Vouched for and upvoted because I think it's important for readers here to see how much effort goes into creating posts that game the system. I think it's better for these strategies to be known than hidden. It will be interesting to see how tactics like this one evolve as ChatGPT use becomes more widespread.<p>There's a definite tension between the rule of not accusing other users of being shills and the reality that there are quite a few shills out there. I think it a still good rule, but not because it's never right. Rather, the rule is good because the false accusations do more harm than letting some shilling slip by.
I don't think there can be much better praise for a site's moderation approach than someone deciding that <i>creating relevant, high-quality content</i> is the best way to "beat" the algorithm/approach.<p>And someone doing that has certainly earned the right to include "one sentence that is the least salesy you can do" of self-promotion.
I don't see this post as "hacking" the HN, but in the same vein as the famous "Mission ... accomplished" comic from xkcd[0].<p>I wish more people produced content like the ones they've mentioned (about an interesting, current topic, with their own take).<p>[0]: <a href="https://xkcd.com/810/" rel="nofollow">https://xkcd.com/810/</a>
Ok so, different take - if this what people call "gaming the system" I'm all for it.<p>All this article says is that hackernews likes interesting, informative posts that actually tell a real story. And I for one am here for that all day. So yes, everyone take this strategy and make great content.
While reading, I kept asking myself why someone would care about getting to the front page of HN (saving up this fake points to get something good?) until I reached:<p>> Step 3: The secret sauce
We always end with a section that is called: Final thoughts. This is your moment to shine and drop a punchline that talks about your product/service.<p>And, there it is.
looking at the submission history for their domain... well, not <i>that</i> consistent and one of their accounts seems to be automatically killed by the spam filter. :D But I guess this confirms the blogspammy feeling I got from them sometimes.
Sorry in advance for the grumpy response, but I hate articles like this and I detest the manipulation of an organic voting mechanism for self-promotion.<p>I know this is the Internet we have to live with, but this kind of stuff just makes it a worse place to be.
> You can post multiple times: HN understands that quality posts can go unnoticed, ...<p>Yes, anecdata: A number of my own highest-quality finds have sink with barely a ripple on the "new" page.<p>> ... so you can try the same post again. Don’t overdo it. I would say max 2 or 3 times.<p>Most legit posters have better uses for their remaining lifetime minutes of brain activity than to game HN in such a tedious exercise.<p>Various software mitigations to recover credit for otherwise lost quality posts occur to me, but the coding effort looks substantial.
Spoiler: headline is clickbait and article is a bunch of HN reader flattery, so naturally it gets upvoted. It is not a critical look at exploiting HN algorithm or audience, it just tells people what they want to hear on a lazy Saturday.
> Obviously, the goal is to get traffic to your website<p>ok sure. Why not.<p>> and increase brand awareness […]<p>Hm. HN isn't Google. Brand awareness isn't always positive. There are several examples here where repeated coverage causes knee jerk <i>negative</i> reactions.<p>> SEO<p>Yes, that is a problem. If every time someone posts about grammarly or whatnot, if the Google algorithm doesn't care that people are vomiting with disgust in the comments, and treats that as "engagement", that is a problem.<p>Then again, you run the risk of having a page full of "omg grammarly is so shit" comments at the top of your Google ranking, so maybe that's appropriately Darwinian in a sense.<p>(No hate on grammarly, I just couldn't think of something more HN specific right now)
This article is great insofar as it describes how to write an article that appeals to HN. But having been writing and submitting to HN for like 8 years with maybe a dozen front page entries, I think the hack is simpler: pick a topic people want to discuss/find interesting, name the article well (not clickbaity but not boring), and submit earlyish in the day PST. The content of the article is not super important for hitting the front page (as evidenced by a lot of the stuff that does hit front page). BUT if you want to stay on the front page/rank higher, I suspect article quality does matter a lot.
Honestly, having had my articles on the front page of HN a few times. It’s cool but doesn’t really change anything and honestly compared to other sources such as some Reddit subreddits it’s smaller and shorter.<p>But you do get a ton of back links so that makes for go SEO(?)
> we drop everything and start investigating the news item<p>I suspected that "indie hackers" are mostly hacking their customers, not their code. Here's a good data point in favor of my theory.
I have hit the front page 5 or 6 times just by sharing content I find genuinely interesting. HN users have a sixth sense that detects organic links vs automated stuff.
Good read. I would love if they'd taken the next step and told us how the extra traffic and SEO links had helped the business. I mean, that's the ultimate goal, and Hacker News doesn't pay the bills: <a href="https://www.reifyworks.com/writing/2017-03-13-hacker-news-doesnt-pay-the-bills" rel="nofollow">https://www.reifyworks.com/writing/2017-03-13-hacker-news-do...</a><p>The tl;dr of the article is: provide value to the HN audience by highlighting articles of interest, possibly adding some extra commentary, and you'll get karma points. No gaming, no telling folks "vote for my post".<p>Kinda seems like the system is working!<p>From my perspective, I do post self-promotional links, but keep them to 5-10% of my posts (don't really keep track, that's more of a 'look at the last 30 posts and see if I have 2-3 self-posts'). Keep the self-promotional stuff quality, and you have to share other posts too. (I got a warning when I posted less than high-quality links and took it to heart. The mods are definitely watching.)<p>In fact, one of my joys is finding an interesting article from someone else and having it 'hit' on HN. It's such a gift to all the writers out there who are screaming into the void.<p>It doesn't always lead to something, but it sure is fun to have folks reach out and thank me for the HN spike. Plus the HN crowd gets exposed to the quality ideas.<p>As I said, the system is working.
As an English non-native, I can't reproduce the way to create an article in 1-2 hours. Can you guys do it easily?<p>Anyway, their strategy is one of the popular ways of content marketing. But each step has something new in detail. Good takeaways!
TLDR:<p>1. Be the guy that posts the news articles<p>2. Try the same post multiple times if it doesn't 'make it'<p>3. Timing is important - weekends are good opportunities.
(Yes, I acknowledge that this stuff is hard, and that a lot of effort is going into it.)<p>It feels like HN moderation is mostly focused on getting the comments interesting, not about getting the stories interesting.<p>HN needs to step up its game here, IMO. There's way too much gamed crap reaching the front page. It seems especially bad during European office hours when the Californians are asleep.