If you do a web search for definitions of Web 2.0 you’re likely to get a bit overwhelmed. Don’t get concerned – its impact, especially in terms of Social Bookmarking and Social Networking, is indeed overwhelming for business. Social Bookmarking for traditional or network marketing businesses is allowing them to grow at previously unseen rates by rapidly identifying or developing “social networks” of peers and prospects, finally providing the marketing and relationship building tools the internet has always promised.
The terms “Web 2.0” and “Social Bookmarking” or “Social Networking” were created by those who were describing a paradigm shift in the way people use the internet for both personal and business pursuits.
To Simplify: Web 2.0 Is a User Involved Internet Experience
The internet is no longer a digital library that we visit to read; it is an ever changing and responding archive we are impacting with every action we take.
Sure, internet users have always been able to contribute to the old 1.0 library in that we could buy a domain and build a website or contribute on bulletin boards or forums – but 2.0 sites take things farther. Websites that incorporate 2.0 principles literally respond and can change shape according to the needs and input of its users.
What do you think of when someone uses the term ‘Web Two Point Oh”?
Blogging? RSS? Tagging? Comments? Social Bookmarking? Social Networking?
These are all aspects of 2.0 and we will look at them individually in a moment.
How Do You Incorporate 2.0 Tactics In Your Online Business?
To embrace 2.0 in your online business you’ll approach it from two directions.
- From an internal point of view, you’ll create a web presence that is designed to interact and respond (technical “stuff”) to users.
- From an external point of view, you’ll want to come out from behind your website and have an active presence where your target market can be found (Social Bookmarking).
What Makes Web 2.0 and Social Bookmarking Possible?
First, don’t let the terminology and technology get in your way. If you either can’t or don’t want to understand it on your own, there are resources out there that are more than happy to assist your progress into the 2.0 world. In the past, building a web presence involved creating an ‘online brochure’ or ‘website store front’, a site that visitors could come to learn from or buy from. Interaction was rare and usually involved calling a telephone number or sending an email.
Today’s technology makes it possible for a website to be truly interactive.
For example, Customer Service scripts allow site owners to monitor visitor’s movements on their website. Contact can be initiated by the visitor or the site’s representative to ask or offer answers to questions.
Many ecommerce websites, including massive Amazon.com, have made it easy for users to create wish lists and recommendation lists that other users can view and respond to. The sites even incorporate ratings scripts, allowing website users to give an instant thumbs up or thumbs down on books and products. Not only are user reviews asked for, they also ask other users if the review was helpful or not. Every step of the user’s experience is molded by the last step taken.
Dynamic Content Changes Everything
In a CMS (Content Management System) content is managed by a database and can be accessed via RSS (Really Simple Syndication).
Keeping things basic, RSS is a file created by your CMS that makes your content “broadcast-able.” This lets your online content reach out beyond the pages of your website to touch users wherever they access the RSS feed.
There are a wide variety of RSS directories that allow users to search for content they are interested in. Users can also subscribe to your specific RSS feed through a feed catcher or by subscribing through a web-based feed service that will allow them to track feeds of their own choosing.
RSS also allows for the use of tags. Tags identify the topic of the content and are a large part of what makes using RSS so attractive. Entire websites have been developed around scripts that search RSS feeds for common tags. You can visit a site like Technorati (http://technorati.com/tag/ ) and see which tags are being used most in real time in the form of a “Tag Cloud.” The larger words and phrases indicate the tags that are being used more often.
Technorati and similar services also allow users to set up RSS enabled search strings that will notify them as soon as content is posted on topics that interest them.
Good Grief, What Does This Mean?
What this means is that there is now far more to attracting your target market than ranking in search engines. If you use RSS enabled web pages and make sure that your RSS feeds are submitted to as many RSS directories as possible, your target market now has far more ways to find you than merely “googling.”
Beyond RSS, a CMS based website or blog (a blog is a CMS) provides an interactive element that allows users to make comments on your site content. Any level of privacy can be chosen, from letting anyone post comments, to requiring user registration.
Comments build content for you – and provide you with valuable user feedback, both good and bad.
Plug-ins and modifications for many CMS systems invite even more interaction. Polls gain information from users. Forums invite the formation of a community. The options are increasing all the while and if you don’t find something that does what you want, you can hire a freelance programmer to create something for you.
Social Bookmarking
Sites like Delicious (http://del.icio.us/) provide us with a way to share our favorite links and blog posts with others. Instead of adding a ‘favorite’ to your browser, you create a bookmark in your Delicious account. You can then make your list public to others and see how many others have also bookmarked a particular resource.Items that get a lot of bookmarks rise up in popularity and gain exposure on the website.
Digg (http://www.digg.com) allows users to add stories to the site so that other users can give it a vote of confidence (digg it) and if it gets enough diggs, it rises in popularity and hopefully reaches the main page. Top stories get discussed on the popular Diggnation podcast.
OnlyWire (http://www.onlywire.com/) has a large list of social bookmarking sites and provides you with a way to add items to all of them at once if you have accounts with them.
Enough of that! Why should I care? The External (Customer) Point of View…
Web 2.0 Social Bookmarking allows for greater connectivity over greater distances than ever before.
You can find a friend, a spouse, an employee, a new boss, a business partner…just about anything.
The key to initiating and benefiting from successful connections online is seeking out the right networking environment.
Social Bookmarking – The Latest Business Building Tool!
Social Bookmarking is the primary aspect of Web 2.0 that has made social networking easy and that is allowing savvy online marketers to network with peers and prospects to build big business quickly.
Social Networks of every kind have popped up on the web, making interaction and connection easier than most would have imagined possible just five years ago.
Social Networking allows users to initiate relationships for friendship, romance, information, entertainment, and careers. Most importantly (for our purposes, anyway) Social Networking is used to foster and grow business relationships.
