
How to get 30k Hacker News visitors to your website - harrydry
https://marketingexamples.com/content/drive-traffic-from-hacker-news
======
dang
This is the wrong way to look at getting traction on HN. The more you do it,
the more likely you are to fail, with the modal case being that none of your
posts get any attention at all. I can't tell you how many people we see who
think that a clever title and posting at the right time and attracting upvotes
in a tricky way will get their content noticed. It pains me to see people
spending their energy on something that we know from experience won't work.

What matters is whether an article is interesting. That's what you should
spend your effort on. An interesting article doesn't mean you'll get noticed,
but an uninteresting article means you won't. Articles that try to make a
system out of how they succeeded on HN always miss this point. In reality,
what happened is that they hit on something that the community found
interesting. (In this case, it was how Nike sold its first shoes.) Then they
try to generalize based on the mechanical tricks they used. But those are not
what made the article interesting.

What makes this difficult is that it's hard to produce interesting articles
repeatedly when your motivation isn't curiosity but marketing your business.
With most content marketing articles, you can feel what the author was solving
for: "What's a thing that HN would find interesting that we can use to market
our startup?" You can even imagine the brainstorming session that led to that
topic getting selected. There's a limit to how interesting such content can
ever get—if it's not something even the author is intrinsically interested in,
why would it excite readers?

~~~
DoreenMichele
For those who don't realize it, dang is the lead moderator for Hacker News.

I've gotten some of my own writing to the front page of HN. Titling things
well is hard and very important, but the content also needs to be good.

For some quick and dirty data:

I used to track pieces of mine that made the front page. I've had several,
maybe as many as a dozen, that got at least 10k page views.

My best piece got over 50k page views the first 24 hours. That was in January
of this year. It took me about two weeks to write it.

It wasn't content marketing. I'm a blogger. It made me no money whatsoever.

In a nutshell: Take any write-ups about "How to get X amount of
traffic/sales/whatever from HN!" with a grain of salt.

~~~
harrydry
Hi Doreen.

Good points and I do agree. I honestly think we're arguing from the same side.
One of the points the case study makes is to not overthink and think about
"marketing".

To quote the last line of the case study: "He isn't a marketer on Hacker News,
he's a Hacker News user on Hacker News."

------
onion2k
_Choose the correct title and your startup can be projected to thousands._

If you're selling a product that HN readers will buy then that's awesome, and
well worth doing. Those of us who sit and read /newest will happily upvote
things that are great.

If you're selling something that will appeal to a different group of people
who don't read HN, or to the mass market so HN readers won't make much of a
dent in the metrics, then it'll just spike your bandwidth costs for a while
with no upside. If that's the case then focus on marketing to your potential
customers. Ignore everything else. 30K views from random people who won't buy
what you're selling is vanity.

~~~
harrydry
Yeah, I couldn't agree more. I do in fact make this point in the case study:

"The point is that once you start hanging with your perfect audience,
conventional marketing goes out the window. You don't have to try so hard.

Find the place where your tribe hangs out. Show up, help people out, talk
about what you're doing, and the rest will take care of itself."

Hacker News is useless, unless you blog / product is aimed at the Hacker News
archetype.

------
mcv
I think the most important point is in the final paragraph:

 _" Find the place where your tribe hangs out. Show up, help people out, talk
about what you're doing, and the rest will take care of itself."_

The article starts out sounding like it's about effective marketing, but as it
progresses, the unavoidable conclusion becomes that it only works because he's
sharing content relevant to HN, in a way that appeals to HN, because he
himself is a HN user.

Marketing as an insider of the crowd you're marketing to is trivial. Marketing
as an outsider is hard.

~~~
tardis_thad
This exactly. I've tried couple of times with my side project on show HN -
[https://tardis.dev](https://tardis.dev) (aimed at algotraders) and it didn't
pick up, but on the other hand on reddit algotrading sub I received useful
feedback and even few paying users.

~~~
marcosdumay
Sites that display content based on upvotes are inherently chaotic, you can
get published or denied for no reason at all. They are just biased into being
useful, but there are no guarantees.

A set of small communities, like on Redit, have a much more predictable
behavior. If you have content that interests one of them, it is very likely
that it will get picked.

~~~
mcv
I think there are ways to game it, actually. You need someone else to give you
that first upvote. I think/assume that those first few upvotes will make it
visible to more people which will hopefully attract more upvotes. Of course
the content still needs to be good enough to get those upvotes; but it makes
it more likely to dodge the risk of good content going ignored because nobody
sees it.

~~~
tardis_thad
I've tried that in limited scope, didn't change much, but perhaps content
wasn't good fit for the audience and I accept that.

------
tpaschalis
I recently posted one of my silly side-projects to HN and it reached the
front-page; I'm not really into analytics and user tracking, but I was curious
about how much traffic was generated.

So, I just awk/grep'ed Apache's access.log [1]. The results were about 23k
requests from 17k unique addresses in a couple of days and then a longer tail
for about a week, but haven't checked since.

[1] [https://tpaschalis.github.io/show-hn-sunlight-
live/](https://tpaschalis.github.io/show-hn-sunlight-live/)

