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I have seen many blogs that focused on the Digg top 100 users. Although that approach is somewhat interesting, I think focusing the top articles can give a better insight to what works, and what doesn’t on Digg. Being a math geek and a fan of Digg, I spent time analyzing the top 100 articles of all time on Digg. What is the average number of words for a Digg top 100 article? Should you choose a different title when you are submitting an article to Digg or just stick with the one on the blog? What is the average number of words in the title of a Digg article? Do I have too much free time on my hand?

Before I start answering these questions and few others, here is the approach I followed. I looked at the Digg top 200 submissions of all time. If the submission was an actual article as opposed to picture or a video I included it in the list.

Well, let’s take each of these questions and see what the data tells us.

Should you choose a new title for an article when submitting it to Digg or should you stick with the original title of the article?

Of the top 100 articles, the submitter chose a different title 75 times. Only in 25% of the top articles did the submitter decide to stick with the original title of the article. Some common sense here; many people do not know how to write good titles that hook the reader. So, if you want to get on the first page of Digg not only do you have to find good content, you have to do some more leg work and choose a better title.

Okay, if I choose to come up with a new title when I am submitting to Digg, should my title be longer than the original title?

70% of the time the title on digg has more words in it compared to the original title. Only in 30% of the submissions, the digger decided to shorten the title when submitting an article to Digg.

So, when submitting to digg, choose a more descriptive title

What is the average number of words in the title of a top 100 article?

Average number of words in the title of a top 100 article is 8 words.

The smallest title of the top 100 had 3 words in it

• 1 Miiiiiillion Users
• Digg This: 09-f9-11-02-9d-74-e3-5b-d8-41-56-c5-63-56-88-c0

The longest title amongst the top 100 articles goes to:

• So, as of yesterday, If you protest the war, the Prez can take your stuff (15 words)
• PLEASE Digg this story up. This boy needs help, get his story out PLEASE (14 words)
• Courtney Love does the math, or Why you needn’t shed any tears for the RIAA (14 words)

What categories do better on Digg?

Here is the category breakdown of the top 100 articles

Technology rules on Digg, then business.

What style of articles does better on Digg?

Although top lists, how to, and secrets articles generally do well on digg, they are not of the kind that will make it really big. You might be able to hit 400 to 700 diggs with them, however the chances of hitting 2,000 diggs is very limited.

What is the average number of words in top 100 article?

• The average number of words in a top 100 article is 674.89 words
• The median number words in a top 100 article is 444.5words.
• The smallest article had 27 words in it.
• The largest article of the top 100 had 6881 words in it.

67% of the top 100 articles are less than the average number of words. You articles will do better on Digg if you keep them to less than 700 words.

What is the average number of words in the description on Digg?

• The average number of words in the Digg description of top 100 article is 41.28 words
• The median number of words in the Digg description of top 100 article is 47.5 words
• The smallest Digg description of top 100 article had 2 words in it.
• The largest number of words in the Digg description of top 100 article had 68 words in it.

So, even a description of 2 words can make it! But you probably want to do a little better than that.

What is the average number of comments a top article receives on Digg?

Number of comments is a good indicator of how well the blog engages the community.

• The average number of comments on the Digg for top 100 article is 520.99 comments
• The least number of comments on the Digg for top 100 article was 56 comments
• The most number of comments on the Digg for top 100 article was 1649 comments

What is the average number of comments a top article receives on the site publishing the article itself?

• The average number of comments on the publishing site for top 100 article is 73.45 comments
• The least number of comments on the Digg for top 100 article was 0 comments
• The most number of comments on the Digg for top 100 article was 1691 comments

So, the number of comments an article gets on digg is about 8 times more than the number of comments on the publishing site.

What is the Google page rank for sites publishing these articles?

75% of the articles are published on sites with a Google PR 5 or more. The median page rank for top article sites is 6.