Tag Archives: Digg

The Secret To Building A Popular Blog

: Image by Getty Images via Daylife

Jon Morrow , Associate Editor of Copyblogger, who should know, shares with us this pearl of wisdom:

The Oldest Blogging Myth

“Content is king.”

Well, that is pretty discouraging to those of us who focus on producing or discovering great content. But then Jon explains what, in our hearts, we already know. In Why No One Links to Your Best Posts And What to Do About It , Jon points out that this is no longer even Web 2.0. It’s moved beyond that. The era of social media has arrived and that means Friends: Facebook, FriendFeed, the Twitterati. If you want to be popular, you need to start getting hooked up with very popular friends/fellow bloggers. Or , as he puts it:

“If you want links now, you need to be more than great. You need to be connected.

The Secret to Building a Popular Blog

Remember the saying “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know?”

Well, it’s kind of true. A mediocre writer that’s friends with every member of the Technorati 100 will become a popular blogger faster than a brilliant writer with no friends at all.

Why? Because bloggers link more often to their friends than anyone else. If you write a reasonably good piece of content that interests their audience, they’ll link to you, mainly because they like you.

The secret to building a popular blog isn’t just writing tons of brilliant content. It’s also having tons of well-connected friends.

How to Make Friends with Popular Bloggers

So… how are you supposed to make friends with all of these popular bloggers and get them to link to your best posts?

Traditional wisdom says you should link to their posts, hoping they’ll notice you and start reading your blog. Sometimes it works, but in my experience, you need to be a little more creative. Here are some ideas to get you started:

Write a guest post that gets lots of traffic and adoring comments
Attend conferences that all of the “Who’s Who” of your niche go to and network your tail off
Volunteer to “vote” for any posts that they’re pushing on social media sites like Digg, Del.icio.us and StumbleUpon
Email them an irresistible question, hoping to spark a discussion
Leave lots of truly memorable comments
Interview them in either a post or a podcast, making sure to ask lots of intelligent questions
Join their private membership program (like Teaching Sells) and make lots of smart posts in the forums

Give and Ye Shall Receive

We’re not talking about anything new here. Really, it comes down to one of the oldest principles of persuasion: reciprocity.

Contrary to what many people think, A-list bloggers aren’t islands, separate and self-sufficient. They deal with problems and annoyances, just as much as anyone else. If you can help alleviate them, they’ll thank and remember you for it.

The key is finding ways that you can be genuinely useful to them. Make yourself relevant and then use that opportunity to start building a relationship.

Give it a few months, and then start pointing them to your best and most relevant content. They’ll probably link to you anytime you do anything interesting, bringing you lots of readers. They’ll also introduce you to other popular bloggers, giving you a chance to do more favors and expand your network.

It’s hard work, but it’s worth it. If you put as much effort into building relationships as you do writing great content, you’ll have a popular blog in no time.

And better yet, you’ll have made friends with some of the most interesting people on the web. That’s a reward in and of itself.”

Power Marketing By Building A Blogging Team (steven-sanders.com)

From The Mouth Of A Guru: 10 Great Social Sites for Resume Building

10 Great Social Sites for Resume Building.

This is a time many of us need to broadcast our resume in the smartest and most socially connected way possible. Luckily, these tools and viral networks are out humming and reaching an ever broader, but very targeted audience, just when we need them most. And if we need a guide to tell us how to put our best foot forward in the most effective way, Dan Schawbel is just the man to do that. He is the author of Me 2.0: Build a Powerful Brand to Achieve Career Success (Kaplan, April 09), and owner of the award winning Personal Branding Blog.

Dan says :” Creating the perfect resume is not easy. Luckily, there are a number of online resources dedicated to helping you create outstanding traditional and social media resumes. Here are 10 great social sites with unique features that let you create your own resume-like profile, edit your resume online, get it reviewed by experts, print it, share it on social networks, and much more.Remember, building a strong profile can help serve as a great marketing tool to help you get the job you’re looking for.

