If you do a search on how to promote your website or blog these days then you will find at least a few references to ‘social media’. This means any site that allows users to connect to each other and generally be social: think Facebook, Myspace and more recently Twitter. Along with other day to day operations of a website such as SEO (search engine optimisation), updated and original content and incoming links social media at one time represented a great opportunity to increase traffic.

With all of the talk about social media it makes you wonder how effective these kinds of approaches can be if everyone is doing it. The easy answer is that it is by far not as effective as it once was. Most people who start a website simply tick off their ‘to-do’ list that they have gotten from reading articles (suc as this) that advise on increasing traffic. In other words they try the “all of the above” approach. I tend to disagree with this option and think a more tailored approach works better.

I will use my own example of kjwriteleft.com and some of the techniques I use. I would like to state that I do not like to “promote” as much as I like to “share”. After all, with a website that serves articles, creative writing and art as well as a blog it is more important for me to let people know what is available on the site than to try and get people to visit the site like they would with wikipedia or even facebook. This is where my tailored option for promotion is twitter.com. It allows me to post my latest articles as well as to share pre-existing content to users who have chosen to follow me on twitter because of the content I share.

On the other hand, if I was a small business with specific products then perhaps facebook would be more useful with a ‘fan page’. Anything local would benefit more from Facebook than the free for all twitter format. The point of all of this is to provide something that people want to look at, just don’t expect a presence on any social network will bring you any traffic at all. In fact I get traffic from twitter because people want to read my articles, news and creative writing. Too often you see on twitter repeated messages about ‘making money online’ or products available for purchase. Sorry guys, even if you are not spam it sure looks like it to those using twitter for social comment and discussion.

It is that double edged sword of promotion that means you must be so careful about how you promote yourself. For me I prefer to find something like twitter that I can really enjoy using, and the traffic to the website is just an added bonus. Never make it your sole aim to drive traffic to your website. People are not cattle, so yes use the social media to share what you have on your site but be careful not to be too forceful, remember that people know what they like and they do not need you telling them what they like.

I hope this has been a helpful discussion on social media. Please check out the website (if you like of course) and I hope you become one of our regular readers or even contributors.

• Twitter Weekly Updates for 2009-12-13 kjwriteleft.com Merry Christmas to all kjwriteleft.com readers and members http://is.gd/5frKF # Sorry I have not had much time to jump on twitter :( But will get tweeting tomorrow I think, Day off!!! # Have a great day everyone and don't forget to check out http://kjwriteleft.com/ !!!! # kjwriteleft.com Gaza......
• KJ and the Case of the Neglected Blog Image by DavidErickson via Flickr As some of you would have noticed unfortunately I have been neglecting the blog for a little while. This is not because I do not care of course but more because of time constraints. I have been busy this month implementing new systems on......

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