Don’t make me laugh. Okay, go ahead, it’s good for the soul after all.
In case you’ve been under a rock for the last few months, you might not know that all the webmaster community is abuzz now over Social Media. If you have a website, or multiple websites, and even pretend to be trying to make a living at it – every advisor from every corner of the web is shouting that you must, simply must, join every possible Social Media community and actively participate in those communities so that now and then you can slip one of your own posts or sites into your submissions, and not get kicked across the playing field for doing so.
Here is the problem. I know what Social Media is. You – maybe so, maybe not. I have fingers in a lot of pies – you might follow me because I am a fellow writer, or artist, or you are just a friend of mine. If you are not, in fact, a web promotions expert of some sort, you might just go HUH? when faced with the term that made me laugh so hard – SMO. Social Media Optimization.
So, for those of you who don’t know – Social Media is all those communities that you probably joined just because your friends were there. That’s MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, Mixx, Digg, StumbleUpon, Propeller, Flickr, Flixster, del.icio.us, MyBlogLog, BlogCatalog and maybe Beliefnet, BlackPlanet, and Catster! Just to name SOME of the ones I am a member of, myself. In fact, although all of these are older communities are are less often mentioned I think Gather, Squidoo, and DeviantArt all qualify, too.
The biggest downfall is that it actually takes some time to be a member of a community, to contribute, to become an expert (or renowned as one anyway), and to gather a bunch of followers. In my case, because I also create my own content – I spend hours every day writing, drawing, and creating webpages or websites – I find that all this social stuff cuts into my actual work production. Not that I don’t enjoy the interaction, but to me, it is social – play, and work comes first.
To become really “popular” on any of these sites, requires the exact same sort of manipulation, playing politics if you will, as becoming class president or getting on the cheerleading team in high school. I didn’t play well with others then, and I don’t now 😛
While various bloggers have shared anecdotal evidence of major spikes in readership coming from a post that suddenly becomes popular on Digg, or StumbleUpon or another site – and there are certainly some true stories about music groups who leveraged a MySpace membership into success (and there are musicians on BlackPlanet now that are attempting to do the same) I have come to have a slightly bemused view of the whole situation.
A spike in traffic doesn’t mean a real increase in income. I get a spike every year around April 1st because of my April Fools Day pages. I get a really nice little spike every time one of my Naturalist Notebook entries makes it into the I and the Bird Carnival. Each of those events usually also creates a little spike in income – but face it, most of the year that April Fools day page lays there and waits. The spike is nice, oh yes, it is, I love it (and besides it’s fun doing a review of all the pranks every year) but it does not make a full-time sort of income. And while I certainly have some wonderful, regular readers at the Naturalist Notebook, and some of them certainly found me through the Carnivals, I don’t pour all my energy into making it into the Carnival every month because the returns really don’t justify the effort. I concentrate on writing good entries, and then if I think one is particularly good, I may submit it.
In my personal opinion, the whole Social Media thing is on about the same level. There are people who are devoted bird watchers and read bird blogs, and can’t wait for the I and the Bird Carnival to roll around so they can read the best of the best – but I bet that most of you have never heard of that Carnival before, and aren’t in the least interested in it. There are undoubtedly people who have Digg as their homepage and go through all the stories first thing every day. I suspect that even of those people, there are those who really only read all the political stories and maybe skim the headlines of the rest, and those who really only read all the humor stories, and maybe skim over the political headlines.
It is estimated that in social media, 1% of the users create content, 10% participate by reading, commenting, etc, and the other 89% just passively consume. It’s also estimated that only 1% of Internet users have any clue what Social Media is, let alone use it.
I think it is much ado about nothing.
And now we have – Social Media Optimization. *shaking my head*
Okay, guys, calm down. You know what is going to work best for you in Social Media? The same thing that works best with SEO. Simple, organic optimization. If you want to show up in the search engines, write on topic useful articles on subjects people want to know about. Want to be followed and shared on Social Media – guess what – same thing. Want to get popular and renowned on a Social Media site? Choose a community you can personally be passionate about, that you enjoy, and that energy will be returned to you.
That’s why I’m on Beliefnet.com. I just enjoy the community. Wish I could spend more time there, really – but I have to work.
That’s why, I think, that even though you’ll never see a link around here to my Live Journal – because it is quite personal and is followed mainly by people who really, truly are my personal friends on some level – when I post a link to a new website or page or article there, I find a definate spike in traffic directly from that live journal entry to that page.
And, in case you are wondering, yes, I’m a member of everything listed above. You can usually find me with the user name “foovay”.
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