Five Social Media Marketing Techniques for Driving Traffic

According to Wikipedia Social Media is an umbrella term that defines the various activities that integrate technology, social interaction, and the construction of words, pictures, videos and audio.

This interaction, and the manner in which information is presented, depends on the varied perspectives and “building” of shared meaning among communities, as people share their stories, and understandings.

Social Media Marketing on the other hand is the use of this combined technology and social interaction to promote a product or service or website online. There are many social media available to use as tools in your Social Media Marketing strategy. These include but are not limited to forums, message boards, podcasts, video and weblogs.

There are also social media services available through which you can promote your website such as Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, YouTube and Flickr, to name but a few. These sites provide the medium to promote the media and Internet Marketers use both in combination to develop a Social Media Marketing strategy.

I believe the foundation of any social media marketing plan should begin with a Blog. The Internet Marketer should create a Blog to drive traffic and direct this traffic to the product or service being promoted. The Blog owner should also comment on other Blogs in order to attract traffic to his or her Blog.

Another good technique for driving traffic is Internet Forums. This is a good way to establish your reputation by submitting quality content which is of some service to the reader. This will encourage people to reciprocate and visit your website or Blog to check out your content.

A third Social Media Marketing technique which is a good way to create a buzz online and therefore generate word of mouth is video. Create a video promoting a product which may be coming soon and distribute it to the various video sharing sites such as YouTube. This should contribute to increased traffic to your website and therefore increased sales.

Video can be utilized in many different ways. For example: to make people laugh, to demonstrate how a product works, to illustrate how to do something or to conduct a product review. Video attracts people’s attention and leaves an impression and this is why it is the wave of the future for Internet Marketing.

A fourth technique which you can use to get your message across is social networking. You can accomplish this by joining some of the social sites available such as Facebook and MySpace.

However anyone using these sites as promotion tools should be careful to follow the rules and not spam or promote excessively. Treat these sites with respect and use them as they are intended and the traffic will still materialize.

Finally, audio is another social marketing technique which can be implemented. Create an e-book for example and distribute it to the various audio sharing sites such as Soundboard. Or if you have a talent share it with the rest of the web through audio and your traffic should increase exponentially.

These are five techniques any Internet marketer can implement into their Social Media Marketing plan, but there are many more available to choose from.

The point being you shouldn’t overwhelm yourself with so many methods that you cannot do justice to any of them in terms of the time involved. As with any plan choose the ones you enjoy most and you will achieve your goal of increased Social Media traffic.

Bob Withers is a professional sales and marketing person with over twenty years in the field. He has also turned his sights on Affiliate Marketing to apply his trade. Bob changed career paths four years ago when both he and his wife began working with Autistic adults in the US, which along with his Home Business and Affiliate Marketing, is his focus right now. If you want to get in touch with Bob or learn more about Affiliate Marketing and Home Business opportunities please visit:
Free Home Business and Affiliate Marketing Advice

This is my new Blog and having been away from it for a couple of years it’s great to be back because I really enjoy it. Just to tell you something about myself, my wife and I are currently working with Autistic adults in the state of Maine and we love it. Although we’re from Canada, originally from Newfoundland, this is our second stint working in Maine and the two men we are working with this time around are great. We’ve become very attached to these young men and we consider ourselves to be a family. Actually our job title is that of Therapeutic Foster Parents and of course we take it very seriously. One of the main reasons we take it so seriously is that we are advocates for these young men because at times they can’t speak for themselves.

The sad part about our job here in Maine is that we have to leave the country after 18 months. The reason for this being the company who hired us and sponsored us into the US could only get us into the country by way of a Training Visa with the main condition being we have to leave after 18 months. We were here under the same circumstances in 2007 and had to leave the guys we were caring for at that time at the end of 2008.

This of course was very difficult for the three men we were working with and living with at the time and it was also very difficult for us because we became very attached and as I mentioned earlier we became a family. One of the main benefits of coming back is that we get to see the guys we worked with on our first visit and we also get to do what we enjoy which is caring for and helping these young men.

Because of our love for what we do and for the people we work with I will be dedicating a Page on this website to Autism and to the people who live with it on a daily basis. I’m hoping this will help educate people who aren’t familiar with what is fast becoming a global concern and help to raise funds for research.

The other objective of this website is to offer Home Business advice and present opportunities to people who are interested in making a legitimate living by working from home.

I’m hoping to have a great deal of relevant content added soon and I hope people will make it a point to visit often. Thank you for visiting and for taking the time to read this information.

The following two videos should give you some idea of the majestic beauty of Newfoundland:

I’ve added a video below, one of which is actually an advertisement by a local brewery located in St. John’s, Newfoundland which is where I’m from. But it contains some great shots of the area and I like to think portrays what we, as Newfoundlanders, are all about: People who care about people, who work hard and play hard but aren’t afraid to laugh at ourselves. In the following videos you will see many examples of this outlook on life as portrayed by local entertainers performing at what we call “Kitchen Parties”.

These are events where neighbours come together to have a few drinks and entertain one another through song and dance. Please take the time to have a look.