Here is a quick overview of some of the most highly traveled Social Networks on the web today.
Linked In – http://www.linkedin.com
This site’s purpose is to equip members with the means to grow a list of people (Connections) they meet and learn to trust in business. As your list of connections develops you can view their connections (known as 2nd degree connections) and ask them to help you with an introduction.
Linked In is used to locate work, make new business partnerships, find employees or freelancers, etc.
Xing http://www.xing.com
XING is a multilingual business network. They offer personal profiles, groups, forums, events, and other social networking features. Basic membership is free but full features are only available to premium members.
Ryze – http://www.ryze.com
Ryze is a widely used business network that allows you to create a page for free that can be customized with your own HTML. You can activate a guest book that lets other users comment and you can also communicate with each other via private messages. Gold and Platinum level members can host networks and set limitations on who can contact them based on level of membership.
Networks incorporate traits of an email list and a forum and network owners can communicate with their networks through broadcast emails.
Meet Up – http://www.meetup.com
Meetup.com is an online social networking site that helps members connect via offline meetings all around the globe. You can find groups by searching for a common interest and your ZIP code or city out of the US. You can find MeetUp events even in smaller communities.
My Space – http://www.myspace.com
MySpace is famous for social networking. The website offers users the ability to create highly interactive web profiles and a network of friends to share it with. They can post to blogs, participate in groups, share photos, music and videos.
Since MySpace is ranked as the fifth most visited website on Alexa.com and because it is relatively easy to create a large network of contacts using automated tools like ‘adder bots’, MySpace is constantly targeted by social network spammers. (Even though using these bots are against the MySpace terms of service.)
Friendster (http://www.friendster.com), Bebo (http://www.bebo.com) and Facebook (http://www.facebook.com)
These sites are all similar to MySpace in that they attract a young crowd focused on making social connections and are generally unfriendly to business networking.
Windows Live Spaces http://spaces.live.com/
Live Spaces looks and feels quite a lot like MySpace. You can create a profile, post to a blog, post photos and videos, make connections, etc.
Yahoo 360 http://360.yahoo.com/
Yahoo 360 again, has a similar feel to most of the other social networking sites out there, but if you’re using Yahoo Mail or a member of any Yahoo Groups you’ll soon find that your 360 connects you with these areas, making it quite useful
An exhaustive list of social networking sites can be found here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_social_networking_websites
What about Squidoo?
Squidoo (http://www.squidoo.com) is certainly a Social Networking website but it does differ from most of the resources listed above in that it focuses on the creation of valuable web content more than on the development of individual connections.
Squidoo members create “lenses,” as many as they like, to display their expertise on the subject and in many cases, to draw traffic to their individual projects. Squidoo lenses can be monetized in a variety of ways.
Lenses can be tweaked to allow commenting and Lens Masters can connect their lenses through Groups according to the topic of content they are focusing on.
How do I decide where to network?
It is time consuming to build a worthwhile presence on any of the above networks so it would be a mistake to jump into all of them at once. It’s smarter to take one at a time and give it your focused attention for a period of time.
If you have a multifaceted business, you should choose one aspect of your business to highlight and promote on a network. Profile pages that list every business you’re involved in and every website you own is not likely to be effective as visitors are faced with too many choices.
The Good, the Bad & the Ugly of Social Networking for the Internet Marketer
Business owners in the offline world know the value of networking. There are many opportunities locally, nationally and worldwide for meeting new people who share similar business interests and will benefit from these contacts.
The value of networking only increases when you take it online. It’s easier to reach more people and it usually costs far less.
There are a wide variety of networking opportunities on the web – as you’ve seen from the list above, some are free and some come with features that involve a fee to use.
Good networking opportunities bring you into contact with those who are potential:
- Customers
- List Subscribers
- Source of Word of Mouth Referrals
- Affiliates
- Cooperative Partners
- Media Contacts
Good networking behavior includes:
- Showing interest in others.
- Asking questions that help you to learn about your target market.
- Offering to help others with useful introductions when possible.
- Answering questions when appropriate.
- Respecting moderators and rules.
Bad networking behavior includes:
- Only talking about you.
- Spamming with links or ads.
- Offering non-constructive criticism.
Ugly networking behavior includes:
- Pushing business opportunities on those who haven’t asked for info.
- Harvesting contact information without permission.
- Flaming competitors.
Online networking can move beyond interaction on social networking sites. There are a growing number of opportunities for networking via audio and even video through services like Skype (http://www.skype.com), Co-Op World (http://www.coopworld.com) and Go To Meeting (http://www.gotomeeting.com).
Measure Results and Embrace Limits
Social Networking can be addicting, especially for those who are otherwise spending a lot of time working alone on a computer. Take care that you don’t lose track of time and end up spending more valuable business hours on it than you should.
Take steps that will let you measure the results of your networking efforts. Use special landing pages, ad trackers or redirect links to count the number of responses to a particular offer you promoted.
If you’ve spent five hours each month networking to promote a particular project, yet haven’t seen related subscribers or purchases – it’s time to re-evaluate what you’re doing. You may be networking in the wrong places or if you are reaching your target market, you may have just learned that they don’t want or need what you have to offer.
I Don’t Have Time For This!
Don’t let a lack of time keep you from benefiting from Web 2.0. Many aspects can be outsourced, or you can find an online partner that already has a Web 2.0 system in place.
In point of fact, you found this article via a Web 2.0 technique.
If you would like further information or the opportunity to partner with an online marketing group already employing Social Bookmarking and Social Networking techniques and profitably positioned within a growing, recession-proof industry, feel free to look over our business. Today’s online world requires business people to be marketing savvy. You don’t have to reinvent the wheel or go it alone.
