StumbleUpon has launched a new advertising system, which the company says helps cost-effectively deliver advertiser content to targeted audiences, while increasing the opportunity for content to go viral.

StumbleUpon finds and recommends ad content it deems relevant to targeted audiences’ interested based on demographic and topic areas. StumbleUpon users by simple nature of the site choose the content topics of interest to them, and are delivered random content based on this). This makes for an interesting way of delivering ads.

"With StumbleUpon Advertising, we’re solving the challenge of how advertisers can get more content that is relevant and impactful in front of their targeted audiences," says StumbleUpon CEO and Founder Garrett Camp. "We are dedicated to providing the tools that help advertisers identify and reach their audiences, measure campaigns effectively and gain real-time user feedback."

"After testing the StumbleUpon Advertising system for eight months, we know it’s an extremely cost-effective way to drive qualified traffic and let the content speak for itself," said Jason Clement, Director of Findability at Wieden + Kennedy. “Since StumbleUpon Advertising targets content to users based on their personal interests, we can be confident that our content is reaching the most receptive audience possible. And when an audience enjoys our content, the reward is a healthy amount of free, organic traffic."

"StumbleUpon Advertising makes it easy and cost-effective to deliver the right content to a new audience of our target users," said Ben Tider, Assistant Director, Audience Development at Time Inc. Lifestyle Digital Group. “With streamlined campaign set-up and management, we can better optimize ads and recommend content based on the individual user. Because readers can self-identify the types of content we show them, they are more engaged and likely to share it with friends."

"StumbleUpon Advertising enables brand advertisers to serve up compelling content while users are searching or ‘stumbling’ around the Web," said Josh Spear, Founding Partner of Undercurrent. "With StumbleUpon Ads, an advertiser’s content is not an interruption, but rather a fully integrated experience that affords an opportunity for additional exposure when audiences like or respond well to the content. It is comparable to a banner that becomes more cost efficient based on positive viewer feedback. The new user interface also greatly enhances the service by delivering advanced analytics and more detailed campaign management tools."

StumbleUpon claims to generate nearly 600 million recommendations per month for its community of almost 11 million members.

Related: About a year ago, we interviewed StumbleUpon’s VP of Business Development about advertising on the site.

Today is, for better or for worse, the last day many people will have off before heading back to work or school and resuming normal life.  And if you have lots of stuff to do, good luck.  But if you’re a bit bored – maybe still stuck at a relative’s house or just out of books to read – here are some of the "Most Stumbled Sites of 2009."

One important note: The sites were divided into ten categories, and in each category, three sites were named.  So for the sake of not overwhelming you, we’re just hitting the highlights.  Click through to the original post on the StumbleUpon if you’ve got even more time on your hands.

Jim Jarmush Quote came out on top in the Arts category with 278,000 stumbles.  99 Things You Should Have Seen On The Internet won the Bizarre/Oddities field with 471,000 stumbles.  Next, 26 Cakes Perfect for Geeks placed first in the Food/Cooking group with 290,000 stumbles.

Air Traffic in 24 Hours won in Environment.  Humor was headed by Cheat Sheet for Travelling Back in Time.  8 Tracks Mix: Songs that Make You Feel Better did best in Music.  And Peter Funch Street Photography triumphed in Photography.

Finally, Robot/People Art by Kacie Kinzer beat the competition in Science.  12 Most Amazing Pools in the World topped everything else in Travel.  And Ball Droppings fascinated folks among Video Games.

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StubmleUpon launched a big redesign today. The new version of the site comes with a variety of new features, which the company says are designed to make it simpler, searchable, and more social.

"Our vision for StumbleUpon was simple–create a site where you could click a button and discover interesting, personalized and highly relevant websites," said Garrett Camp, StumbleUpon CEO. "We are now combining the power of discovery with search–and offering another way for people to access over 35 million user-endorsed websites."

With the new version of StumbleUpon, anyone can receive personalized recommendations directly from the StumbleUpon homepage, from any computer, without any registration or installation. The company says the new design makes it easier for new users to discover interesting content.

The  company says the personal preferences and collaborative human opinions that go into making "stumbles" personalized applies to search as well.. The result is personalized and relevant search results, according to StumbleUpon. Search is available from every StumbleUpon page, so users can search through their favorites, others’ favorites, or just through friends’ favorites.

There is also a new and improved friend search feature, making it easier for users to find people they know and meet others with similar interests. In addition, users can see recommendations from people they know highlighted in search results, and easily stumble or search within their favorite sites.

"It’s great to see the original founders’ vision reflected in this release, StumbleUpon’s first major product release since its independence from eBay," said Ram Shriram, StumbleUpon investor and board member.

StumbleUpon can provide a tremendous source of traffic. Read this for information on how to get that.

