 35 15 20 42,9% 57,1%
4 39 25 14 64,1% 35,9%
5 32 17 15 53,1% 46,9%
6 43 14 29 32,6% 67,4%
7 31 14 17 45,2% 54,8%
8 31 12 19 38,7% 61,3%
9 29 18 11 38,9% 61,1%
10 36 14 22 38,9% 61,1%
Average 35 16 19 45,7% 54,3%

 

StumbleUpon

StumbleUpon had unexpected number as well, but in the opposite direction as those of Digg. There was no single day where the number of “stumbled” pages coming from blogs surpassed the the number non-blog ones.

On average, 32,7% of the served pages were coming from blogs. Maybe the results are biased due to the fact that they are coming from my personal stumble activity, and not from the Stumble Buzz page. I am working on the latter and will update the results shortly.

Day Total Stories Blogs Non-Blogs % of Blogs % of Non-Blogs
1 30 10 20 33,3% 66,7%
2 30 9 21 30,0% 70,0%
3 30 11 19 36,7% 63,3%
4 30 6 24 20,0% 60,0%
5 30 8 22 26,7% 74,3%
6 30 8 22 26,7% 74,3%
7 30 12 18 40,0% 60,0%
8 30 11 19 36,7% 63,3%
9 30 13 17 43,3% 56,7%
10 30 10 20 33,3% 66,7%
Average 30 9,8 20,2 32,7% 67,3%

Bear in mind that these results might deviate from the actual popularity of blogs within the mentioned social bookmarking sites (even because said popularity changes over the time). I am already working on extending the period of the research to 30 days in order to confirm the results.

On average, 54,1% of Digg‘s front page stories were coming from blogs, 45,7% of Delicious popular stories were coming from blogs and 32,7% of StumbleUpon stumbled pages were blogs.

Regardless of the peculiar characteristics of each social bookmarking site, the numbers were higher than what I was expecting. There are 15 million active blogs in the world, which is a fraction of the active “traditional” websites.

Perhaps there is a widespread misconception regarding the popularity of blogs. In this case, it seems that the facts trump opinions; blogs are more popular and credible than people think.

Top Social Networks – Many Marketers are Considering them the New Social Bookmarking Sites of 2024)

Platform
Traffic
SEO Benefits
2.8 billion monthly active users
Massive user base, potential for high traffic, content visibility
Over 2 billion logged-in monthly users
Second-largest search engine, high-quality traffic, video optimization
2 billion monthly active users
Direct communication, personalized engagement, targeted traffic
Over 1.3 billion monthly active users
Direct messaging, customer support, engaged traffic
Over 1 billion monthly active users
Visual marketing, engagement, shoppable posts
Over 1.2 billion monthly active users
Engagement, broad range of services, traffic targeting Chinese market
Over 1 billion monthly active users
Viral video content, creative campaigns, potential for high traffic
Over 800 million monthly active users
Traffic targeting Chinese market, social networking, messaging
Over 517 million active users
Content sharing, customization, traffic targeting Chinese market
Over 500 million registered users
Microblogging, content sharing, traffic targeting Chinese market
430 million monthly active users
Diverse communities, content sharing, potential for viral traffic
Over 293 million daily active users
Ephemeral content, engaging with younger demographics
Over 459 million monthly active users
Visual discovery, traffic for creative and visual content
330 million monthly active users
Real-time updates, engagement, content amplification
740 million registered users
Professional networking, B2B opportunities, industry visibility
Over 500 million monthly active users
Secure messaging, engagement, traffic for specific communities
Over 187 million monthly active users
Messaging, content sharing, traffic targeting Asian markets
Over 260 million monthly active users
Messaging, voice calls, content sharing
Over 475 million registered users
Microblogging, creative expression, community engagement
Over 60 million monthly readers
Content publishing, SEO benefits, opportunity for wider readership

Top “Traditional” Social Bookmarking Sites in 2024

These social bookmarking sites allow users to save, organize and share bookmarks (or links) different resources online that they would want to revisit in the future.

  1. Reddit
  2. Digg No longer a social bookmarking site.
  3. StumbleUpon/Mix StumbleUpon was shut down as a social bookmarking service, and the URL now redirects to Mix.com
  4. Pinterest
  5. Pocket
  6. Scoop.it
  7. Slashdot
  8. Diigo
  9. We Heart It
  10. Folkd
  11. BizSugar
  12. MetaFilter
  13. Newsvine
  14. Pearltrees
  15. Flipboard
  16. Fark
  17. Instapaper
  18. Feedly
  19. BibSonomy
  20. CiteULike
  21. MySiteVote
  22. HubPages
  23. Kirtsy
  24. LinkaGoGo
  25. LinkedIn Pulse
  26. Blinklist
  27. DropJack
  28. DotNetKicks
  29. LinkArena
  30. Newsle
  31. BoingBoing
  32. Current
  33. ClipClip
  34. DesignFloat
  35. WireFan
  36. 43 Things
  37. 1 Look 4
  38. Blog Bookmark
  39. Blurpalicious
  40. Bookmark4You
  41. Bookmarking Base
  42. Bookmax
  43. Cloudytags
  44. Coolpot
  45. Dailyhostnews
  46. Dealigg
  47. Dzone
  48. Easybm
  49. Gab
  50. Goldenmidas
  51. Gpone
  52. Hotklix
  53. Indofeed
  54. iOrbix
  55. Kippt
  56. Lynkos
  57. Milocalbuilder
  58. Murl
  59. Myhq
  60. MyLife
  61. Netvouz
  62. Ngopost
  63. Openfaves
  64. PiPiNews
  65. Plurk
  66. Postolia
  67. Pusha
  68. Sitebar
  69. Sitejot
  70. Skyrock
  71. Socialadr
  72. Sociall
  73. SocioPost
  74. Startaid
  75. Techdirt
  76. Tracky
  77. URL.ORGanizer
  78. Votetags
  79. Wirefan
  80. YouMob
  81. ZicZac
  82. Zypid
  83. BookmarkMaps
  84. AixinDashi
  85. BookmarkingHost.info
  86. BookmarkTalk.info
  87. SocialBookmarkNow.info
  88. SocioPost.com
  89. ActiveBookmarks.com
  90. Onlinewebmarks.com
  91. GreatestStory.info
  92. BookmarkDiary.com
  93. BookmarkURL.com
  94. BookmarkFollow.com

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