I have an apology to make. I’ve been giving you hints and tips for using StumbleUpon and never thought that maybe you don’t have StumbleUpon installed yet. So, first things first, run, don’t walk, to StumbleUpon, sign up, and download the toolbar. (Think I could throw more cliches into that sentence without it sounding ridiculous?)

Okay, so you’ve signed up at SU, you’ve got the toolbar installed, you’ve added a picture of yourself (or anything that’s different than the ipody looking temp avatars SU gives), you’ve even read (or watched) my instructions on how to set up your toolbar, and now you’re wondering what to do next.

Well, the first thing I’d recommend doing is to give yourself a thumb up. I’m serious! You like yourself, right? You like your Stumble page, and want others to visit? Then apply that thumb button to your SU page! You can even write a comment if you’d like, it’s really not a bad idea, thanking others for visiting your site and leaving a comment. Your review of your own site will always appear at the top of your review page, so that anyone who looks will see it.

The next thing I’d recommend doing is to make a couple posts. Find a picture or a website you like and share it. (Here’s how to add a picture to your page.) When you start getting visitors, you want something interesting on your blog so that they’ll stop for a bit. Hopefully they will give you a thumb up also, which will start bringing even more people to visit.

After you have a few items on your page, I suggest visiting other stumblers some. You can do this several ways. You can see which stumblers are online now, you can use your toolbar and set it to show you other stumblers, then click on the stumble button, or if you already know a stumbler, you can visit their page and click on their friends list. I love doing the last one, visiting friends of friends of friends…it’s like watching the 6° theory in action.

Oh, and while you’re visiting, don’t forget to pop over to my page and say “Hi.” I try to return visits, but don’t always get to everyone before the list changes (you’re shown your 10 most recent visitors), so if I don’t stop by after your visit, please forgive me, and feel free to come by whenever.

Technorati Tags: StumbleUpon. Stumbling, Stumble, SU, Stumble upon, Beginner, Getting started, Toolbar,

I mentioned before that the new SU layout isn’t as intuitive as the old one. One reason I know this is because I like to invite my friends to join StumbleUpon, and instead of “Wow” or “This is awesome!” the comment I’m hearing the most lately is “I just can’t figure it out.”

And so I’m going to start a new tag here called Beginner. Each time I post a topic that will help someone new to stumbling, I’ll use the beginner tag on it. I already have one post that belongs there, instructions on how to post pictures on SU. Today I’ll be talking about how to add friends. If you’re new to StumbleUpon, click on the Beginner tag to learn tips that will help you enjoy your first days stumbling. If you have friends who are just starting, send them here. We won’t eat them, I promise.

Today a friend from another online site sent me a note asking how to add me as a friend on SU. Used to be, it was simple. You’d visit their page and click the Add as a Friend button in the right hand corner…

(By the way, if you’re wondering whose page I used, that’s Ed Dale from the Thirty Day Challenge. If you want to learn about internet marketing, I recommend doing two things, both free: 1) Sign up for the Thirty Day Challenge and 2) Sign up for Taggzilla. You won’t be sorry.)

See how simple it used to be to add a friend? Here’s what the friend button looks like now:

Not nearly as easy to find, is it?

Okay, but what if you think you’ve added someone as a friend but aren’t sure?

Go back to their page and look in the same spot. You should see a note saying you are friends:

StumbleUpon will also put a note in the same spot if the person is a fan of yours but you haven’t added them as a friend:

And that’s that. Now you can go forth and add up to 200 friends (the maximum number of friends SU will let you have).

I’m guessing that the guys at SU headquarters are figuring if you’re new to SU, you’re going to depend on the toolbar to learn your way around the site, since to me, the new pages seem more like they’re made for people who have been stumbling for a little while. It’s easy to find “people like you,” not too hard to find the top ranked sites of the day (although it’s harder to find the Buzz, a daily list of the instant hit sites, pages that were discovered and became popular in a matter of hours) and it’s easy to see what your friends have stumbled on.

I LOVE the Recent reviews section. It’s probably one of the main things that keeps me from switching back to the old layout. It’s really nice seeing the most recent items my friends have posted:

Okay, lean in close everyone, I’m going to share a secret. Are you listening? Okay, think about this. If you are getting the most recent posts from your friends, what are they getting???

Yep, they’re getting your most recent post. Without you having to lift a finger to suggest it to anyone. Just by posting it on your blog, you’re sending it out to as many people as you have befriended.

Now, there are a few things I still need to check and if anyone reading this knows, please share your findings. I know you don’t get pages from your fans, but I’m not sure whether your pages go out to people who are fans that you haven’t befriended. Either way, it’s still a powerful marketing tool, whether you’re blogging for a business or just wanting to move up the ranks in SU. Having the Recent reviews page set as your default SU homepage doesn’t hurt either.

Any questions?