So What is it? Social media encompasses a variety of technologies which allow for greater interaction of a user other than just buying a product (ecommerce) or submitting a request for more information (lead generation). Prominent social media sites include Myspace.com, uTube.com and Technorati. These sites allow user profiles, communication between users and the exporting of data such as text, images, audio (pod casts) and video. This is called syndication.

 Syndication is NOT a new concept.  Traditional media providers have been syndicating content for years through various facilities such AP Wire. AP Wire is a global news network that delivers news from every corner of the world in all media types. A publisher like the New York Times may syndicate their content into AP Wire and AP Wire announces it to thousands third party news providers. Third party news providers may republish the story or create their own news from it. If a third party picks up the story, they give a credit back to the original news source.

This concept has been adopted by a multitude of Web sites and utilizes RSS, which means Really Simple Syndication. RSS allows a Web site to syndicate select content for publication into variety of channels. RSS is one aspect of Social Media.

Another aspect is social book marking. Social book marking portals such as Technorati, allow users to create profiles and bookmark their favorite sites.  They also encourage people to “tag” their bookmarks with keywords which allow them to easily find their bookmarks later.  Additionally, users can share their bookmarks with one another.

Another important aspect of Technorati is that a user can submit their RSS feeds for inclusion in the Technorati directory of RSS feeds. Additionally, if you have an RSS feed, you can “ping” Technorati whenever you update your RSS feed.  This will cause Technorati to come visit your site again and include your newest content on their site.

By including your syndicated content in Technorati and other such sites, you increase your link popularity.  This results in greater “spider traffic” and human traffic.

Google, Yahoo and MSN also provide similar services. The big three also regularly crawl Technorati and subsequently, crawl your site. Increasingly, millions of people consider Technorati a viable search alternative to the big three.

A third aspect of Social Media is community building.  This relates back to increased functionality of a Web site.  When you allow and encourage users to create profiles on your site, contribute content and communicate with one another, you are building community. Myspace is a prime example of community building, as well as uTUBE.com.

Combined, all of these technologies are known as Social Media. Social Media Optimization means to optimize your site and marketing strategies to include social media in every aspect relevant to you business goals.

As part of our Social Media Optimization we offer the following services.

SMO Services at Compitent Hosting:

On Site

• RSS creation
• Ping
• Tagging
• Bookmark Functionality
• Data creation and population
• Audio creation (PodCasting)
• Video creation

Offsite SMO

• RSS Distribution
• Remote social book marking
• Remote user profile creation and management
• Pod Cast distribution
• Video distribution
• Pay Per Post
• Strategic and ethical blog commenting

To schedule a complimentary Social Media Optimisation consultation contact us