In the past few months, I’ve gone deeper and deeper into social networking. As the Internet evolves, this medium now provides website referrals with implied trust. Basically, someone you “know” recommends something, so you are more inclined to go check it out.
When you sell something online, or just when you want to get your name out, social networking sites can be great promotional tools for you. Here are some of them:
- StumbleUpon – very quick to bring traffic, but visitors only stick around if you can really grab their attention. Friends and groups are helpful, but once your page makes it into the SU database, it may get propagated by random users who “stumble upon” it with the toolbar
- Digg – mostly news items and technology, but famous for bringing sites down due to the massive amounts of traffic sent over a short period of time. Requires time to build a following
- Twitter – a “mini blogging” platform, surrounded and supported by a host of applications for filtering tweets, vetting friend requests and grouping friends. Tweets can go to and from your mobile phone while you are away, as well as to and from your website automatically
- LinkedIn – invitation-only website for professionals and business people, featuring excellent group discussions and allowing you to build business affiliations, create joint ventures and find strategic clients online. Self promotion is frowned upon, so participation and adding genuine value are the best approach
Of course, there are others, like MySpace and Facebook, and the social interaction can quickly take up all of your time if you are not focused, so you must do your homework before choosing the best social networking sites to promote your website, pick the best tools and consider hiring people to help you do the work, while you are busy selling.
I’m doing quite well out of the social scene and getting good content, good referrals and lots of traffic for several of the sites I promote. If you’d like to get my help with your site promotion, let me know.
Happy marketing,
Gal
