

Ask HN: what makes some show HNs really work? - kinj28


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chris_va
So, I had tried to submit a "Show HN" a couple of times, and it never worked.

A week later, someone else submitted the link to my project and it made the
front page of HN.

Thus, I suspect there is a great deal of variance/chance involved.

~~~
Mz
I agree there is a certain amount of chance involved. But, I have made the
front page a few times and the time someone else submitted my work had the
best upvotes/traffic/comments. There are some good reasons for that. Someone
else thinking your stuff is cool enough to submit gives it a vote of
confidence that you promoting it yourself does not.

Of course, for the most part, my stuff still makes it here due to my own
submissions. I have been told for years to "self promote" and been seriously,
horrendously attacked and crapped on for trying to do exactly that. I appear
to be getting less bad at it but..yeah, it generally is better if someone else
is promoting your stuff. There are sound social psychology reasons for that
being a stronger position.

~~~
chris_va
Meh, the content is the same. The same content should be consistently ranked.

Granted someone else posting the link is a good signal, but that reflects more
the prior probability rather than the outcome.

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adrianh
I had a successful "Show HN" a year and a half ago: 482 upvotes, lots of
positive comments about my site. It even (tangentially) led to some business
partnerships.

Here's what I think made it work:

* Above all, a good product that's worth talking about and learning from.

* A clear, unambiguous title. Don't piss people off with linkbait.

* Luck/timing. I posted it around noon Chicago time, which feels like a good time of day to post, considering major time zones represented by this community. And there wasn't any big tech news at the time, IIRC.

* Participation in the comments. One of the great things about Show HNs is the opportunity to ask questions and provide feedback to the poster(s). If you (as the poster) participate in discussion, it makes the whole experience better for everybody.

(Here's the Show HN link in question:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4790636](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4790636))

~~~
enscr
Also, it doesn't hurt to be co-creator of Django ;)

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amjd
I think the timing and wording is important. Someone here did an analysis
about the most optimal time for submissions. I don't have the link right now,
but from what I recall it was during week days and starting around 1:30 PM GMT
and lasting a couple of hours.

~~~
xpressyoo
This link, I presume: [http://silverman.svbtle.com/the-best-time-to-post-on-
hacker-...](http://silverman.svbtle.com/the-best-time-to-post-on-hacker-news)

~~~
amjd
Yeah, that's the one. :) According to that post, the optimal time is 9 AM to
10 AM EST (or 2 PM to 3 PM GMT).

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rpedela
In general, I have noticed that posts that get upvoted have good content and
the title has at least one word in it that people recognize such as HTML5,
SQL, Go, etc. However if the title is full of buzzwords, it is probably
linkbait and not cool. As others have said, timing is important too. I once
posted an article and it was off the "new" page in ~10 minutes because I just
happened to post when a bunch of other people did.

~~~
kinj28
do you suggest this title of my show HN doesnt resonate with people?
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7861469](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7861469)

~~~
rpedela
I am not an expert so I don't really know. Please take my opinion with a grain
of salt.

I personally don't find it engaging because I don't have any sense what it
means. Sharing HN articles is not something you usually do with a team nor is
it a problem I personally need solved. So I would probably skip looking at it
because it didn't grab my attention. Your website seems to be a bit like
Reddit so maybe using an analogy to it would help your post stand out. Reddit
might not be the best analogy, but the idea is to use an analogy that is
understandable and recognizable.

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return0
It s a mystery really. I submitted 2 almost identical websites recently, the
first got 0 votes, the second made it to the frontpage.

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karangoeluw
Luck.

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forgottenpass
If you're asking this question, I assume you're trying to advertize a product,
a boring product.

Your submission title (and webpage) have to immediately answer the question
"Why does this matter/is interesting enough to even bother clicking the link?"

~~~
23andwalnut
Assuming that the product is boring seems like an unreasonable assumption. I
see lots of very interesting Show HNs that never hit the front page. I'm
pretty sure a big part of it is timing and luck.

~~~
rickr
I would think it's mostly timing.

It would be interesting to see success rates of different categories of links
based on time submitted.

~~~
kinj28
well - i posted this question at a very odd hour compared to what others are
suggesting on this thread. this seems to be doing far better than my show hn.

