SEO Step Six of Ten: Social Media
October 2nd, 2008 | by Indonesia First |Welcome to part six in this ten part SEO series. The ten parts of the SEO process we will be covering are:
- Keyword Research & Selection
- Competitor Analysis
- Site Structure
- Content Optimization
- Link Building
- Social Media
- PPC
- Statistics Analysis
- Conversion Optimization
- Keeping It Up
Social Media
On the second day of SMX Social, I had the privilege of being on a panel that spoke about micro-communities. The panel included Rand Fishkin and myself while Danny Sullivan moderated. Several of my colleagues were a little confused with the title of the panel, just as probably a few of you are right now. So just what are micro communities?
First, before I explain that, let me start off by saying - the concept of Social Media is not new. That’s right, the concept of what exactly social media is not new. The fancy term that has been coined “Social Media” and the new “Web 2.0″ looks are what’s new to this rather old advertising medium (old in terms of the internet that is). Social Media has been around since the inception of the Internet. Think I’m a little nuts in stating that? Stop and reflect a moment, some of the most powerful social media outlets for your clients, services and products have been around a very long time - Forums and Message Boards.
Forums and Message Boards are chalk full of relevant very honed content around particular subjects. Whether its subject is about collecting comics, fan fiction writing, or making crafts most forums have a lot of “power” when it comes to value and optimization of your website (think age of domains, relevant content, etc.). They also offer traffic from very qualified resources, and these are resources that really would be more interested in what you have to say.
So now, maybe you are getting an idea of what micro-communities are? Micro-Communities are specific communities built around niches. When it comes to social media it can encompass a wide variety of social media types from specific social news sites (BallyHype, Sk*rt), bloggers blogging about very finite subjects, specific communities (WebMD, Corkd), to fourms/message boards (Cre8asite, Rotten Tomatoes). All of these social media types provide user generated content created by people interested in one particular niche.
Rand had a great list of all different types of communities in his presentation. This listed consisted of websites that were designed to be “communities” around a certain niche. However, when marketing to micro-communities you need to look beyond just a particular website that caters to creating a community to one niche. You have to open up the possibilities of reaching more people with your message, by only looking at “communities” per se, you limit your reach. Micro-community marketing strategies should include social news sites, blogs and blogging groups, forums and message boards, video and photo sharing sites (think about photo groups and video subscriptions) and also communities. Any where people “share” they are being “social”.
Source : http://www.webpronews.com/expertarticles/2008/03/13/seo-step-six-of-ten-social-media
