Here’s how it works.

Delicious, like other social bookmarking sites, stores links you save. But there are some features that make me like it more than others. First, I can create my own tags for the links. This is important to me because I can group links together in a way that makes sense to me or that represents how I plan on using the links in the future. Second, you can choose if a link is stored publicly or privately.

Let me illustrate the beauty of Delicious with a personal example.

My mom has an online business selling a product. It’s a rather expensive, but highly beneficial, product that takes a lot of interaction with a client before a sale is made. She has numerous links that she shares with people regularly containing pertinent information regarding her product and the need it fills. She also happens to be visiting us in Tennessee this week, without her laptop. As she has tried to conduct business while here, she has spent extra time looking for those links again because they are all saved on her laptop which she didn’t bring.

I explained Delicious to her and she immediately recognized what a time-saver it would be to have access to your favorite links from any computer. This is one more way to feel the freedom of blogging for income. You’re not tied to a location nor are you tied to your own computer. Feels great, right!

How it affects traffic

Many people need to bookmark your post in Delicious before it makes the front page and really brings in traffic. Vandelay Design recently published a post on using social bookmarking sites to increase traffic. He shows a great strategy for getting to the front page of Delicious, among other beneficial places to get your post showcased. I suggest reading his post and following his strategy.

photo credit: topgold

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Here’s how it works

You sign up for an account with StumbleUpon. You fill out your profile including keywords related to your interests. Now you have two options.

• Option 1: Let StumbleUpon show you different sites people have liked that are related to your keywords. Simply click Like It! if you want to see more posts along the same lines or Thumbs Down if it’s not for you. Then stumble onto the next website.
• Option 2: Go out to your favorite blogs and websites and add them to StumbleUpon. You can choose to add a review to the page when you stumble it.

Here’s how it affects traffic

Typically when a post or page on your site is stumbled, you’ll see a dramatic increase in traffic within minutes. It’s amazing how quickly the traffic pours in. It’s great to be stumbled! The down side is that this traffic often bounces. You get a lot of traffic, but they don’t tend to stick around. A few people will hang out and click around your site or follow a link in your post, but don’t expect many people to do this kind of browsing on your site. Most people who use StumbleUpon are in pure surfing mode and are poised to click the “Stumble” button, not the “post a comment” button.

Is it worth it?

Yes, it’s worth it! Even if only a handful of people browse your site and even fewer subscribe to your RSS feed, that’s still more than zero. Plus it keeps track of sites you find and like so you can refer back to them later when you want to link to them in a post.

Additional Features

You can add friends in StumbleUpon and then subscribe to their StumbleUpon RSS feed so you can see what sites they are interested in. You can advertise your site through StumbleUpon. Based on a pay-per-click model, you can drive traffic to your site by asking StumbleUpon to specifically send people to you. Once a few people have given you positive reviews, be sure to remove your site from the advertisement pool so that you don’t continue to pay for traffic that can now be generated from the previous positive reviews.
photo credit: topgold

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What Is Social Bookmarking?

You’re surfing through the Internet. You find a blog and follow a link to another blog which links to another blog with a super perfect and timely post. You want to capitalize on this information in your own blog. You leave a great comment introducing yourself and find another interesting blog in the comments. You click on that link which leads to another link and before you know it, you have moved several blogs away from that awesome post. You try to retrace your steps but you can’t find that post anywhere.

Social bookmarking is the solution to this problem! You can add that amazing post to one of several sites dedicated to keeping track of what you like online. Instead of cluttering up your toolbar or creating a bookmark menu a mile long, you are able to keep track of all these places you want to visit again through an online site. Thus you’ve bookmarked your find.

The social aspect comes because now you can share your list of bookmarks with friends, fellow bloggers, the entire online community. You can help promote posts, products or any other content that you feel is important and beneficial in some way. You are interacting with people, engaging them in your online community.

This sharing also provides links to pages and helps them get indexed by search engines. It also drives traffic to those pages because people are interested in what others are finding of value online. Can you see the potential for driving traffic to your own site? But, it’s not as effective if you are the only one bookmarking your sites or if you’re only bookmarking your own sites. Invite others to bookmark your post and bookmark others’ sites, too.

Social media is about connecting with people and sharing valuable content. Social bookmarking is just another way to connect with your community and build relationships that lead to trust.

Pop Quiz!

• Name three social bookmarking sites. No research, just off the top of your head.
• Extra credit if you already have accounts with them!

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This video is a couple years old so we now have Twitter in the limelight while MySpace has lost popularity blog promotion.

Prior to watching this video, I hadn’t considered how our social network’s potential is hidden in real life.

For me, my local community is an important place to build readership and work with local brands. I need to be more proactive in uncovering these networks when I can’t access them on Facebook or Twitter.

What potential are you overlooking in your social network?

