Are you looking out to leverage social media to create a personal brand that goes a long way? If your answer is yes, then you’ve reached the right article. Given below are a few easy to apply social media ideas that will help you in more than one way to not only create a strong brand out of yourself, but to also reach out to your audience in a targeted way.

Focus on Quality, Not Quantity: If you look closely, you will observe that many businesses and blog owners are in competition to get the most followers and fans. Even though it is very good to have a lot of fans, but this is not the only thing that you should be concerned about. For instance, if you have a B2B company, do not stress out when you notice only a handful of Twitter followers as opposed to others. What matters more than the quantity is the quality of your followers. The same logic goes for all social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn. Whenever you spend your time counting numbers, you are wasting your time. Be laser focused in your approach. Be sure that you are the only one competing for your target market. Distil all the fluff. Have the best type of audience around you.

Be Very Clear: Social media deals with real human beings and not just computers. In order for you to produce your personal brand and unbreakable relationship with these users, you have to be very obvious when using your particular techniques. This will give you the chance to see things from the viewpoint of your target audience and provide them what they are really searching for. By being crystal clear, you will not only build trust between you and your targeted market, but it will also have an impact on your overall business in a good way. For example, if your site was having unusual problems such as a bad server or other technical difficulty, then let your targeted audience aware of everything that happened. If someone has had a problem with your service or product, be available to give them help. Once you begin using these steps, only then will you be capable of growing your brand via social media.

Practical Application: When you build your brand and do your marketing through social media what matters most isn’t theory it is putting to use the things you learn. In other words, nothing will beat real application of your strategies and tactics; your results will speak for themselves and will guide you towards your goal once you start taking action. Engage with your target audience and understand their needs/wants, give them what they are looking for, provide them high value and build strong relationships. The more active you are in terms of social media the more you will be noticed by people. It will take you some time to make your presence felt, but you’ll definitely have an upper hand if you are persistent in your efforts, with consistent action. If you have team members that you are trying to work with, let them have the freedom to take action as well because simple theory training isn’t going to help you at all. Well there you are! These are tips that are easy to apply to your social media strategy that won’t just help you build a good brand but will also help you get regular exposure with your target audience.

For more tips on how to use video to build your personal brand, check out this Video Boss review.  Another resource is this Video Boss review site that might give you a better idea!  Video Boss is all about giving you the tools you need to succeed with video online!

Another resource that you’ll like is Lets Get Social.  Lets Get Social review is all about how to do social media for businesses!

I just wanted to put up a quick post asking if anyone wanted a Google Wave Invite.  I’ve been playing around with it for the last few days and am pretty impressed, but I was wondering if anyone else wanted to join in the fun?

In case you haven’t heard of Google Wave, here’s a brief description:

Google Wave is an online communication and collaboration tool that makes real-time interactions more seamless — in one place, you can communicate and collaborate using richly formatted text, photos, videos, maps, and more.

A wave is a conversation with multiple participants — participants are people added to a wave to discuss and collaborate on its content. Participants can reply any time and anywhere within a wave, and they can edit content and add more participants as a wave develops. It’s also possible to rewind waves with the playback functionality, to see what happened, and when.

All you have to do is leave a comment and I’ll send the invite to the email address you enter for the comment.  I think I have six invites left, so the first 6 get them!

– Jason

** I’m trying to get my hands on some more!  Stay tuned.  As you can see the comments filled up quick :0)

I get to talk to a lot of the top users over at Digg. This is important because the Digg algorithm is always in a constant state of tweak (a statement that can be construed properly several different ways). It changes as fast as, if not faster than, Google and other search engines. Two questions always pop up with either me asking top users or other users asking me:

“What does it take to get to the front page?”

The answer has two parts: time and tools. We can go into the time issue later, but for now, let’s assume that you have the time. The second question is:

“What are the right tools?”

There are dozens of lists of Digg tools out there. Most of them are nice and quaint, but do top users really use them. Normally, no. Here are the tools that they do use. Some are obviously loose interpretations of the word “tools” but anything that helps to achieve the goal of hitting the front page often should be listed.

Great Sources

Bottom line, some sources hit more easily than others. It’s an unfair social media world, but a story posted on sites like HuffPo, Cracked, and ArsTechnica will have a better chance of hitting the front page of Digg than the same exact story posted on SERM Experiment. Use DI66 and their list of top sources in the last 7 and 30 days to find out what’s been hitting lately. Check it often – you’ll find some sources that hit often one month, especially new sources, mysteriously stop hitting altogether the next month (but remember, Kevin and Jay say autobury doesn’t exist).

It isn’t easy to get stories from the top sites. Many users sit on these sites, ready to pounce as soon as the next story is posted. Some sources post around the same time every day, which is why around 9pm PST you’ll see one, two, or even three duplicate submissions of the Astronomy Picture of the Day and a mad dash around 5am PST for the latest posting on Cracked. Find sites on the list that you’re interested in that hit often. Sometimes, the best sources aren’t even in the top 20.

RSS Feed Reader

Once you have a list of sources, you need to monitor them for new stories. Open up 50 windows on Internet Explorer and then…

Wow, that statement failed in so many ways. No, you don’t have to refresh the websites every few seconds. All you need is a great feed reader. You need one that pings your sources constantly. That’s the key. Having a feed reader that pings every 10 minutes won’t help you land the top sources. You need something that’s always working for you.

