Update Multiple Social Network Profiles with One Click

Social networking is an essential part of marketing on the internet. But for social networking to work for your business, you really have got to be seen to be participating in these communities.

If you are anything like me, you probably belong to a handful of social networking sites and do not have the time to go to each one to post an update.

A stagnant social networking profile does nothing for your reputation. Problem is with so many other things to do, one soon loses track

There is a tool I have been using for a while now to help make things easier.
It allows you to post to all your social networking profiles with one click.

Admittedly all the sites will display the same message but it does keep your profile active.

And if your update contains a link then you could get up to 42 different sites that the link is posted to. Not a bad thing

The tool is http://ping.fm

Anyone following me on twitter will notice that some of my updates are via ping.fm

It's a free service and really user friendly.
There are 42 social networking sites that you can update from your ping dashboard. You do have to be registered with each of these social networking sites and ping.fm will ask for your log in details, stands to reason really.

And you'll find that you may already be a member of the social networking sites updated via ping.fm

the current list includes facebook, twitter, linkedIn, friendfeed, diigo, Hootsuite, Flickr, Posterous, Vox and more

So if you want the ability to update all your social networking profiles with one click, check out ping.fm

Social Networking Does Work

So I am certain that you have seen several posts extolling the virtues of social networking. And you are probably thinking
'Oh No! Not another post on how to use social networking sites'

Well I am not going to do that, i.e. point out all those obvious and rehashed tips that every other blog master has published

Instead I want to share with you a pleasant and profitable experience I recently had

First you should know that I have blogs that are mainly business blogs for example this one... and then I have blogs that are purely for my entertainment

The entertainment blogs are in areas that I find interesting. Hobbies so to speak

Anyway on one of my hobby blogs I wrote about a popular TV show. It's a show I like and hey I had something to say!

It's funny when you are writing without monetization in mind, the content can turn out pretty good

Anyway a few days later I noticed I had about 700 hits and rising. Thought it was a glitch in my traffic analysis. Usually the blog only gets about 50 uniques a day if that

More traffic analysis later and the answer is revealed. A big personality on Facebook had put a link to my post on their account!!

One link and a few days later has resulted in a few thousand uniques to the blog

Who says social networking doesn't work

The irony is, I hadn't done any of the networking. Go figure

Digg Now Using No Follow Selectively

One of the major advantages of Digg was the do follow attribute on links there. You submit your story, you get a back link

Just read on the digg blog that digg has decided to put the no follow attribute on some of the links on the site

These include

• Links in comment
• Submit that do not meet a certain threshold in popularity
• Links in user profiles

Obviously the question now is, what are they using as a measure of popularity?

• Is it the number of diggs a story gets
• Or the number of times the link is clicked on

Still a little unclear but I'll let you know if there is any further news

Digg. How to Get The Most Out Of Your Diggs

So now the shout system is gone, how can you get the most out of Digg for website exposure and traffic

In the past, when you submitted a story to Digg and wanted your friends to Digg to see it, all you needed to do was send a shout. Your friends got an email notification and..instant traffic. It really was as easy as that. And if they liked your story then they in turn Dugg it and, if it's really good sent a shout to their friends. And before you knew it you had a ton of traffic hitting your website or blog

Then one grey day, Digg decide to abolish the shout system. And I understand why....

....Spam. That ugly word. There were so many shouts on a daily basis and a lot of them were tagged with 'please Digg' or ' Digg this and I'll Digg yours' messages.

But then again there were shouts that I was interested in. Shouts that brought to my attention useful or quirky stories that I may not have otherwise come across.

Anyway, now the shouts system has gone, how can you get the most out of Digg. Here we are talking about maximizing exposure on Digg for your stories and getting some click throughs.