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Here are a few of my favorites

1. Commenting on each other’s blogs: They left comments that added to the discussion. They found that other people coming to the post were more likely to leave comments. The also realized that they were improving their writing because they knew these other experts in the niche would be reading and commenting on their posts.
2. Linking to one another: They linked to each other’s posts when they were relevant to their own readership. They could suggest a link that they wanted exposure for each week and if it was relevant on another blog, they’d help promote it. They found they were getting 2-3 links a week which significantly helped their google ranking.
3. Guest posting: They would post on each other’s blogs as a way to help each other out if one was on vacation. This helped them get exposure with different readers and build a relationship with them.
4. Monetization leads: The share a lot of information surrounding their monetization efforts. They tell each other when they sign up for a new affiliate program, how much they are making and how well it’s working. They also share what they are doing to improve their affiliate sales. One other thing they do I found really unique. They introduce each other to the advertisers they are working with. Instead of having a competitive result, these advertisers are often interested in working with several of the blogs.

Kim at Sophisticated Dorkiness wrote about how these alliances are natural for book bloggers. This community seems to be a very collaborative group where most of them blog as a hobby. She mentioned a comment from Jackie that really hit home for me. Jackie “pointed out that women sort of naturally make groups, she said it’s funny that men have to organize them.”

I agree that women naturally find friends in their niche find ways to work together. I was happy to see that I had done a few things on the list so I know I’m headed in the right direction. But, there’s more that can be done if we come together and help each other.

Do you know who you would start a blogging alliance with?

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As we visit each place, networking and building relationships with readers and fellow bloggers, we want people to know who we are from place to place. I want people to know that I am Amber Passey on Twitter and that I’m that same Amber Passey on Facebook.

There are two easy things you can do to be consistent which will help people recognize you as they move from community to community. By the way, as people connect with you in different communities they are able to see all the sides of you, your blog and your business. This builds trust as they see you be consistent in your values and behavior.

Step One: Choose the Same User Name

As you sign up for different communities, choose the same user name or ID to have appear next to your activity in the community. You can choose your name or your blog name. There are merits to each depending on your goals. But for branding yourself, the important key is to be consistent.

I use the same user name whenever that user name is available (which it has been so far every time I’ve signed up for a new community.) When people see the same user name in two different places it rings a bell and they feel connected to that person because they’ve seen that name before.

Step Two: Use the Same Picture

To solidify the connection people make between communities when you have the same user name, always use the same picture. Again, this could be a picture of you or the button or logo for your blog. In social media, though, it’s about connecting with people so I would lean toward a personal picture rather than your logo.

Seeing the same picture with the same user name eliminates any question about you being the same person in each community. You now have a brand that people will recognize. As you participate in these communities and people get to know you, they will begin to trust your opinions and recommendations.

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A while back Twitter parties hit their peak of popularity and then were criticized by severely for a variety of reasons. Namely that Twitter parties increase the number of conversations during a set time thus “polluting” the Twitter stream with irrelevant content. Another gripe is that Twitter parties promote brands in an ineffective way and just bug the people not interested in participating. One final complaint I saw a lot was that people participating in Twitter parties were often rude or aloof to questions about the Twitter party.

I explain all this so you understand the reputation these parties have developed for themselves in order that you can make an informed choice about attending or not attending a Twitter party. While I understand to some extent the complaints I’ve mentioned regarding Twitter parties, I believe there is merit to them, especially for Twitter users trying to find people to have conversations with.

How to Attend a Twitter Party

Refreshing your home page at Twitter.com is not going to cut it given the speed at which Twitter parties travel through the Twitter stream. My favorite way to attend a Twitter party is with TweetGrid.com. Choose a 1×3 grid to help you follow the conversation better. In the first column enter the hashtag of the party (e.g., #gno). In the second column enter From:”TwitterID” of the host  and panel members of the party. In the third column enter @”yourTwitterID” to see when people talk to you.

How to Participate in a Twitter Party

To follow the main conversation, refer to your middle column where you’ll see what the panel members and host are saying. You can respond to the questions posed there or make comments on the answers the panel give. to respond, hover your cursor over the tweet in the box. Blue arrows will appear in the bottom along with some other symbols. Click on the left-pointing arrow and it will put the @”username” in the Tweet box for you. If you click the right-pointing arrow, it will retweet the message by putting the message in the Tweet box for you then you just Tweet!

Use the left column to see what other attendees are saying. Find comments that you have soemthing to add to, even if it’s just “Me, too!” and reply to them. this helps get you into a conversation. It’s not necessary to talk to everyone at the party. Look for tweets that seem to match your personality and reply to those people. Just like social networking in real life, you need to be interesting and add to the conversation. This will encourage people to respond to you and engage in conversation with you.

Look for people talking to you in the third column. Here you’ll see people talking to you or responding to your tweets to them. The benefit of a Twitter party is to find new people to engage in conversation with on Twitter. Try to keep the conversation going.

