Peter Lenkefi asked:




The social media marketing niche is full of hype pipers and hope dopes. Everyday I get a “product launch” email touting the latest WordPress plugin, software app or marketing system, promising BIG traffic or quit-your-day-job ROI.

If you have been around (the internet marketing scene) for even a few months you’ll know just what I am talking about. I am at the point where I am more interested in the way the product is being marketed than what the product is.

I have settled in to a few (mostly free) web 2.0 tools that make my social media marketing work.

So, shut up and tell you what they are already, right? Got it…

VIDEO SYNDICATION

The big gun in video submission is, of course, Traffic Geyser. This is a great service and, besides taking hours to set up and being priced on the high end, works very well at getting you and your silly videos plastered all over the web. However, recently I stumbled upon a free video submission service called TubeMogul that I like quite well, thank you very much.
TubeMogul allows for automated submission to the 12 big video sites all at once. The interface is super-simple. It allows you to add a title, description, tags and category setting to you video. And you can upload as many videos as you want for nada (FREE!).

Check it out at TubeMogul.com.

SOCIAL MEDIA SUBMITTING AND BOOKMARKING

Some of the new folks get confused here so let me briefly explain… Social media marketing calls for lots of “submitting”. One of the mainstays is submitting your post (your story, your article whatever you call your content) to a social media site.

There are really 2 types of sites for post submission. There’s the social bookmarking sites like del.icio.us and technorati which just want you to primarily submit a link and tag. There’s not much voting or browsing of these “bookmarks” going on after you submit.

Then there’s the social news sites like Digg and Propeller. These sites want your link and tags also but you will also need to provide a good description of you post and hope that other vote it up.

So, with that out of the way… On to the freebie.

I have used a few of the paid tools out there to automatically submit to both the social bookmarking sites and the social news sites and, in my opinion, the free tool at SocialMarker.com works better than all of them. You just input your post data, check the sites you want to submit to and arrow through the submissions. “That was easy!”

KEYWORD RESEARCH

Yes, I still do keyword research, I think it is important to keep track of your main keywords and look for variations as new topics come up. I use the free tool from the giant keyword service called Keyword Discovery. The free tool works great for bloggers who are not building 10,000 word PPC campaigns.

IMAGE EDITING

By far, the service I use the most is picnik.com. I always have to crop, resize, fix, etc. the images I need to use. This online editor makes it quick and easy.

VIDEO CAPTURE AND EDITING

Well, this may be a bit advanced for the new folks but just in case you are ready to stick your toes into the video pond, here’s a couple of free tools you’ll need.

First, you will need a good screen capture software. I like the tools from TechSmith, either Camtasia (V3 is free right now) or JingProject.

Once you have you fancy screen capture then head over to Jumpcut.com and start editing. This is an awesome free online editing software that should cost big bucks.

So, there you have it…

The list is not long but, trust me, these free tools will get you f-a-a-a-r in your social media marketing endeavors.

You can try lots of other similar free marketing software, tools and systems; there is an endless number of them that’s for sure.

This is what has worked (and continues to work) for me. Enjoy!

Beer Crafting

Darko Veljovic asked:




Social Marketing

Social sites are very popular place where people collect and share content from anywhere on the web. Catch is if you find something interesting on the web there is a big chance that someone else using the bookmarking website will find it interesting, too. Use a tool called SocialMarker.com to submit to over 46 sites. Chose the group which is in your niche and post some content from your site or blog.

Social bookmarking websites are very popular with the major search engines, so if your blog posts can be found on these social bookmarking sites they will be noticed by the search engines as well.

OnlyWire.com
This is a social bookmarking service that allows you to submit your articles or blog posts to many social bookmarking websites at once When you create an account you’ll simply need to enter the title of the post, a short description, the main keywords that describe your post(tags), and the category that it fits

Stumbleupon.com

StumbleUpon works on the same premise as OnlyWire with difference that there is also a community component so you can add friends to your account and let them see what you’ve been bookmarking. You can form networks of people with similar bookmarking interest, and vote on sites that have been bookmarked.

BlogCatalog.com

BlogCatalog is a social community for bloggers. It is a blog directory where you can search blogs, connect with bloggers, learn more about blogging, attract more blog readers, participate In groups and discussions, find the latest tools for your blog or promote your own blog.

Digg.com

Submitting your blog posts to Digg.com is a high and rapid way for quality traffic. You can create an account to submit your posts which are then interpret and rated by it’s users. By submitting quality and helpful items you can make popularity and be promoted to the front page. Another advantage of Digg is that all information is equivalent when it is submitted. Blogs only become ranked higher by the people who vote for them.

Totally FREE Website content

R. Scott Hall asked:




You know how important social media optimization is but, admittedly, it can be a daunting task trying to keep up with it all. So I thought I’d give you seven simple social media marketing tips you can do regularly to help build your social media network.

1. Contacts. Add 5 new contacts on Facebook or LinkedIn each week. This should take you less than an hour. Fortunately, Facebook and LinkedIn make this easy for you by recommending friends with similar interests. Or you can simply visit the pages of your other Facebook friends and find new friends there to invite. When you send an invitation, include a personal message, such as, “Hi, we are both friends with Jim Miller and have some similar interests and hope you will accept my invitation.”