Friends

The number of friends and the quality of friends you ave is the backbone of any social networking campaign you run. Digg is no different. You need a solid base of quality, mutual friends. Friends that you have cultivated a relationship with, that are genuinely interested in your content, that Digg stories that you are interested in as well. Active friends. Before making a fan of yours a mutual friend, just take a look at the stories he has Dugg. The guy who only Diggs his own submits is not worth your time. Same goes for the guy who looks like he will Digg anything. You want people who when they Digg your submits, other people take notice. People whose Diggs are consistent.Whose followers in turn Digg their Diggs

Twitter

Add your twitter profile to your Digg profile. Diggers do interact outside of Digg and since the shout system went down I am amazed at the number of people from Digg making connections on twitter

Stories you submit to Digg

Source

You must vary the source of your submits. You can not exclusively submit your own material from your blog or websites.

Well you can but it will do nothing for your street cred on Digg. Blatant self promotion is just not attractive. So submit your blog posts and website articles, but also submit other people's content like stories in the media, other people's blog posts that you have found useful [could win you a mutual friend], articles form article directories, forum posts, you tube videos that are interesting. The trick is to digg other peoples' content that are not indirect competition with you [Obviously!]

Title and Description

This cannot be over-emphasized, YOUR TITLE AND DESCRIPTION MUST CAPTURE THEIR IMAGINATION. Give them an idea of what your story is about, whet their appetite, but don't give too much away.

Formulaic titles like '7 crucial tips for whatever' just do not have the pull they once had. So think out of the box. Be inventive without misleading. Or just tell them what they will gain by reading your story.

Again in your description you are trying to get them to want to read the entire story. There are so many Diggs that I have come across where the description gives away the entire story. "What's the point in clicking to the website if there isn't more to be had?" And we all know that our monetization is on our sites, not on Digg

Categories

Choose your category carefully. You want to make sure that your Digg is submitted to the relevant category but at the same time choose a category that does not have too much activity.

Take the news category for example. A submit in this category will last only a few minutes on the news upcoming front page. Because so many stories are submitted to this category. So you want to choose another relevant category that your Digg has a chance of being in front of the upcoming page for ... a little longer than a few minutes.

Comments

Crucial! Your comments will increase your reputation on Digg of used properly. I recently posted a comment on someone else's Digg. My comment got 135 diggs at the last count. That's a lot of diggs for one comment. [Shame I didn't have a link to my site or blog in that particular comment. Hmmm!]

You can also use comments to bring an old submit of yours back into play. For example say you submitted a story on a topic a while ago and the topic becomes conversational again, or things have moved on a bit and there is more current information on that topic. You could add a comment to your old Digg with the new information. Kind of like bumping a forum post but done ethically. Only do this if it is genuinely relevant

Digg Button

Last but not least, add the Digg button to your websites and blogs that you want to get traffic to from Digg. Another obvious one, but one that is so often forgotten

So the shouts system may be gone but there is still a lot of potential in Digg

Twitter Backgrounds Are Just Awful

Having a Twitter account these days is essential if you have an online business. Even I have come round to understanding and benefiting from the power of Twitter in my business.

And having taken the time and effort to build a decent business online, I obviously wanted my Twitter account to reflect my professionalism. And so should you

And I guess the same is true for most of our marketing colleagues out there

So why is it that the selection of templates available on Twitter are so awful. Sorry guys, you've created a great blogging platform but the fluffy cloud, starry night or even birds flying themes just don't cut it

I am not a template designer and haven't a clue how to go about designing my own background

So fluffy clouds it was....till today.

I just found a great website where you can create your own customized Twitter background free. It's http://www.twitbacks.com/

I am still playing with it but they have loads of templates that are varied and you can customize things with your logo and URL and stuff... Still discovering what stuff includes

You can check out my new profile at http://twitter.com/amisuggests

I know it still sucks but a great improvement on what was there before.

No fluffy clouds now

Tweet Later an essential marketing tool

A lot of twitter applications these days have me baffled.
I just don't know why anyone would want some of them. But, hey ho! One mans meat and all that.

But in my trawl through the myriad of twitter applications out there, I have come across some that are actually quite useful and a few essential applications especially if you are using twitter as an Internet marketer or to boost your business

The first of these is Tweet Later.