~~~
jsgo
That's interesting. We use IIS, I wonder if there's a similar means for doing
analytics at that level instead of the analytics library on the front end
approach. I'll need to look into that a bit, thanks.

~~~
mooreds
You can set up awstats for IIS:

[http://www.damirscorner.com/blog/posts/20150105-HowToConfigu...](http://www.damirscorner.com/blog/posts/20150105-HowToConfigureAwstatsForWindowsAndIis.html)

------
edent
Interestingly, I wrote a similar analysis 7 years ago. 30k visits was also
what I saw! [https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2012/11/whats-the-front-page-of-
hac...](https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2012/11/whats-the-front-page-of-hackernews-
worth/)

I had a couple of moderately popular posts in June this year. HN sent 31,588
views directly - plus associated views from apps. A post of mine in March got
36k.

I wonder if HN has reached a local maximum of readers?

~~~
nesadi
I take it you're always reaching _some_ small subset of HN readers - filtered
by the kind of people who visit links by the kind of people actually
interested in the topic, etc. I know that of the links that I do upvote, I
probably only visit a tiny fraction of them.

------
phonebucket
The contrarian in me is fighting the urge to click on this story.

~~~
avip
Finally, I can legitly skip content and read comments first.

~~~
Fred27
That's what I did. The most ridiculously obvious click-bait.

~~~
throwawaylolx
Click-bait implies deceptiveness, but the article content is consistent with
the promise in the title.

------
jameslk
> LESSON 4 - HOW TO SHARE

> ...

> What I’ve noticed some people do is put out a tweet directing people to the
> newest page. This gives their followers an easy route to find their post.

I'm pretty sure this method gets flagged. It's easy enough to detect a bunch
of users landing on the new page with Twitter as a referrer all upvoting the
same article. The mods and the community don't appreciate sockpuppeting
(unless you're in YC of course).

~~~
marknadal
Oh oh oh, so true. I love that you just called this out.

~~~
deadcoder0904
It's so true. Every time a YC startup launches, there is an upvote ring from
YC I think. They reach front page so quickly. Sick practices :(

~~~
dang
Posts that start with "Launch HN" get placed on the front page similarly to
how job ads do. These are the two formal things that HN gives back to YC in
exchange for funding it:
[https://hn.algolia.com/?query=by:dang%20launch%20job%20ad&so...](https://hn.algolia.com/?query=by:dang%20launch%20job%20ad&sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comment&storyText=false&prefix=true).
The difference is that job ads can't be upvoted and decline in rank as a
function of time, while Launch HNs can be upvoted and get ranked like regular
stories after the initial placement.

Posts by YC startups after their initial launch don't get any special
treatment. If a submission doesn't say "Launch HN", it's subject to the same
rules as everything else.

Edit: HN also displays YC alumni names in orange to other YC alumni.

------
egypturnash
What the hell is going on with this website? The post pops up in a modal
(which is not focused, so my cursor keys and space bar didn't work to scroll
at first) that only takes up about a third of the screen. Close it and there's
a bunch of article links with giant thumbnails.

------
Uptrenda
Except that people have admitted to gaming the upvote system here many times
in the past so its not all organics-based. I wouldn't be surprised if the
majority of top articles had been shilled to N 'friends' / 'associates' /
'colleagues' etc before they had reached number 1.

If you look at all the new submissions there are many interesting articles and
most of them only get like 1 or 2 upvotes. So either its all random luck or
people are coordinating it like they do on Reddit. But ofc: I will trust this
totally legit website about marketing that everything is hard work, organics,
yada-yada-yada, here's my email bro and ill be sure to click your referral
links too ;>)

------
rikroots
Many thanks for posting this. It's really useful to find guidance on how to do
stuff to more effectively engage HN readers with a website or project.

Of course, all my efforts so far have failed to engage the sort of people I
want to engage. But then I've been here for less than a month - not an excuse,
I know - and I am still trying to work out what sort of tone/content a
post/comment needs to convey to get people to engage with it.

The other problem I'm suffering from is a lack of self-discipline: every day I
come to HN with the intention to make an impactful post or comment, but then I
click on some links and find myself drawn into articles and conversations that
have nothing to do with my work/projects, but are just too interesting in
their own right to be ignored ... and suddenly the clock's gone forward
another hour and I've done nothing productive! HN is too addictive (but I'm
not ready to quit it yet!)

I'll not post any links to my projects etc in this comment - maybe I'll try
out Lesson 2 tomorrow.

------
ch_123
Perhaps by posting an article titled “How to get 30k Hacker News visitors to
your website”?

~~~
viraptor
Yes, my first though was: Is this title meta? Am I being baited?

~~~
Zaskoda
Indeed we are.

------
buboard
I m quite baffled by meta posts claiming that hacker news has a different
culture that anywhere else. Sure its not facebook but it s very similar to
mid-level moderated subreddits. Major plus is there are no images.

