All New CommentMILK Version 1.0Social Marketing Needs to Start Somewhere - Day 14 of COWpetition
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IMPORTANT –> Before we go too far in this post we need to stress that please do not think that a contest is the only way to go. A contest is great but look at the most talked about items on sites like Digg.com, there are very few contests and in fact at this moment chances are none of the stories have anything to do with a contest. The reason we are saying this is because often times when we are training people, they simply duplicate the exact steps we are doing and this is a HUGE mistake. You need to look at the market you are in and make a plan but MOST important of all is to make it YOUR plan. You need to look at your market and go where they are talking and find out what they are talking about.
In the previous post we talked about getting the criteria of the contest on our link bait page ready, now it is time to start dropping seeds about the contest in different areas. This is where we start tapping into various different “Web 2.0″ communities and getting involved with like minded people. This part of the job is where we see a lot of people really drop the ball, they get lazy and do a half ass job and only see a tiny fraction of the results they should. You see each of these communities we are about to get involved in are very picky and do not take kindly to internet marketers trying to spam them to death. That means that you need to become an authentic part of their community before you can tapping into them or you need to find someone that is and get them to help you out. If you just join the community and then post a link directly to your blog and tell everyone to check out this great site, you will be completely ignored.
If you plan to use your own profile then another point to consider is the markets you are in. Often people tend to build blogs on different niches and this can pose a problem, imagine going to a site like FaceBook and seeing “John Cow” owner of JohnCow.com , GamerzReviewz.com and FrillyScrapBooking.com. You would look at this and probably have a few questions and if you were looking for something in the scrapbooking market then you would probably have some doubts that the person in the profile was who you were wanting guidance from in this market. Now, if we created a Facebook profile for our wife and had her name tied to the Scrapbooking site, that would be better. Oh and let me apologize right now to any of you guys out there reading this that are passionate scrapbookers, we are sure your frilly scrapbooks would make even my gramma envious… don’t let us discourage your manly passion (hey we actually kept a straight face while writing that).
OK, so now we needed to start listing the communities we were already a part of and remember one of the reasons we picked this market was because it was something we were familiar with and because of that we had profiles already established in some of these communities that matched up nicely with our new blog. So we listed the communities we were already a part of and then listed the communities that we were not part of and then needed to figure out how to tap into them. This actually turned out to be MUCH easier then you would think because of the strategy we used for getting writers… since the authors are real gamers, we simply requested their help.
NOTE –> If you do not already have established accounts in these communities, take your time and build them. Add real pictures and do not leave blanks, the first hint of a spammer is an unfinished profile.
IMPORTANT –> Do NOT add your own posts to these communities as recommendations. What we mean is it is fine to put your blog in your profile but do not digg your own pages. There are loads of people on Digg that will report this the moment they see it, they hate this kind of activity. What you can do however is ask people to digg the article for you. Now this might sound a little hypocritical that you can not post your own page but you can “ask” someone else to do it for you, but that is just the way it is. This was easily accomplished by simply asking the authors to digg the page and hopefully once the seed was planted, it was healthy enough to grow on its own after that.
Some of the communities we used were…
- MyBlogLog
- Digg
- Stumbleupon
- Mixx
- Bumpzee
Now we used more then this but we are not listing them and that is because we want you to think for yourself. Go to Google and find sites like these but that are targeted directly to your market.
Using Press Releases:
Press Releases in our opinion are one of the most effective paid promotion tools available. This of course is 100% dependant on the quality of the content and of course the value of the story. You could have a fantastic press release but if the story it references is boring then it is a complete waste of time. The service we use is PRWeb (http://www.prweb.com) and we only use it when we have something of value to tell our market about. If you have a brand new blog, a press release is a great way to get the news out and like the example of GamerzReviewz, having a contest to celebrate the grand opening helped to make the news that much more exciting.
The draw back of using PRWeb is they are pretty expensive but the exposure of linking that you get is HUGE. Your press release gets distributed to major high authority sites and the credibility of your blog in the eyes of Google absolutely skyrockets.