Tweet later is a multi function application

Automation. Tweet later allows you to automate

• Automated direct message.

Thank you replies to your new followers is a great way of retaining readership of your tweets.

The thing with twitter is a lot of people are following other people solely to get them to follow them back. Sort of like reciprocal following.

So the person who has started following you on Twitter has, in all probability, ticked the follow box on a bunch of peoples profiles that day.

It is important you acknowledge them if you want them to sit up and take notice.

And the best time to try and see you as a useful 'friend' is soon after they have chosen to follow you.

If you send your automated thank you note as soon as they start following you, they are more likely to still be online and read your thank you message. Leave it a few hours or days and it becomes a blur. They probably, by then, will not remember why they were following you in the first place.

• Autofollow people who are following you.

Now I don't recommend that you automatically follow all your followers. you could soon end up with a stream of inane tweets on your twitter homepage.

You only want to follow people who share information useful to you.

Tweet later allows you vet people before following them.

Or you could just set it up to autofollow everyone following you. It really is your decision.

• Tweet scheduling

We all know that to get the most out of twitter, you need to maintain a presence there. But with other aspects of your business to run and probably a day job to boot, there just is not the time to 'post tweets every couple of hours'

Tweet later allow you to write a bunch of tweets and then schedule when they will be posted to your twitter account.

• Keyword research

Tweet later is excellent for doing keyword research or niche discovery on Twitter

For example, if you are trying to assess the demand for a certain keyword, you can set up tweet later to notify you every time this keyword is used on Twitter.

Or you are going into a new niche. Where better to find out what people are saying about the niche, what aspects of the niche are most popular, current information and even what people's problems in the niche are.

Just use tweetlater to set up a keyword alert and you can follow whatever keyword is relevant.

And the keyword you track could be any word including your niche keywords, your twitter name, a products name, use your imagination

More information on getting your free account at Tweet Later

Facebook Vanity URL and Niche Marketing

I am sure you are aware of the recent change in facebook which allows you to create a URL with your chosen name in it.
So instead of your facebook profile address reading something like facebook.com/profile.php?id=xxxxxxx where xxxxxxx is a series of numbers
You get facebook.com/your website title, or whatever user name it is you choose

The advantages of this are immediately apparent.

• Search engine optimization.
  If you choose your user name with care and optimize your posts in facebook, you theoretically can get good search engine position for your facebook profile.
  
  Traffic to your facebook profile could mean an increased number of friends and therefore an expanding audience
  
• Promote your business.
  Vanity URLs make it so much easier to refer people to your facebook profile.
  
  Referring a user to facebook.com/your website title makes more sense than referring them to facebook.com/profile.php?id=xxxxxxx
  
• Branding.
  If the facebook account is a business account, then getting a vanity URL obviously helps brand your business

But in view of the draw backs I have seen so far which include

• Saturation.
  All the really good keyword targeted, short user names have already gone. Talk about chasing the long tail...again!
  
  We got this with trying to register a domain name, now we have to fight for a decent vanity URL for our facebook accounts?
  
  It really would be amazing if there is not a significant proportion of user name squatting going on. 500,000 names in the first 15 minutes of launch. people were waiting to pounce on this thing
  
• Locked In.
  Once you have chosen a user name, you cannot change it.
  
  So research the name you want and possible alternatives if your first choice is not available carefully.
  
  Oh and watch out for typos
  
• Unproven.
  The impact that a facebook vanity URL will have on your business as a niche marketer is yet to be proven.
  
  The great stampede is all anticipatory or speculative. May turn out to be the next big thing on the Internet, but personally I think it will just be another tool to add to your niche marketing arsenal

So how do you get your own vanity URL?