1. Razume

Razume is a service that enables job seekers to complete their resumes and polish them up with feedback from reviewers in the community. The resume you create using this service is exactly like traditional resumes you may have created in the past, but this service allows you to improve your resume so you’re more likely to better your chances at landing your next job. Users are able to search for jobs on Razume and will soon be able to apply for them through the site itself.

2. LinkedIn

LinkedIn seems to be on all of my job lists and for good reason. LinkedIn is a combination of a resume, cover letter, reference document and a moving database of your contacts. The resume portion is quite standard, with fields asking for your education and work experience. The cover letter piece is the summary you get to have at the beginning, where you can position yourself for a particular job, based on your qualifications, awards and an explanation of what type of job you’re looking for.

As you accelerate in your career, your network can easily observe your change in jobs or positions. You can also update your status bar, just like in Facebook Facebook reviews or on Twitter Twitter reviews, with the type of job you’re looking for. Your LinkedIn “resume” will be perceived as noteworthy when you fill it out completely, acquire endorsements for your work, join groups related to your interests, and add applications (such as your blog).

3. VisualCV

VisualCV is a website that provides users with a virtual resume, as well as a database of job openings and networking opportunities. Whether you’re a job seeker, entrepreneur, consultant, student or manager, VisualCV lets you display all of your credentials in an easy to read format, with multimedia integration. For example, you can upload or embed a video resume or a podcast of you being interviewed.

The latest capabilities that they offer allow job seekers to integrate their resume with social media sites, such as LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook, to share their qualifications with friends and colleagues. When you update your resume, it can be shared through websites such as Digg Digg reviews and StumbleUpon StumbleUpon reviews. Your resume, or VisualCV, can combine other elements, such as images, charts, awards and recommendations, in addition to traditional resume fields such as “work experience.”

Disclosure: VisualCV sponsors my blog and magazine.

4. Emurse

Emurse allows you to create, share and store your resume for free online. Their resume builder is job seeker friendly, allowing you to create and maintain a professional resume which can be downloaded in any format, such as PDF. Just like LinkedIn, your resume can have a unique URL linked to your name and the ability to view employers who have seen your resume in the past.

You also get statistics and graphs to aid in resume distribution. In addition, Emurse lets you keep track of your contacts, invite contacts and always access their latest information, similar to LinkedIn. Just like Google Google reviews does with AdSense, you get job postings in your local area that are relevant to your resume. There is also a job search area and organizer, similar to Monster.com’s, where you can keep track of the resumes you submit over time.

5. Xing

Xing is a social network with over 7 million business professionals globally, and is read in 16 languages. Aside from being able to create a profile, the networking part of this site is what shines. There are over 22,000 groups and networking events from London to Beijing advertised.

Xing offers many of the same services as LinkedIn, and like LinkedIn, can serve as your online resume and cover letter. The standard service lets you create a professional profile page, search for people by name and industry, and join groups and events. When you login, you’ll see jobs that might interest you, new members, visitors to your profile and much more.

6. ResumeBucket

ResumeBucket is a service that enables you to post a resume quickly online. The site provides you with a unique URL for your resume and enables you to promote your resume on your website or blog with embeddable ResumeBucket badges. In addition, resumes are shareable via popular social bookmarking and social networking sites.

If you’re currently employed and would like to keep your resume private, you can. ResumeBucket also provides you with sample resumes and cover letters as best practices to help you when you build your own. And if you need assistance, they have a resume writing service where their professional writers can help you along the way.

7. ResumeSocial

ResumeSocial is a social resume community, where you can post your resume online and get feedback, just like Razume. Registered users can build a resume through feedback and comments from other users who have similar job experience. You can also be a resume expert and become a valuable member of the community by providing others with resume assistance.

There is also an area for sharing cover letters and follow-up letters, which are very important as well. When someone finds your resume on this site, they can print it, quote it, favorite it and email it to other people. There is also a job search area, a blog and a career area, which gives you advice for putting resumes together.

