WebProNews

Yahoo has some suggestions for using social media to market one's website. With a little planning, the Diggs and Flickrs of the world can provide a boost.

Using Social Media To Market

The age-old axiom of spending money to make money may have a new corollary: spending time to make money. Investing time and effort into social media, as Louise Rijk discussed on Yahoo's Publisher Network blog, offers a nice potential payout.

Planning is key, as one wants their message to reach a receptive target audience. A site publisher needs to set some goals and expectations for social media marketing (SMM), then research social media websites to find the best choices.

"The best social media sites for an SMM campaign are those that are supported by large public communities," said Rijk, who listed a number of the more popular ones in an assortment of categories. It would have been nice if she had linked those names to the sites in question.

Then the effort comes into play. Rijk provided some ideas on content to create and submit. How-to lists tend to be popular with the social media crowd, for example. Uploading and tagging images or videos to Flickr or YouTube, or setting up a profile on a site like Facebook, helps get one in front of an audience.

Rijk said it is important to build trust on these sites. Contributing useful content helps with this. Spamming and other tricks will be recognized and likely backfire in the process.

One Yahoo site in particular can help with building trust and authority. Yahoo Answers has been a popular platform for Yahoo's users. It could be a good place to kick off one's SMM efforts, by helping others and developing trust in a name.