What is Social Networking?

It used to be that the only reliable way to find information online was to use a search engine.

However, with the advent of what we call Web 2.0 (interactive, dynamic websites that promote or operate as social networks), people can now easily find information and websites that other human beings recommend.

The most recent instance of this is social bookmarking. Websites like Del.icio.us, Digg, and Furl allow users to share their personal favorites (bookmarks) with others. Users tag each bookmarked website with the keywords they feel are most applicable.

Now, instead of using a search engine to find information, people can search tags that will display all websites bookmarked with that specific tag. This amounts to a human referral or vote for the site and its relevance to the subject being searched.

Other versions of social networking include blogging social networks – primarily Technorati.com. Technorati indexes blogs based on the amount of incoming links those blogs have, as well as the tags associated with their posts.

But the most popular social network is of course Facebook. This is in terms of users and the growth doesn't seem to be diminshing. That said, Twitter is the most rapidly growing social network. It's growth has been huge and it provides real time news and interaction with other users. Twitter is a great site for branding your business and keeping tabs on what's said about it as well.  Many large corporates use Twitter both to promote and  monitor their brand.

Although many people just don't "get" Twitter when they first visit, it is an extremely powerful tool to have in your arsenal in promoting both yourself and your business.

Lastly, two powerful new social media networks have emerged that are revolutionizing audio and video: YouTube and BlogTalkRadio. These mega networks allow citizen filmmakers and broadcasters to share their visions with the world and spread the word about what matters to them. Statistics show that video is accounting for more and more internet usage.

Few businesses realize it yet, but these media networks are potential goldmines stock full of future Speilbergs, Bloombergs, and Oprahs - all potential broadcasters of your marketing message.

How Will Social Networking Help My Site Traffic Grow?

Two out of three people online in June 2006 visited a social networking site. In fact, 1 out of every 20 website visits is to a social networking website. Experts say that social networks are starting to eclipse traffic from the major search engines Yahoo! and Google.

So if your company is not present on any of the major social networks, you're missing out on the easiest, fastest way to access 67% of internet users.

How Do I Get Involved in Social Networking?

Working with social sites is similar to working with the media. Give them a good enough of a good story, secrets, tips, or resources that they can sink their teeth into and you’ll have an army of talkers spreading the word about you and your business.

And this translates into referrals, which convert into sales on an average of 667% better than cold leads (search engine results). So even if you reach less people through social networking, your conversions will be far higher.

We target various social networks through a variety of methods:

Article or Blog Promotion

We assist a number of clients with their blogs (as well as article pages) that contain posts written purely to capture the imagination and interest of our client’s target market.

For instance, if you sell paint, cleaning services, security or are a charitable organization, we can develop a series of blog posts or articles that discuss a controversial or “hot off the press” topic that people interested in your niche either find highly valuable as an information resource, or highly intriguing or emotionally stimulating.

We can show you how to get these articles listed in directories and on social bookmarking sites, all of which increase your exposure to the vast internet audience. In turn these create more and more links pointing back to your site.

Social Promotion

The biggest buzz online these days is Twitter. We can show you how to set up a Twitter account and maximize your impact to promote your business. We can also show you how to tie your Twitter account can be tied in with other social media accounts such as Friendfeed and Facebook to save you maintaining all three.  Another worthwhile service for professional businesses is Linked In.

When it comes to social media and Twitter, we really know what we are talking about!

This image shows Ric Raftis (Principal of Bushsong Internet Consultants) ranked at number 4 in Australia on Twitter.

How Does Social Networking Work With SEO?

As more and more internet users begin to use tags to find information (a tag is a keyword that a human associated with a website, vs. a keyword that a search engine attributes to a website), Search Marketing professionals cannot ignore the growing dominance of the social networks.

However, we view the partnership between social networks and search engines as an excellent and balanced marriage. Social networking gets you in front of people who no longer use search engines in lieu of finding their information through referrals or bookmarks/tags.

But the added, and perhaps more exciting bonus, is that while you grow in popularity with social networks like Digg and Twitter, your search rankings will continue to increase as a result!

Your popularity signals Google that you are an authority in your market according to your human audience.

The bottom line here is that whilst Google provides a very real measurement of your ranking in its search engine results, it can be difficult to measure your "ranking" on the other social networks.  Nonetheless, they provide a really valuable means of generating traffic to your site.