------
Zaskoda
I recently tried sharing an article I wrote for CryptoSlate about general
stuff happening around gaming and it was flagged. I have no idea why. It
wasn't spam. I wasn't selling anything. Honestly, a post on how to game
HackerNews seems way way way more spammy than what I had flagged. I just
wanted to share content that I had created. I don't expect I'll ever get
30,000 of you to look at one of my links.

------
Pete-Codes
If anyone want to read an interview with Adriaan van Rossum who made Simple
Analytics which was mentioned in Harry's post you can grab it here:
[https://www.nocsdegree.com/how-this-developer-is-
competing-w...](https://www.nocsdegree.com/how-this-developer-is-competing-
with-google-without-a-cs-degree/)

------
Pete-Codes
I also got 30k views for No CS Degree the other week. Should have answered
every comment but hard when there are like 200!

~~~
newman8r
FYI if the comment count goes above the number of points (after a certain
number of points, ~45, I forget) - your submission gets penalized and drops
off the front page really fast.

So there are times when you might want to hold off on adding comments if it's
close to that threshold.

~~~
Pete-Codes
Thanks for the tip!

------
crispsquirrel
Write an article with the title "how to get X users to your website" and
pretend you're not click baiting

------
gpestana
This is plain garbage. The best way to get visitors to your website is to
create good content. No marketing, no click-bait or other garbage, just good
content.

~~~
slava-k
Hm, it is very doubtful that good content is simply enough nowadays. With tons
of information in the internet, "just good content" can hardly be discovered
by itself. There are should be ways for target audiences to find it, share it
and engage with it.

------
digitalni
I posted a question [1] to see if there is any interest for octopus deploy
alternative (fdeploy.com) but got zero replies. I'm still developing the tool
for my personal use though.

[1]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20506088](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20506088)

Edit: just noticed that there was indeed 1 comment. Made my day :)

------
bit_4l
Right. If HN readers are your exact target audience, then it’s totally worth
it.

After we got featured on HN for awhile, whenever I hangout at some tech
communities, there will always be someone saying “yeah, I came across the post
about TablePlus (my product) on Hacker News the other day. Tried already”

That feels good tho. Also a good way to start a conversation and ask for
feedback.

------
simonebrunozzi
> Notice how Adriaan links the Hacker News way with [1]. This shows he knows
> the platform and also puts his links in a more prominent position.

Unacceptable!!! The first link should always start with [0], not [1].

Joking of course! But I still prefer [0].

------
Pete-Codes
Nice post! I think it's interesting how every website has their own culture
and what is totally fine on Product Hunt wouldn't be fine here etc.

~~~
jonathan-kosgei
Agreed! We had quite a few false starts on HN before getting any traction.

~~~
wila
This isn't the first post of TS either, but it looks like it is his first
successful one.

FWIW, had a few failed "Show HN's" myself. You certainly need a certain amount
of luck in order to get enough upvotes to be noticed.

------
ElijahLynn
I did not click this link and won't.

------
fidla
[https://sweetmusicstudio.net](https://sweetmusicstudio.net)

------
bityard
How to make it to the HN front page: write an article about how to make it to
the HN front page...

------
ElFitz
This making it to the top posts pretty much drives the point home ^^'

------
timurmamedov
That is super useful, thanks for sharing this!

------
mfbx9da4
Did you actually manage to get 30k from this?

~~~
harrydry
No this got 5k views

------
caffed
Use the title “How to get 30,000 Hacker News visitors to your website”

------
betimsl
actually, i'm not clicking on that.

------
harrydry
Author here. Ever since I knew of Hacker News, I've always been interested in
the massive leverage it provide to both startups and individuals.

Choose the correct title and your startup can be projected to thousands. Write
a thoughtful comment and you can make 20 sales. Ask the right question and you
can end up with a Silicon Valley job (that actually happened)!

I came across Simple Analytics [1] a privacy-focused startup which pulls in
huge traffic from HN. Fortunately all their traffic was all "/open" so I could
compare traffic spikes with their founders [2] Hacker News activity and
understand what really does works on Hacker News.

[1] - [https://simpleanalytics.com](https://simpleanalytics.com)

[2] - [https://twitter.com/AdriaanvRossum](https://twitter.com/AdriaanvRossum)

~~~
r3bl
Yeah, it's just the title. I was on top for like 16h or so because I had a
catchy title and some way of supporting that title within the content.

Comments were far different. Almost all of them were negative and highly
unconstructive. I don't mind criticism, but I really mind criticism from which
I can't learn anything. One HN reader actually took the time to write a
constructive comment. I don't know who it was nor did I thank him at the time,
but that one constructive criticism was way more helpful than all the traffic
boost I got.

------
slava-k
Thank you for sharing this - Almost all the info in the article is new to me.
Definitely worth reading

------
anthilemoon
Super interesting, thanks for sharing. I had never read about anyone managing
to get consistent traffic from HN.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
I think a few sites get consistently highly voted, because they're known for,
and produce, good content. Gwern.net might be one.