• Log in to your facebook account
• Point your browser to http://www.facebook.com/username
• The user name form page will load
• On this page you will be given a few options based on your current profile name
• Click 'more' at the bottom of the list of options and a box into which you can type your desired name will load
• Insert your desired user name into that box and select the radio button beside it. As you type you will see the new facebook vanity URL to the lower right side of the page
• Check availability by clicking the button that says so
• If available click the confirm button if you are happy with your new facebook vanity URL
• Again make sure you have no typos before confirming
• Once confirmed you cannot change your user name

Till next time

Increase Website Traffic With No Follow Social Bookmarking

'No follow' social bookmarking sites are not particularly useful for SEO. But you can generate a ton of traffic using 'no follow', yes 'no follow', social bookmarking sites

I was going through one of the social bookmarking sites I frequent and someone had sent me a shout. Well I get a ton of shouts everyday but this one caught my eye.

So I clicked on it and it was a link to the same story bookmarked on another site.

On finally reaching the page, which was a blog post submitted 3 days ago, I noticed it had received 500 visitors. And it was not a particularly useful or informative post.

Hmmm.
'I wonder what sort of a backlinking strategy he has' I thought

So I fired up my backlink analysis software and.... Nothing. No backlinks.

'Golly! My backlink analysis software must not be working!'

So I did the Yahoo links query again nothing

On digging [no pun intended] further, It appears that most of his traffic seems to be coming from social bookmarking sites

The tip as mentioned in crucial tips for social bookmarking is the number of friends or followers you have.

Another tip which this chap seems to be using is one given by Jeff Johnson in his training lab which is 'bookmark your bookmarks'

Just another little tip on generating traffic to your sites

Twitxploitation Or Essential Tools

So you probably have not heard of twitxploitation before.

Well neither had I till i sat down to write this post, but it seems rather appropriate for the sudden rash of Twitter applications put there. At least that's my take on things.

There is no doubt that twitter is a great networking site. Admittedly in my early encounter with Twitter I was skeptical but now I can see some of the potential.

And it would seem so can a lot of software makers out there.

So is it exploitation, or to stick to our term Twitxploitation; or do we really need 275 different twitter applications?

It seems twitter has fallen victim of it's success. Everyone wants to climb on for the ride

Please don't get me wrong. There are some really useful twitter applications out there. I use some of them.

Tweetfeed for example is a must have. I can't praise it enough [Big Tip :) ]

But do we really need a twitter application that measures out tweets in inches!!

So what say you. Is it Twitxploitation or useful applications all round?

Stop Social Bookmarking Till You Have Read This

Social bookmarking sites are GREAT for traffic.

But so many niche affiliate marketers complain that they are not getting the ton of traffic expected when they bookmark their content

So what on earth could be wrong?

The power of social bookmarking lies in the number of friends that you have

'It is who you know that counts' is a true saying both offline and online

My suggestion?

When you join a bookmarking site, take a few weeks to make friends or followers or fans or whatever the relevant term is on the social bookmarking site you use BEFORE you start submitting your bookmarks.

Several reasons for this

Momentum.
The maximum number of bookmarks a post gets is usually soon after you submitted it i.e in the first few days. So when you bookmark your post, you want to ensure that it is visible to a large number of people i.e your friends, as soon as it is posted. Think about it, when last did you digg, tweet or sphinn a post that is more than a month old?

Pay It Forward.
If your posts are goods, your friends may share it with their friend ... more diggs, stumbles, etc. If you already have a large number of friends from your two weeks of active participation, then the chances of getting a few who will 'pay it forward' i.e share your bookmark are higher

Also when you do start bookmarking your content, do not submit every post on your blog. It just will turn people off. Choose your best posts. The ones that will draw people in. These are the posts you want bookmarked. They are the posts that will get the most diggs, stumbles, tweets and therefore draw attention to your site

Finally, bookmark other sites as well. By this I mean submit other sites as well. The more active bookmarkers, I have noticed tend to submit news stories, just to mix things up a bit

Digg Offline But Why?

Tried to log in to my Digg account this morning and was greeted by this message

And off course , apart from the mild irritation about the inconvenience of it all, I started wondering why?

