There is no force stronger than the Change itself in real world as well as in virtual world. It simply dominates every other aspect. There are a lot of analogies that come forth to back up this stance; even more so, when we have a peek at some of the trends of social bookmarking and sharing world that dominated throughout 2011.
Statistics reveal the fact that socializing has definitely become one of the most effective tools in any domain of virtual world, but there are many lessons to learn from fast paced and highly dynamic changes that made their presence felt within social bookmarking/sharing aspects of social media marketing.
Following the most dominant shifts
Let us begin our learning quest by seeing what happened to some big names of social bookmarking world. According to stats, Digg appeared as a clear champion in social news and bookmarking, with Yahoo Buzz and Mixx trying hard to maintain their effective existence. However, Digg also seemed to lose its charms after mid 2011, while Yahoo Buzz and Mixx almost came to a halt. At the same time, certain new players seemed to invade the arena by the end of 2011, namely, Reddit, Stumbleupon, as well as Pinterest.
What was the difference?
Of all these changes, one thing became clear; the newer sites taking over these yesteryear channels proved to be much stronger in their visual and community-based interactions with the audience. Now, let us analyze how to get the best of these changes:
According to stats provided by comScore, 70% of Reddit audience is comprised of males; with 61% of them from 18 to 34 years of age. This type of audience should be served with funny and genuinely unique content comprising of relevant pictures or images that could generate a buzz within them, so that they can be actively engaged on the content. An alternative approach here might be seeking feedback from Reddit audience that is interested in a particular brand.
- Example The most famous example could be of Microsoft, a business that was faced with certain brand issues. When they approached Reddit audience seeking feedback on their IE9 browser, they got significantly positive response from audience.
About Pinterest, comScore reveals that 68 percent of their audience comprises of females, with 57 percent of them between 18 to 34 years. It basically comprises of online scrapbooks and pictures that can conveniently be shared among community by becoming friends like Facebook and following like Twitter.
- Example Whole Foods, an organic food business with brick-and-mortar existence enjoyed great success with Pinterest when they built scrapbooks based on different recipes, kitchen designs, and certain eco-friendly practices on Pinterest.
StumbleUpon
comScore shares with us that 60 percent of Stumble Upon audience comprises of males and 60 % of them happen to lie between 18 to 34. This audience can be stimulated well by sharing interesting info-graphics, videos, and other interactive content bits, just like a timeline graph of some celebrities.
- Example The University of Phoenix made the best use of StumbleUpon by sharing some interesting interactive pieces of content with interested audience.
Conclusion
The analogies presented above can be very helpful for any internet marketing agency, and the key points to summarize the discussion giving a better idea of using social bookmarking sites during 2012 include:
- An improved demographic understanding of your audience
- Serving most appropriate content to the target audience for a particular channel
- Keenly observing failures and success stories to formulate best strategy for yourself
- Engaging with your target audience in a way that entices them to act your brand advocates
All these aspects should help any organization get much better results from their social media interaction through these above mentioned social bookmarking and sharing channels.