Can Digg improve your site’s SEO?

Websites looking to increase traffic and search engine optimization (SEO) are instructed to get as many links as they can to their content. However, speculations are suggesting that linking to Digg, the popular social news site, may not help a site’s SEO.

Earlier this year, Digg unveiled the DiggBar, a toolbar and URL shortener that was said to be an SEO booster. However, last weekend, reports said that the URL-shortened links does not help website traffic. Instead, it redirects browsers to Digg.com.

“In short, Digg has broken the trust relationship with its publishers and users,” said Pete Cashmore from Mashable. “They might not be hurting, however, since the use of Diggbar links significantly increased the amount of traffic to their site. Now that they’re driving a bunch more traffic from thousands of hijacked URLs, they’ll experience a veritable traffic bonanza at the expense of users and publishers.”

Digg’s founder Kevin Rose said he was not aware of the changes as he tweeted over the weekend. He had been on vacation for the past two weeks and would look over the issue today.