Social Networking Solution: Finding All the Social Networking Sites

Copyright © Laura Shapiro, Your Home Business Guide

 More and more online marketers are searching for the perfect social marketing solution. A big part of the solution is knowing how to find these sites. Most of us know about the "famous" social marketing sites like Facebook, Twitter, Blogger and Wordpress. But you would be surprised to know that these represent just a drop in the bucket of what is out there:

These following social marketing solutions are what many would consided the core of the social networking concept:

- ClassMates, http://www.classmates.com

- Bebo, http://www.bebo.com

- Deviant Art, http://www.deviantart.com

- Facebook, http://www.facebook.com

- Flickr, http://www.flickr.com

- LinkedIn, http://www.linkedin.com

- Meetup, http://www.meetup.com

- MySpace, http://www.myspace.com

- YouTube, http://www.youtube.com

- Gather, http://www.gather.com

- imeem, http://www.imeem.com

- Itsmy, http://www.itsmy.com

- My Yearbook, http://www.myyearbook.com

- Webshots, http://www.webshots.com

The Blogging Social Networking solution is very popular - and if done well and consistantly, this might be all you need to do. 

Here are some social networking sites that emphasize on blogging or micro-blogging (like Twitter):

- Blogger, http://www.blogger.com

- Livejournal, http://www.livejournal.com

- Twitter, http://www.twitter.com

- Windows Live Spaces, http://www.spaces.live.com/

- Wordpress, http://www.wordpress.com

- Vox, http://www.vox.com

- Xanga, http://www.xanga.com

Here are is social networking solution with sites that focus on certain interests like music, books, coffee or pop culture.

- Advogato, http://www.advogato.org/

- Amie Street, http://www.amiestreet.com/

- ANobii, http://www.anobii.com/

- CafeMom, http://www.cafemom.com

- Buzznet, http://www.buzznet.com

- Broadcaster, http://www.broadcaster.com

- Cake Financial, https://www.cakefinancial.com/

- Care2, http://www.care2.com/

- Eons, http://www.eons.com

- TravBuddy, http://www.travbuddy.com/

- Travellerspoint Travel Community, http://www.travellerspoint.com/

- BlackPlanet, http://www.blackplanet.com

- Elftown, http://www.elftown.com

- Flixster, http://www.flixster.com

- Geni, http://www.geni.com

- Goodreads, http://www.goodreads.com

- Gossip Report, http://www.gossipreport.com

- Guild Café, http://www.gamerDNA.com

- Hospitality club, http://www.hospitalityclub.org

- Last.fm, http://www.last.fm

- Library Thing, http://www.librarything.com/

- Lifeknot, http://www.lifeknot.com/

- Live Mocha, http://www.livemocha.com

- One World TV, http://tv.oneworld.net/

- Plaxo, http://www.plaxo.com

- Ravelry, http://www.ravelry.com

- Sci Space, http://www.scispace.net/

- WAYN, http://www.wayn.com/

International social marketing is more and more in demand.

They may be specific to one place (region or country) or cater to the worldwide population.

- Friendster, http://www.friendster.com

- Face Party, http://www.faceparty.com

- Friends Reunited, http://www.friendsreunited.co.uk/

- Biip, http://www.biip.no/  (Norway)

- Cloob, http://www.cloob.com/

- Cyworld, http://us.cyworld.com/

- Fotolog, http://www.fotolog.com/

- Frühstückstreff, http://www.fruehstueckstreff.org/

- Grono, http://www.grono.net

- Habbo, http://www.habbo.com

- hi5, http://www.hi5.com

- Hyves, http://www.hyves.nl

- IRC Galleria, http://www.irc-galleria.net/index.php

- iWiW, http://www.iwiw.hu/

- Profile Heaven, http://www.profileheaven.com/

Social media sites specialize in sharing media and news with other members of the community. This is where bookmarking also comes into play.