What to Do After the Party

Go back through your tweets and follow the people you sent @replies to. Then, and most importantly, go through your @replies and follow all the people who talked to you. This is how you acknowledge your conversation with them and say, “Hey, I thought you were interesting. I’m going to remember who you are so we can chat in the future.” Then, be sure to read their tweets from time to time and respond to them. Also, feel free to initiate conversations with your new acquaintances so they can become friends and allies in your online world.

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It’s a great introduction to Social Media and will serve as a solid foundation for exploring this topic more in depth.

How do you participate in social media?

• Do you blog, podcast or vlog?
• Do you provide feedback?
• Do you use feedback to improve your business?

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1. Choose Twitter ID

There’s a choice to make here. Do you use your personal name or your blog’s name for your Twitter ID? there are pros and maybe some cons to each. I use my name because I feel most like myself that way. Also, I want to be known as an expert in my niche and I want people to know MY name, not just my blog.

Using your blog name helps build the brand of your blog. It helps people connect that you on Twitter is the same as you on your blog. However, Twitter IDs are only 15 characters long so you may need to do some tweaking.

Speaking of character length. Here are a few things to keep in mind. Longer names are harder to remember, especially if they include numbers that appear random. You may know that 985 is your anniversary, but no one else does and will therefore have a harder time remembering the numbers. Also, shorter names leave more characters for conversation. This is particularly important when you ask people to retweet.

2. Add Your Website

Once you click through the pages on adding followers, you are directed to your Home page. In the top menu bar on the right click on Settings. Here you’ll add your website. This is important for getting Twitter followers/potential followers to visit your blog. Avoid using a MySpace page and never, never, NEVER use your Twitter page as your website.

3. Add Your One Line Bio

Describe yourself in 160 characters. Don’t be too fancy, but please make it readable. Long lists of hobbies or areas of expertise don’t draw me in. Say something unique about you. Also include what topics you like to discuss.

While on this tab you can also add your location. This is important if you are building a network based on where you live. If you want to be invited to those cool blogger events, people need to know where you live! I am also turned off of a profile when the location is sarcastic or overly general: the universe, for example.

4. Add Your Profile Picture

This is so incredibly important, I cannot stress it enough. Add your pic. Before you tweet. Before you follow people. Add that picture! Click on the Picture tab at the top of the Setting page. Upload a pic that you like. If you don’t have one, use your computer’s camera and take one now. It’s that important.

As I mentioned earlier, I look at all this information when making the decision about following someone. I’ll give a new Tweep a chance if they have this filled out and match my interest, even if they don’t have many tweets yet.

5. Set Up TweetBeep

TweetBeep is a nifty little service that sends you an email notification if someone sends you and @ message on Twitter. Twitter sends you an email if someone sends you a DM, but as far as I know, TweetBeep is the only way to know that someone said something to you publicly on Twitter without checking your Twitter home page. In fact, you can set up notification for any information that’s tweeted that you want to know about.

Finally You’re Ready to Start Tweeting

Now you may send our your first tweet. Make it interesting. Make it relevant to your blog audience since that’s who you’re hoping to attract on Twitter. It’s also great to start with a conversation. Shows you know people on Twitter and lends a bit of authority and authenticity to your presence. If you’re just starting, you can talk to me, @ajpassey, in your first tweet. I’ll respond, I promise! Even if it’s not your first, you can talk to me {wink, wink}

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My name is Amber Passey and I am Kelly’s newest intern for this blog.

I have spent the last year learning the ins and outs of using social media to promote my blog and look forward to sharing exciting and effective tips with you over the next ten weeks.

A Little About My Life:

My family recently moved from Utah to Tennessee so my husband could attend medical school at Lincoln Memorial University-DeBusk College of Osteopathic Medicine. He is in his first year and has survived two rounds of tests. I stay home full-time with our two girls, Sammi age 3 and Elli age 1. Sammi just started preschool and is loving it. Elli started walking this past weekend and is ecstatic about her new freedom.

A Little About My Background:

I have studied human development and applied linguistics. I love teaching and have taught at a few universities. I am incredibly social. My mom always received notes from my teachers explaining that I talked too much during lessons. In post-school life this tendency has served me well! I got into blogging professionally last year and have enjoyed the journey.

A Little About My Blogging Life:

Through a completely different ambition, I found my way into the blogging world and landed among a wonderful community of bloggers in Utah. I have learned about various uses of social media from some of the top names and organizations in the industry. I have been invited to red carpet blogger events and other opportunities to promote local businesses.

What I Hope To Share.

I’m excited to share the lessons I’ve learned and the people and organizations who have taught them to me. I’ll be highlighting terrific resources and opportunities to improve the visibility of your blog. I’m excited to help you feel comfortable using social media to develop and promote your brand and your blog.

Did I miss anything? What questions would you like me to address? You can ask me anything about my own life and experiences or anything about blogging and I’ll do my best to get you the best answers possible. I’m looking forward to the next ten weeks. I hope you are, too.

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