8. Gigtide

Gigtide is a website that lets you create, publish, manage and track your resumes, contacts and cover letters online. You can store unlimited resumes, contacts and cover letters and there are professional resume templates to help you. You also have the option of creating a social media resume, which includes images, video, direct links and sharing functionality. Another interesting feature is a direct employer contact form, where employers can contact you directly through your resume.

9. Howtowritearesume

Howtowritearesume gives you an easy way to build a professional resume, without being an expert. You get their phrase builder technology, which helps you build compelling headlines, qualifications, achievement statement and more. Then there is “one-click formatting,” which automatically reformats your resume and makes it easy to choose the best layout. Your resume is stored online and is accessible by potential employers. The templates are all predefined, so filling in the blanks is really easy. You can change the font and margins and preview the changes instantly before printing or saving it.

10. Ziggs

Ziggs is designed to help you market yourself and manage your personal brand on the web. The service lets you create a profile and manage your online identity, and alerts you each time a recruiter views your profile and resume. You can discuss topics, ask people for advice or referrals, and search for jobs.
Image courtesy of iStockphoto, peepo

From The Mouth Of The Guru: 10 Ways To Increase Your Twitter Followers

: Image via CrunchBase

Kevin Rose, founder of social media site digg.com, touted as one of the most influential people on the web, has 272,706 followers on Twitter as of this moment. Blink. There are probably more now. I could go on and on about Kevin, but what’s important for you and me is he’s telling us how to do this thing we’re all trying to do : create a gigantic, mind-blowing, profit exploding following on Twitter. At least that’s what I’m trying to do and I bet at least some of you are too.

Kevin’s advice…….which I’m sure you can take to the bank….both literally and figuratively is set out in 10 Ways To Increase Your Twitter Followers. ( Follow the links for a full explanation of any terms you’re not familiar with.)

Explain to your followers what retweeting is and encourage them to retweet your links. Retweeting pushes your @username into foreign social graphs, resulting in clicks back to your profile. Track your retweets using retweetist.
Fill out your bio. Your latest tweets and @replies don’t mean much to someone that doesn’t know you. Your bio is the only place you have to tell people who you are. Also, your bio is displayed on Twitter’s Suggested Users page. Leaving it blank or non-descriptive doesn’t encourage people to add you.
As @garyvee says, “link it up.” Put links to your Twitter profile everywhere. Link it on your Digg, LinkedIn, Facebook, blog, email signature, and everywhere else you live online. Also, check out the great feedburner-like badges from TwitterCounter for your blog.
Tweet about your passions in life and #hash tag them. Quality content coupled with an easy way to find it never fails. If others enjoy your content, they’ll add you. Learn more about #hash tagging here.
Bring your twitter account into the physical world. Every time I give a talk, speak on a panel, shoot a podcast, present slides, or hand out business cards, I figure out a way to broadcast or display my twitter account.
Take pictures. Pictures are heavily retweeted/spread around. This one from US Airways Flight 1549 has been viewed 350,000+ times. For mobile pics use iPhone apps such as Tweetie or Twitterific, both which support on the go uploading.
Start a contest. @jasoncalacanis offered a free macbook air if he reached the #1 most followed spot. That never happened, but Jason added thousands of followers…brilliant.
Follow the top twitter users and watch what they tweet. Pay attention to the type of content they sent out and how they address their audiences.
Reply to/get involved in #hash tag memes. search.twitter.com lists the hot ‘trending topics. Look for the #hash topics and jump in on the conversation (see #4 for links to #hash instructions).
Track your results. TwitterCounter will show you how many new users you’re adding per day and Qwitter will email you when someone unfollows you after a tweet.

If you enjoy this content, let me first give due credit and tell you to be smart and add Kevin at twitter.com/kevinrose. I also hope you add me as well at twitter.com/gretchenglas, thank you.

AW WebBiz & Social Media Blog

Mentoring, Tools & Strategy To Succeed