- Digg, http://www.digg.com

- StumbleUpon, http://www.stumbleupon.com

- Del.icio.us, http://del.icio.us

- Reddit, http://www.reddit.com

- Fark, http://www.fark.com

And for the younger generation. . .

- College Tonight, http://thequad.com/

- Gaia Online, http://www.gaiaonline.com

- NeoPets, http://www.neopets.com

- Student.com, http://www.student.com

- Reunion, http://www.reunion.com

Each one of the above social networking sites represent an opportunity to drive targeted traffic to your articles, blog or your website. Remember that the key to social marketing is to be social - no outright sales pitches are allowed.

So, now you have a huge list of sites! Where to start? First, start with the concept that you prefer and try the various sites in that list and pick one or two. Focus on that one for a while and see how it goes. Don't jump into all of them at once. Pick one, stick with it for a while, evaluate your results and see if you have the time to add another one or to just move on altogether. The power of social networking is incredible and growing continuously - an absolute must for online marketers.

What if you are not that social and you don't have the time to spend on these sites? If you understand the power of social marketing but don't have your heart in it enough to be consistent with them as a marketing tool? Then I suggest you take a look at this social networking solution that does the work for you on auto-pilot. It's saved me countless hours and all the stress that comes along with trying to squeeze everything in.

Laura Shapiro is a Home-Based Business Owner and Consultant in addition to being a full time Mom. Is a Home Business your Dream? It doesn't have to be - let me help you make it a reality. . .

Free Marketing Leads - Where Should You Get Your Free Marketing Leads?

Copyright © Laura Shapiro, Your Home Business Guide

Where do free marketing leads come from? And how can you get them? Online, you can get many from social media sites like facebook and twitter or free blogs like blogger. You can get them from traffic exchanges like TrafficSwarm or some of the many safelists. You can get them through your participation in forums.

The first thing that many new online marketers try to do when just starting out is go to Free Marketing Leads services but here is why you want to avoid doing that.

If you type the words “free marketing leads” into google, yahoo, msn or whatever your search engine is, you'll get pages and pages of results. Most of these "free marketing leads" come from organizations which sell you these leads. Wait a minute. . .if they’re selling you leads, then the leads aren’t free, right. . .?

Another trick of “free marketing leads” to avoid comes in the form of email lists. Often the seller of the list claims that these emails are pre-filtered to be relevant to exactly what you are selling. Many of these providers sell the same list to every would-be marketer, regardless of the product or service you offer.

In other words, these leads have the proverbial snowball’s chance in a well-known, hot, unpleasant place of ever generating sales. It basically means that you will be cold calling the free marketing leads that you end up getting from these services. If you’ve always dreamed of becoming a spammer, this is the way to go. Be wary of these types of services and ask for proof and refund policies before signing up and spending your hard earned cash for these "free marketing leads".

Here is a very simple concept to keep in mind. . .

Contact information does not equal lead.

Contact information doesn’t become a free marketing lead unless the person behind the contact information has some specific reason why they’d be more interested in your product or service than someone else's.

Try to getting inside the head of the person behind the contact information and provide them with what they are really looking for. What do they like, and more importantly what do they want?

Another very important point to consider. . .

People rarely buy what they need. They buy what they want. So, your job is to sell them what they want and then you give them what they need.

This can take a while to get the hang of. . .but once you master it, you're on your way. . .

Sales leads are, as the name states, leads that can lead directly to sales. Marketing leads are slightly different. These are targeted leads that are brand-specific rather than product specific. What makes your brand special? Do people know what you do? How you do it? Who you are?

Think about who needs what you do. This is the first step in generating genuine marketing leads. If someone comes across what you are offering in a social media site like facebook or twitter, they are more apt to understand a little bit more about you. If they click on your advertisement on google, they have no idea who/what they are dealing with.

One of the most honest, most dignified and most trust-establishing sources of free marketing leads is your own website or blog. People who visit your website or blog do so for a reason. If they visit more than once, they’re genuinely interested in what you do, who you are, and how you do what you do. These are genuine free marketing leads, and about as precisely targeted as you could hope for.