Recent events in the news surrounding Digg may have contributed

• There was the launch of the new Digg bar approximately one month ago which has had to undergo a few updates since. Mixed reception from Digg users. A Google search for 'digg bar' came back with 5 out of the top 10 results being negative about the tool bar. Perhaps the rejig is to sort out the tool bar issues, but previous updates did not require the site to go down

• The Microsoft ads thing. Digg has had a advertising relationship with Microsoft for a while now. But anyone in the internet marketing community would have come across the news that Digg has ended this contract a year early in favour of in house advertising team. This simply means that the ads on Digg are managed by Digg staff.

Nothing in either story to merit closing down, albeit temporarily, the Digg site

The time that I am aware of that Digg went offline was in 2007. This had to do with people sharing codes for some HD-DVDs . Naughty but it happens. Unfortunate Digg decided to delete some of these posts from their site raising the issue of censorship. Didn't go down well with the Digg community, i.e members, and soon after Digg went offline. Perhaps to consider options. But Digg came back, the censorship issue was resolved out and everyone seemed reasonably happy

So it leaves the question

Why is Digg offline today and when will it be back online?

About the new Digg Bar

Digg launched it's new tool, the digg bar a couple of days ago and it has already generated a lot of interest

For those new to social bookmarking, Digg is one of the major bookmarking sites that has evolved into a sort of networking site as well. You can digg your pages at the site and it becomes immediately visible to digg users. If your story is interesting or useful then other digg members could digg it as well. The idea is the more popular a story is the more diggs it gets

Obviously the system like any other system online is abused.

For example people form cooperatives, large networks that mutually digg each others submissions to artificially create the illusion of post popularity.

But you can usually sniff this out.

However digg is a very useful site for generating traffic to your sites or blogs...IF YOU HAVE GOOD CONTENT.

This blog for example has garnered a few diggs from that bookmarking site.

Now about the new Digg Bar.

This is a small bar that goes across the top of any website that digg links out to. So all the sites submitted in digg if accessed through the digg site will load with this new bar across the top of it

To see an example of the digg bar in action click http://digg.com/d1nDi4

So in what way does it help

• Short URL. The digg URL is a shortened one so easier to distribute in emails and texts

• Easier Digg interface. In the old days you had to toggle between the destination site, i.e the stories own webpage, and the digg page where the story is submitted. Now it is easier to read any article or post and digg it all on the same page.

• View Comments. Digg allows digg members to write comments on stories dugg. With the new digg bar, you can view the Digg comments on the story right there at the destination or article page.

• More data. The new digg bar shows how many diggs a page has, how many comments on the digg site and also how many times the story has been viewed

• Stumble function. The digg bar also allows you to go on to other dugg pages by clicking on the random button

Bottom line. The digg bar is still new and the jury is still out on this one. However I think it adds more functionality to the digg process and so far I like it

Exploring the Twitter Search Function

Found me a new toy.

It's the Twitter search function. and boy is it something!

Twitter has become a house hold name and to be honest initially I was skeptic about the whole miniblog thing. Add to that the risk of being scammed on twitter and you can understand my less than enthusiastic reception of this social networking tool

Yes, I have managed to get a few followers without soliciting for them.

And yes, it is a good forum for following the trail blazers in this business.

But all in all didn't really 'set my imagination on fire'

Until I found this cool tool. It's the twitter search function and it is a must use for any Internet marketer. Talk about niche research at your finger tips.

And it is really simple to use.

Say you are thinking of going into the plasma TV industry and you want up to the moment information about that niche. What are your options

• Google search. But we know all about the requirements to rank high in Google for any keyword. There is domain age and backlinks and all those things that can be easily manipulated by any savvy SEO specialist. So perhaps not the best way to get up to the minute information on a niche

• Keyword tools. And there are some really good ones around. For example wordtracker and keyword spy. The problem is the links will take you to the free trial which has limited results and you have to pay some money to get full results

• Google adwords tool. Not really up to the moment niche discovery. More demand and supply analysis

Enter Twitter search.

Just enter the keyword and all the tweets on that topic will be displayed. You will find out the latest news and gossip. How people are promoting this. What non marketers are saying about it. You must remember only a small proportion of twitter users are actually Internet marketers. Instant niche research without paying a penny.