2. Forum posting. Concentrate on one active forum in your niche and build up your profile and make 3-5 posts per week. Use the PM (Private Message) feature to communicate with other members behind the scenes. But don’t sell to them!
3. Prune your RSS Feeds. Go through your feed reader (Google Reader, Bloglines, etc.) and ruthlessly prune. You’ll find that you don’t read all the blogs you have subscribed to and you should eliminate this clutter so that you aren’t as distracted from your work. Make a list of the top 5 blogs in your niche and read those posts every day and leave at least one comment per week on those five blogs.

4. Yahoo Answers. This isn’t effective for all niches because Yahoo Answers readers tend to be young, but answer 5 Yahoo Answers questions per day in your niche, if appropriate. You’ll quickly notice that most of the people who answer questions aren’t very articulate or don’t provide quality information, so it will be easy for your answers to stand out and get selected as the best answer.

5. Digg away. Spend 15 minutes on Digg each day and try to befriend some of the top Diggers there. Instant message is the best way to keep in touch with them and they usually post that info on their profiles.

6. Focus, focus, focus. Just because there’s a lot of hype about a particular social media site doesn’t mean you should devote time to it. Focus only one the sites that will help you grow your business and don’t get caught up in drama and hype.

7. Be on alert. Check your Google Alerts for your name once a day. If someone has mentioned you in a blog or other website, go and leave a comment or respond in some way.

By following this tips, you should be able to use social media more efficiently and see your business grow as a result.

Beer Crafting

Willy Lim asked:

“Social media marketing…what’s that? Never heard of it in Asia.”

I can almost hear you say that.

That was MY response when I first researched it on Google. I have been using parts of this form of marketing but have never knew the collective term for it.

So What is Social Media Marketing?

I found this rather formal definition on the internet…

“Social Media Marketing (SMM) is a form of internet marketing which seeks to achieve branding and marketing communication goals through the participation in various social media networks.”

After reading it, I’m still confused as to what it is! So I have decided to put it in layman terms for you.

Basically, social media marketing covers all the activities that center around:-

Creating content (articles, videos and audios) on websites or blogs Social interaction within social networking sites like Facebook Sharing videos on You Tube Bookmarking and sharing interesting articles on Digg…. …just to name a few.

Why Do InterNetwork Marketers Need Social Media Marketing?

A lot of people get online onto the internet and become all excited and hyped up about new technologies and forgot all about the “Why?”.

Remember the Dot-Com days? Without a clear focus on bottomlineMany have become Dot-Gone!

In business, network marketing or otherwise, we should never get into anything just because it is the in-thing that everyone else is doing. It would be wise to first evaluate the business implications before investing a huge amount of time and effort into anything.

So how exactly does this social media marketing help us build our network marketing business?

Well, in the offline world, a nicely renovated shop on a busy street will attract lots of customers.

In the online world, however, having a nice flashy website does not attract customers to you…You will need to write lots of relevant content on your website, and leave lots of content footprints everywhere, only then will you attract lots of targeted prospects to your website and opting into your mailing list.

Content creates Traffic. After you have Traffic, you can deepen the relationship and PREsell through emails. You can utilize social interactions within social networking sites to allow people to know you better as a real person. Done correctly, this will position yourself as a solutions provider. It moves your prospects through the process of Knowing You, Liking You and Trusting You. And when your prospects reach the stage of trusting you, Monetization is simply asking for the order

The Anatomy of Social Media Marketing & Where Should You Start?

With so many choices and options and upcoming variants, it’s hard to stay focused and get something productive done!I have recommended below a few areas of social media marketing that I have personally used to build my internetwork marketing business.

1) Website

My website is the centerpiece of my social media marketing strategy and is powered by Site Build It!. This is where I write majority of my content and where majority of my content gets found by Google. If you are wondering why did I choose a Site Build It! website over a Blog, you can find out more by subscribing to my InterNETwork Marketing Newsletter below.

2) Content Sharing Sites

These are sites where you can write articles on a variety of topics. The reason you want to post articles here is because search engines love them and they get found quickly.

I recommend Squidoo and Hubpages, and that you start by learning how to post articles there.

3) Video Sharing

If you have done some searches on Google, you will find that some of the results are videos! Videos are also content (most people miss this one)! People can find your video if they searching for the keyword that you have put into your video’s description.

I recommend You Tube (for short videos) and Google Video (for long videos).

4) Social Networking Sites

These are like those clubs and societies that you have in the real world. People socialize, play games, flirt…whatever in these social networking sites, pretty much like what happens in the real world too! But the best part of these social networking sites is the ability to connect to your friends’ friends’ friends’ friends’ friends (you get the idea?), and keep track of those relationships. This is impossible in the real world.

There is also this function of updating your profile status to let people know what are you doing at the moment. This allows people to “follow” you and know you as a real person. Also, after you have written a new article, you can update your status in your profile with the url and people may actually click to read what you have just written.

I recommend that you start with Facebook, play around with it and make some new friends online! You may also what to check out Twitter, which basically lets you know what other people are doing and tell other what you are doing (it’s fun, just don’t get addicted to it).

5) Social Bookmarking

After you have created so much content, you can share it at social bookmarking sites, so that even more people will find your content and come to your website. I personally used Digg and StumbleUpon.

I hope my recommendations gives you some direction as to where to start in this vast, complex, but yet exciting area of Social Media Marketing.

Beer Crafting