A lot of marketers talk about using the Yahoo Directory (which costs $299) but in our opinion that is something to do once your blog has proven itself. We never pay to get added to the Yahoo directory until we see that it is turning a profit and if you only have so much to spend then use a press release. Now, this does not mean we do not recommend Yahoo Directory, in fact we highly recommend it but once again not until your blog has started generating revenue. The yahoo directory will give a great deal of added credibility and exposure to your blog.
With PRWeb the more you pay, the more exposure you get and also in order to be able to use keyword anchor text in your release you have to pay for one of the premium packages. This is very powerful, as you are getting keyword anchor text to your blog from extremely high authority sites.
In our next post we are going to continue on about announcing our contest in different areas of the web and then after that we will get into our joint venture process.
Hope you enjoyed this post and please post below any comments or questions you have about this post.
PS –> Over the next few months we are going to be sharing how we use different web 2.0 sites but there is no way we are able to go into detail in these posts on that, as each site would a full post and how to use Facebook is a series by itself.
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Social Networking definitely helps bring in traffic, of course to keep even small percentages of that traffic, you have to be bringing them in to great content. My blog is barely a month old, and most of my traffic has come thus far from social networking.
Mr Pappagiorgios last blog post..TEN THINGS: EP1: Great Movies People Didn’t See
I am also a new blogger and I do get traffic from social sites. Completing my profile and being involved in the community has made the most difference. I have now added share/save buttons to my posts and people have been doing that to whatever network they are on. I wonder though if it’s better to have several/each specific button (facebook, digg, technorati, etc.) rather than an all in one. It seems like it could get so cluttered. What do you think?
Loving the posts, John. I am still learning the wordpress.org stuff since I transferred to a self-hosted site, but little by little, it’s happening. My brain hasn’t exploded..YET! And, I am becoming the plug-in/widget queen. LOL! Thanks for all the help.
Together, we are stronger.
Vicki Flaugher, the original SmartWoman
This is my first visit to your Blog John and I have to say I am very impressed…
It Looks as if you try to Pay It Forward in your writings, such as myself. Thanks for the info on PR, brilliant…
The Freedom Guy
Looks like a solid idea. I think that using a service like facebook to market a website like gamerzreviewz is pretty ineffective… unless you are just using it to run ads. I just don’t buy it, but it’s a solid idea if it works for you. What I really enjoyed was your idea about PRweb.com. I hadn’t heard of that website, and really like the notion of getting a press release in a reputable publication.
Actually we completely disagree but have to admit we have not had time to focus on it. A solid strategy is to build a group and let it go viral and grow and then when over 1500 request to change it over to a page so you can keep communicating with everyone. Facebook is actually very effective. We wil be sharing a cool facebook strategy in a couple weeks.
Each post of yours is awesome. Thanks for the information about PRWEB, nice way to promote in respectable way.
I have tried to promote my blog on social community, but I guess I haven’t spend much time onto it, to get the benefits. This post is really helpful.
Thanks John
Prasads last blog post..MyBlogLog verification
Probably have to buy a big big dry erase board for all strategies & plans :).
Thanks for your valuable posts.
Prasads last blog post..MyBlogLog verification
I’m really enjoying these posts, both the content and the style. Makes it very easy to follow, even though there is a lot to take in. I’ve never really got into Facebook, but your ideas have opened my eyes up to the possibilities. I’ll give it a try.
Keep up the good work!
Chris
Chriss last blog post..Profiting from Mini Sites
I find social marketing takes a lot of time for not much return… maybe I’m doing it wrong?
I’ll keep reading John’s posts and learn.
Cheers
Ian McConnell
Getting Ahead In Life
IEarnWhileISleeps last blog post..The Internet Marketing Center And Derek Gehl Make Me Mad
Awesome, never knew about PRweb. I’ll definitely be using them. I’ll probably use the top package.
Jasons last blog post..Quick Update on Trend Spike
Great info, I didn’t know about some of those.
I like the scrapbook reference too