Till next time

Own Group In Facebook Is It A Good Idea

Facebook is a method of generating traffic and leads in your niche marketing business

And if you read any of the Facebook Internet marketing 'guides' a frequently repeated 'tip' is create your own group.

But I wonder how viable is this.

First I must come clean with you.
I have a Facebook account and it does help generate traffic to my sites.
I don't have my own group i.e one that I created and have no intention of starting one in the near future. But that's just me. And you may ask. Why?

Because I don't yet have the following in my Facebook account to make it work

So what are the requirements to fulfil if you want to launch a successful group on Facebook?

• Establish Reputation
• Build a large group of friends
• Have a really good freebie to give away when they join
• Make sure that you have some useful info and a couple of pillar videos to share with your group
• Moderate your group

The idea is to try and get about 500 members in your group within a short period of time. Why?

Because people are more likely to join groups that already have a large membership.

We have all had those group invites where we click to take a look at the group and find...37 members. Not one to join really!

So perhaps having my own group on Facebook is a good idea. I had better get busy building those relationships

Till next time

Facebook and Comic Relief

Just watching the UK's comic relief red nose day drive. And it's amazing just how much social networking sites have blended into the fabric of our society

There was a great sketch on facebook which just had me laughing

Hopefully you can get it on iplayer if you missed it.

I am sure someone will post it on you tube pretty soon

On a more serious note. Please go to http://www.rednoseday.com/ and make a donation to the comic relief drive.

£5 is not too much to ask.

At the end of the day, that's not a large number of adsense clicks and unless you are promoting a really bad product, amounts to about 10% of the commission of ONE affiliate sale

To donate please go to http://www.rednoseday.com/ the comic relief red nose site

Facebook Privacy Issues?

Just came across this article via twitter. By the way Twitter is fast becoming addictive. If you don't have a twitter account it is worth considering

But back to the Facebook thing. As affiliate marketers a lot of us like to maintain our anonymity just because we are rather private people. And on Facebook we are assured that no one can read your profile details unless you have approved them as a friend first. So privacy ensured, right?

Imagine my alarm when I came across this story in the telegraph titled 'Networking site cashes in on friends'

And the subheading 'Facebook founder finally finds a way to profit from its 150m members' private data '

The thrust of the story is they are planning to allow multinational companies to selectively target it's members based on the details you put in your profile

Hey?

Guys, should we be worried?

The link for the story is http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/mediatechnologyandtelecoms/4413483/Networking-site-cashes-in-on-friends.html

Please share your thoughts

RSS Feeds, Quick comment

Just a quick comment on one of the responses I got on the last two posts. A fellow blogger and a friend went the extra mile and put a button for millionrss on his blog. The idea is peopel who visit his blog will bookmark his feed and therefore increase his feeds prominence at the RSS feeds directory. Kinda like social bookmarking.

I think this is great, but as a marketer you need to be selective about which social bookmarking sites you want to achieve prominence in. Then spend time building relationships at those sites.

It really does take time to build enough followers or friends to significantly impact your links..

So what am I saying?

Great idea Andrew, as long as you limit the number of bookmarking sites you want to work with or perhaps outsource things

Is Twitter Useful For Niche Affiliate Marketing

So I gave in and finally took a look at Twitter. Twitter is what is known as a miniblog, i.e a blogging platform that permits you a limited number of characters per post. In the case of Twitter the limit is 140 characters

For whatever reason twitter seems rather popular especially with online marketers

So my question when I joined was does this really help?

I am a great believer in testing things out for myself so I duly signed up and did all the research necessary to improve my chances of succeeding with twitter

The results so far?

• Followers. I have managed to get a few followers i.e other people subscribed to my Tweets. I really honestly cannot tell you how they found my twitter account or why. But as long as their interest is maintained, I suppose that's the point of things really. By the way just to mention that I did nothing to advertise my twitter profile. Just set it up and added updates
• Updates. Really difficult to get a point across in a few words I find and some days I put tweets that even I would not be interested in. I think one really has to think carefully about the updates and get you main theme across within the first 4 or 5 words.