More and more people are establishing their own websites and/or setting up blogs which are inexpensive and relatively easy.

But if you're not into that idea, social sites and forums are another way to get free marketing leads. Remember, you need to be social in these sites. They are not made for selfishly promoting your stuff. Put your profile up with a link to your website, blog or lead capture page and participate. Offer help to those who are asking for it. This is the way to get people to visit your profile and consequently, your more promotional web content.

If you want to take action right away and get step-by-step training on how to generate your very own free marketing leads, I highly suggest this free marketing leads training program which is already helping thousands of others like you set up their free lead generating web content. Even complete beginners and the technically challenged are benefiting from the step-by step, click-by-click instruction to bring free targeted leads into their businesses. It's a great way to cut through the learning curve and get yourself going on the web.

And the best part is that you have access to every aspect of business training that you can possibly imagine. Keep in mind this program was created with network marketers in mind but word has spread so quickly about its unmatched value and affordability that its attracting business owners from all walks of life.

Laura Shapiro is a Home-Based Business Owner and Consultant in addition to being a full time Mom. Is a Home Business your Dream? It doesn't have to be - let me help you make it a reality. . .

Common Negative Internet Marketing Issues and How To Deal with Them. . .

Copyright © Laura Shapiro, Your Home Business Guide

Common Negative Internet Marketing Issues and How To Deal with Them. . .

Some (many. . .) people believe that online marketing is the future of advertising, but there are some negative internet marketing issues that everyone has to deal with.

While online advertising is both a great way to reach a large number of people and a fairly cheap form of advertising, it’s important that you are aware of its limitations in order to help you target your online marketing campaigns better and get you more business.

One of the biggest negative internet marketing issues on the internet is that it is viewed kind of like the television—people only want to see what they want to see. . .with no disrupting ads or information.

So, unless your advertisement REALLY jumps out at them and offers them a solution to something they’ve been worrying about, it will most likely be ignored.

Of course, that all changes when the person goes online searching for what you are advertising. . .more about that later.

Some other possible internet marketing issues involve link exchanges where you get others to post links or graphics that connect to your site on their sites.

This link exchange works fairly well if you don’t mind having a part of your site dedicated to hosting reciprocal links. These other sites don’t want to link to you without you linking back, after all! The problem here is that a few links or graphics don’t look to bad, but when you start getting dozens of them, it can make your site look a little cluttered.

Another of these negative internet marketing issues concerns search engines. The way these sites work is that they rank your site according to how well it seems to match the user’s query (the words that the user types into google, yahoo, msn, etc). It’s not an exact science, but it has to do with what words you have in your title, metadata, and in the text on your site itself.

You might have heard about these keywords or about SEO, or Search Engine Optimization.

SEO one of the most popular buzz words on the internet today, and everyone seems to want their site optimized.

Basically, SEO is the practice of using the words that people are searching for in the right way (not too few times and not too many times) on your site so that search engines will consistently rank it very high and it will get more traffic to it.

The limit here is that writing for search engines means you’re not writing for the actual people visiting your site.

If your page is too heavy on keywords, it just won’t read naturally and may not be that informative. Readers are becoming more and more sensitive to poorly done SEO sites, and most click off the sites they find too keyword-heavy.

One of the most frustrating negative internet marketing issues is that sometimes people simply won’t sign up for your email list.

While in the store, you can often say something extra or give them more information about what you’ll email to them, it can be hard to really push your marketing list on your website. On the other hand, though, the people who do sign up for your email list online are generally customers who are very interested in what you offer and will purchase from you again.

These internet marketing issues are just a few of the negative aspects that you may run into when working on your online marketing strategy. But they can all be overcome with a little work and creativity. Plus, no matter how the internet marketing limitations seem, remember that your information is still reaching many, many people.

Laura Shapiro is a Home-Based Business Owner and Consultant in addition to being a full time Mom. Is a Home Business your Dream? It doesn't have to be - let me help you make it a reality. . .