Note: I’ve recently written an update to this post – the link’s at the bottom.
In this, the 5th in my series on how to promote your site for free, I’m going to take a look at Social Network Marketing. This, itself, is a big subject, so I won’t be covering it all today!
You may have heard the term ‘Bum Marketing’ it was a term coined by one of the first people I followed when I got into Internet Marketing: Travis Sago.
Social Network Marketing is just another name for Bum Marketing – why?
Because they’re both about marketing your website through establishing an online footprint and attracting visitors without spending any money.
Both of the last two topics I covered, Forum Marketing and Article Marketing, fall under the definition of Social Network (Bum) Marketing, because they’re both ways of establishing and growing your online footprint.
Here’s another way:
Create as much web real estate of your own as you can and link it back to your main site.
What do I mean by ‘web real estate’?
Your own pages on the different Web 2.0 sites. Sites like Squidoo, Hub Pages, Pownce, Tumblr, Digg, Facebook, Mixx, Mashable, LinkedIn, Plaxo and more.
There are literally hundreds of these social sites where you can set up your own account, have your own page, put up your own information and write or post your own articles.
Each one encourages you to set up your own profile, offers you the opportunity to link to your site or your blog and encourages you to get involved in the community.
The more of these that you can set up the bigger your online footprint becomes.
But here’s the thing: back in the article on Forum Marketing I talked about the need to establish your credibility and authority – to become trusted within the community – and exactly the same principle applies to every web real estate property you put up.
I cannot over-stress the importance of making sure that you provide value to the community you’re part of.
Here are some examples of things I do:
On LinkedIn I answer questions in the Q & A section on a regular basis. I also make sure that I make introductions and generally network with others.
On Squidoo I have some lenses that contain valuable guides and tips or pointers on how to do things. And, although I don’t do it as often as I should, I keep those lenses updated.
On Digg I make sure to visit every day and Digg up a few articles (as long as I like them!).
On Del.icio.us I set my bookmark RSS feed as Public Domain and make sure that I organize and bundle my tags so that others can easily find their way around.
You get the picture..! This is not set and forget. It’s a commitment to establishing yourself within the online community, in much the same way as you would if you moved to a new real-world community.
You’re probably thinking now that this sounds like a lot of work. It is!
It takes time and effort to create your footprint and build up the momentum. But once you do so, the momentum is powerful and will bring you a lot of targeted visitors.
And there are ways you can reduce the amount of time and effort you need to put in. Effective use of my blog’s RSS feed is one method I use to disseminate my content as widely as I can, without having to re-write and re-post everything multiple times.
Another way is to get yourself organised. Set up a weekly schedule that has you working on 3 – 5 of your social sites each day, writing new ‘cornerstone’ content two or 3 times a week and so on. Make a schedule and stick to it.
By ‘cornerstone’ content I mean meaningful articles giving good solid content that you can post on your blog or post to article directories. In addition, you can make short blog posts which serve as more of a ‘heads up’ to your readers – and you can do these every day or as often as you have something to bring to their attention.
The first step in Social Network Marketing, then, is to establish your accounts at as many Web 2.0 sites as you can (or want to!). Set up your profile in full and make sure you link back to your blog or your main site – which ever you’re trying to drive traffic to.
Think of the Web 2.0 sites as a funnel, attracting traffic and directing it to your blog. And, again: be sure to add value to all of the sites you join! If you don’t, your efforts will be entirely wasted.
If you think this information may be valuable leave us a comment with your thoughts (or questions) on Social Network Marketing.
Update 27 April 2009.
Given the way Social Network Marketing has evolved over the past year, and the changes in the way I do it, I wrote an update post on it. You can find it here.
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{ 2 comments }
Hi,
Good article. It seems to me that the only way to promote website is to write good quality articles.
Hi Jesvin,
Well – it’s not the only way! But it’s a good way of establishing a lot of links back to your site.
As I mentioned in one of the earliest posts in this series, a lot of links back to your site is the basis for good off-site SEO – and, therefore, good results in the search engines.
Cheers,
Martin.
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