• Update Daily. Like blogging, Twitter seems to thrive on frequent posters. As my post frequency increased, the number of followers increased.

• Backlinks. I think Twitter is not really useful if you want to use it to get backlinks to your sites. Once the URL posted is longer than 30 characters, then it uses a tiny URL link. I am still trying to see how to get around this. Found a few methods which I will describe in a later post once I have tested them, but so far nothing that would create any excitement

So for me the jury is still out. I honestly believe that for marketing Twitter is just another social networking tool. The advantages are making more contacts and a platform on which you can build relationships and maybe build your online reputation. But as for any direct and immediate traffic benefits for your site, I don't think Twitter has anything special to offer

Obviously I am still testing things out and if things change as I gain experience, I'll let you know.

Till next time

Social Bookmarking Sites And Niche Marketing

Social bookmarking sites are yet another tool in the armamentarium of niche marketers to try to increase traffic to the money making niche sites

And for most newbie affiliate marketers, that stampede of traffic that is supposed to occur once the sites are bookmarked just does not happen

But social bookmarking sites do work. We just have to learn the rules of the game and then ...Result

So here are a few social bookmarking tips that I have picked up from the many ebooks and videos I have watched on the subject

• Mass submissions: To be generally avoided. In the past it as great to submit to as many social bookmarking sites as possible. Simply for the backlink value. But now the majority of them have no follow links. I know, you have seen the forum posts that have this wonderful list of social bookmarking sites that do follow. Well try submitting your bookmark to them and use SEO elite to try and analyze the bookmarked webpage's backlinks. Need I say more. So select just a handful of social bookmarking sites that you want to work with and stick to them, at least till you get the results you want

• Bookmark other people's sites: If all your bookmarks point to the same set of websites, then things begin to look a litttle fishy. Bookmark other people's sites as well as your own. It helps build relationships fast and could garner you some bookmarks in return. I suggest bookmarking sites that are not in direct competition with yours :)

• Build relationships: This is the reason why you want to work with just a few bookmarking sites rather than the whole horde. You need to build relationships at the bookmarking sites, make friends, increase your profile, that sort of thing. It takes spending time in these sites to build a large enough group of friends to make a significant ifference to your bookmarking results. [By the way, this is what I am working on at the moment] You must have heard of the concept of the power digger at digg. He posts an article and it's like magic. Within a few hours he gets double figure or triple figure diggs for his post. It takes time and a lot of networking to attain this status

So knowing all this what am I going to do?

It's straight forward really, build relationships

Using the old methods I have managed to get one digg per post on this blog. And you guessed it, that digg is mine. Occasionally you will find a post on this blog with two diggs, those days are like christmas

With following the methods in this post, perhaps I can improve on this

Alternative To OnlyWire

Onlywire is a bookmarking service that I have recommended in previous posts. And for a while it was useful.

But recently onlywire has become a subscription service i.e you pay so much a year if you want to continue using the service.

There is still a free service but that entails you putting a code on your site that allows them to place their adverts on your pages. Not clear whether these woll be adverts recommending onlywire or promoting other products. Needless to say, it will be completely out of my control as a webmaster

Not very satisfactory!

Anyway a FREE alternative to Onlywire is Socialmarker

Social marker is another mass social bookmarking service that allows you to submit lots of bookmarks in a short period of time, so check it out

I think if onlywire wants to become a paid for service, they need to up the service

If you are considering a paid for social bookmarking service then I suggest BMD.

This is a truly automated social bookmarking submission tool that just takes the hassle out of getting backlinks to your site

You can

• set up multiple accounts for each bookmarking site
• randomly vary the title, description, user name of your bookmarks automatically
• set up a schedule so bookmarks can be submitted at spaced intervals and loads more

And it is a one time fee not a recurring bill.

Anyway click here for more information and videos on BMD

Till next time