This is probably a term most people have heard of but don’t have an idea of why or how they should use these sites. The name leads you to the purpose though not quite a good grasp of the “why” you should care. So as the name implies rather than a place to store a document or an image, it is a place to collect a link from the web you may want to reference, promote, or share with others. In a simple sense most social media sites “bookmark” links you share. Though they are used to do more than bookmark, they invite you to add commentary about the item. Many websites that started as a simple way to actually bookmark place of interest to you have become more social as time has gone on. Making much of the social bookmarking sites social media sites but the function is still there.
Regardless of what they are known by, these sites serve as a place to create a link to whatever it is you want someone else to find. By the nature of the way they operate it creates a backlink to the site you submit. When used as a way to promote your website it can provide valuable links which can increase the relevance of your site in search ranking and bring traffic to your website. I should point out that ONLY bookmarking your site is probably not the most effective use of social bookmarking, but if the alternative is do nothing, I would certainly rather you bookmark your website. This form of internet marketing would be best used by someone who has a strategy of blogging (content creating) & distributing it as widely as possible.
The issue faced by many is the labor it takes to distribute their original content to the various sites available. To which i do sincerely sympathize with. The amount of companies that allow you to bookmark information runs into the hundreds and many even thousands. This seems like a daunting task to many small business owners. What if I don’t choose the right ones? Many will see the two giant issues and retreat to the sidelines instead choosing to do nothing. This would be the wrong approach. You would miss entirely the benefit this strategy can bring to your web traffic.
Now I am not the one to tell you that this service by itself, is going to change your zipcode. I did mention that it is most effective when you are providing unique content to your site didn’t I? If your already spending time, energy, or money to have blogs written you owe it to yourself to make sure they don’t sit unread. Again this in itself is not a panacea, so with that in mind you need to approach it with that perspective. What if you could post to 50 of them at the same time with one post? If those included some of the most well known and most used sites like Facebook, twitter, Delicious, Digg, Vine and others? That would have immense value wouldn’t it? An easy way to actually do it with an extra 5 minutes of work. Of course the next question is at what price? Would it be valuable to you for $100/year? Luckily there is such a software program that offers this exact service for less than that. Only Wire has a truly awesome program you can use for under $100 per year, actually for only $60 a year! I would say this service in absolute invaluable to any small business who has content to distribute and worth it’s weight in gold.
If I haven’t convinced you of why you should use this easy to use program, I will keep at it. My next blog post will cover it in detail and explain how easy and simple it is to use. And a great feature that once you spend a couple hours setting it all up, will actually do this for you almost without effort for the rest of the year!