StumbleUpon’s founder Geoff Smith, recently announced to their Beta group members that SU is testing a new interface they plan on implementing. The new design is based around simplicity, which can be seen in the beta changes to the user homepage, submission comments, subscriber options, and even the rating system. The new interface has also undergone a programming update, which…

Check out the SEO Tools guide at Search Engine Journal.

Preview of StumbleUpon’s Upcoming Site Changes

A while back, StumbleUpon launched web stumbling, which allowed users to enjoy their StumbleUpon experience without having to download the toolbar, which was previously a requirement. If you’ve been a user of the service for a significant length of time, you’ve probably grown quite accustomed to that toolbar. Sometimes I forget it’s not just part of Firefox.

For those of you who do use the toolbar (and for those who want to give it a try), the company has now released an updated version, which is more compact, and offers some new features. They’ve made the bar shorter, which was a common request. They’ve condensed some of the buttons, so that the toolbar takes up less space.

The new toolbar also comes with new options to report spam and duplicate content. These have been added to the "thumbs-down" menu. StumbleUpon says this will help improve the quality of users’ stumbles.

All of the Stumble Channels now reside under the "All" button. "If you want to use specific Stumble channels like StumbleThru, Stumbling in your favorite topics or through other Stumblers’ favorites, you can find all these options and more under All," the StumbleUpon Team explains.

The toolbar also now offers integration with Twitter and Facebook, allowing users to post their favorite sites to these social networks. This of course supports StumbleUpon’s recently released URL shortening service Su.pr.

Webmasters, marketers, and business owners should not overlook the fact that StumbleUpon is a valuable tool for getting traffic and links. This has become even more the case in recent times as the company has made some important changes. More on that here.

Facebook and Twitter have both been proven to be valuable sources of traffic to many sites, but another potential source that you might be overlooking is StumbleUpon. It is true that in the past, StumbleUpon has been presented as a traffic tool, but the results weren’t always what webmasters and marketers had hoped for.

StumbleUpon has been changing though. Last year, the company’s founders bought it back from eBay and have been busy ever since. They’ve been listening to users and playing catch up to the rest of the social media world and are now doing more for sites’ traffic than ever before. Have you seen much traffic from StumbleUpon in the past? How about more recently? Tell WebProNews readers.

At the recent SMX Advanced show in Seattle, WebProNews had a discussion on this very topic with Internet Marketing consultant Brent Csutoras. You can watch the entire conversation in the following clip.

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In the past, Brent says you would get maybe three to five thousand visitors from StumbleUpon. "It was interesting, but it was just a little bit of traffic. It wasn’t enough to really drive a lot of time spent within the site," says Csutoras. Users were only getting random content, and it wasn’t all that great for links and targeted traffic, although it was always easy to see the potential of the technology.

Now since StumbleUpon has become more web-based this year with features like a web-based toolbar, a navigational section with popular & related content, StumlbeUpon buttons for webmasters to add to their sites, etc., the company has been driving people to participate and interact with other users more.  

According to Csutoras, StumlbeUpon went from 5 million users last year to 8 million this year, and they are now drawing a more social userbase that is prone to sharing content.

So What Does This Mean for Your Traffic?

Well, Csutoras says StumbleUpon is now capable of sending anywhere from thirty to two hundred thousand unique visitors over a period of a week. He knows this because he’s seen it (the example is mentioned in the interview).

Fortunately for webmasters and marketers, it doesn’t end there either. When StumbleUpon users are stumbling through content and they come across your content and like it, they are apt to share it through another network like Facebook, Twitter, Digg, etc. That’s the beauty of the social web (and also a good reason to include as many sharing options on your content as possible).

If you weren’t already getting enough links from StumbleUpon, this opens the door for many more links as your content is spread from network to network – from reader to reader. This is basically (at least partially) where social media fits into the SEO equation.

Get Users to Stumble Through Your Content

StumbleUpon also has a partnership program, which Csutoras says is likely to expand (and apparently requires you to have 3,000 indexed pages within StumbleUpon). What this program does is allow you to place StumbleUpon’s technology on your site, so that readers can go through more of your content without actually being directed back to StumbleUpon at all. That means more time spent on your site.

Interesting Social Advertising Opportunities

StumlbeUpon also has a program where you can directly advertise through stumbles. Earlier this year, I interviewed the company’s VP of Business Development, John Bryan about this. Advertising through stumbles, means people get to vote ads up and down just like any other content. Not a bad way to gauge how effective an ad is.

Wrapping Up

So the moral of the story is, StumbleUpon has the potential to send some good traffic your way. It’s probably not going to happen all by itself though. You’re going to have to push it a little bit, and I don’t mean by spamming StumbleUpon. Create good content that people want to share. It’s the same principal that applies to every other facet of social media (and search engine) marketing. People will share what they like. Give them something to like. Also make stumbling a clear option on your content. Give them that button.

How have you encouraged users to stumble your content? Tell us what has or hasn’t worked for you.