Enterprise Mastermind

Social bookmarking is just like bookmarking or “adding to favorites” in your browser. Except it’s not.

When Johnny adds your site to his browser bookmarks, it’s because he values your content and wants to refer back to it later. Hopefully, Johnny will use the same computer and the same browser, because that’s where that information lives.

But if Johnny decides to add your site to a social bookmarking website, a few things happen. Johnny can access your site from any browser and any computer. He can describe why he bookmarked the site, using a title, description and tags. (Interesting fact: the social bookmarking site delicious.com (formerly http://del.icio.us) actually developed the notion of “tagging”.) This can make it easier for him to refer back to later.

So that’s the bookmarking, where does the social come in? Well in addition to being able to access his own bookmarks from anywhere, Johnny can also see what other people are bookmarking, and they can see his bookmarks. Johnny can search by ‘tags’ to find content related to his interests, and see how popular sites are based on how many people have bookmarked them.

Johnny is able to access his own preferred content easily, and discover new content that others have found valuable– social bookmarking is great for individuals’ productivity.

It’s similarily valuable for businesses, for a few reasons.

From a promotional standpoint, Johnny bookmarking a site means others may access it more easily. Social bookmarking sites often have the concept of “friends” or “networks” within which links are more frequently shared.

From a reputation management standpoint, businesses may monitor what is being said about their site, or their competitors. As individuals add their own tags to content, a business may be able to get a better sense of how they are being perceived externally.

Related to social bookmarking sites are social news sites like digg and sphinn. These sites are also driven by individual submission. However, whereas social bookmarking sites were originally intended to provide an individual with a personal space to store information for later retrieval, social news sites are more focused towards promoting timely information to the community.

A subtle difference is that on social news sites, articles may be “demoted” the same way they are “promoted” – the sites assign value based on individual rankings. This is not the case with social bookmarking sites, where each individual has the opportunity to define his own organization of resources.

Getting listed on the front page of digg can drive tremendous traffic to a site, which has resulted in abuse. Some services where people can pay for their stories to be dugg have cropped up, but this is NOT a recommended practice. Digg is intended to be a community, and therefore it is also considered poor etiquette to create a profile solely to submit your own content. If you want support from others, you must support them as well. Indeed, so important is this notion of trust and reputation, there is some sense that only through endorsement by a digg power user will you hit the front page. These power users have built up a following who trust their judgment in what is worthy to be dugg. Spend the time to work within the community or befriend a power user, and you may be amazed at the results.

Sold on the benefits of being bookmarked or dugg? Ready for the wealth of riches that awaits? Here’s some quick tips:

1. Write good content. The number one way to achieve social success is to write content that is worthy of people wanting to share and save for later.
2. Make it easy to promote. Many blogs or sites use services like “Add this” or “Share this” to encourage visitors to bookmark or promote the site.
3. Understand the value of social sharing, and buy into it. if you expect others to bookmark or share your content, you should also be engaging in the same activity. This will help you understand what’s worthy content, and also help create that sense of community.

About the Author

Andrea Hill is the Director of Social Media and Interactive Technology at Worldways Social Marketing. She got her start online nearly a decade ago as a web designer/developer, and has worked with such prolific clients as Procter and Gamble, Limited Brands, ScottsMiracleGro and LexisNexis. She has retired her coding gloves, but continues to contribute to online conversations and blog about web development, Internet marketing and social media at http://www.afhill.com/blog