Sadly, I wish I could divulge the best one, but I promised multiple users that I would not. It’s not a coincidence that many of them are using the same one, simply because it is the Johnny on the Spot of RSS Feed Readers. But, to keep pointers away from the “close” button on on the tab or window that contains this story, I’ll at least give a hint…

As feed readers go, it’s a spicy one that does not appear on the list supplied on my Feedburner (which may be why top submitters don’t post from here).

Good IM List

The art of using IMs for getting Diggs and comments is a slippery slope. Does it work? If done properly, yes. Is it annoying? Yes, even if done right. Is it necessary? No, but it sure helps sometimes.

If you use IM to promote your submissions, there is a whole blog post or two that could describe what to do and what not to do, but here are the basics:

• Don’t send out too many. Once a week should be fine. Once every couple of days and you might start losing people, but not many. Once a day – annoying, but again, there are a ton of people who do it, so you should be fine. Once you start getting into multiple IMs a day asking for Diggs, you better be a really friendly and likeable person who is quick with the return requests.
• In case you didn’t know, Digg knows the source of the Digg as well as the path that visitors took to get to the source (illustrated well with last month’s ban-parties). Sending people straight to the submission is about as effective as shouting. Mix it up. Send some people to the source if it has a nice Digg button on it. Send them to the upcoming page with the title of the story. Send a couple to your profile and ask them to Digg your top favorite. They have their algorithm geared towards detecting artificially inflated Digg counts. Make it natural.
• IM all at once or spread it out. Nothing in between. There are two strategies: quick bursts of IMs either in the beginning or as soon as it hits the upcoming “Hot in (sub-category)” section is one strategy that works well, but at a certain point you lose the diversity factor. The other strategy is to sprinkle Diggs throughout the 24 life of the submission. Get it some quick ones in the beginning to get the ball rolling, then add a few more every hour or couple of hours.
• Be polite. Make friends. Real friends. If all you do is ask for Diggs every day with nary a “hello” and “thank you” you will be removed from many lists. You might be surprised that there are people on the other end.

Trend Watchers

The above-noted DI66 is a strong tool for getting a basic overview of what’s hitting, but if you have the time, there are better tools for analysis. Social Blade, for example, compiles the front page like DI66, but it goes into more line-item detail about the stories that are hitting. Look at the data and get a feel for what is happening with the algorithm. How quickly are stories hitting? How many stories do front page submitters Digg in the 24 hours prior to it hitting. How many friends vs. non-friends Dugg the stories? How many Diggs did it take? How many comments?

For those who really want to get down to the nuts and bolts and analyze what is happening to the front page, Social Blade is the best. Another useful tool is Digg Explorer. It shows visually what has been happening with the last 500 front page submissions. While it doesn’t have as much useful data as Social Blade, it has its uses and is definitely more visually stimulating.

Friday Night Tech Podcast

Even though it is a tech show, The Drill Down seems to have a tendency of discussing Digg a lot. Perhaps it’s the presence of the top 3 Diggers of all time (well, top 2, then number 4, since MakiMaki recently passed the banned Zaibatsu) as the hosts that keeps the chat room, post-show discussion, and occasionally the show itself talking about Digg.

If you miss the show at 8:30 PST Friday nights live on Ustream, you can catch it on their website, but sometimes the best digg-discussion comes from the chat room and post-show.

Time

It will be an entirely different blog post that discusses ways to minimize the time required to do well on Digg, but know this: now that scripts are outlawed and blind digging gets the “itchy trigger finger” message, users have to find ways to Digg often. Regardless of the intentions of the site or the desires of the masses of users, the front page is about the style and participation of the submitters. Quality has something to do with it — you can’t make it without at least a little quality in your submissions — but as I’ve said before, an inactive user and a weak source can post pictures of Jimmy Hoffa on a beach with Elvis Presley and Kurt Cobain and it probably wouldn’t hit the front page (until it was re-submitted by a strong user or from a strong source later).

img

Pretty sure Osama Bin Laden doesn’t have an account on Facebook but if he did I am sure it would look exactly like the one shown below. Jihadists have had great success in using YouTube and other online networking tools to get their message out on the web. With the popularity of Facebook it seems like their next target is to invade Facebook and use it as a portal for their next propaganda. For more information please click on the link below after you check out the fake Osama Facebook profile.

[source : Wired]

If you are looking to find every Twitter application and tool out there I think this will serve you pretty good. Although there are hundreds of twitter tools coming out of the woods each day, I think it would be safe to say that this wiki covers almost every service that you might possibly need in regards to your Twitter use.

Since it is a wiki you also have the option to edit page and add new apps or make correction where you might thing the information is outdated or wrong. The wiki seems to be updated pretty often. This site should be able to satisfy any urge or any requirements you might have that relates to your twitter use . Give it a try, you will love it with all the applications that are listed here for both desktop and mobile.

The hard thing about getting into Twitter is if you are not already a known figure on the web, it can get quite frustrating gathering up a decent number of followers. Think of it as a new blog. If an established blogger starts a new blog he/she is able to gain a large number of subscribers in a matter of days. But if you are new and just starting out it takes months or even years before you can grab a decent number of subscribers.

Twittieme sort of helps you grab new followers. It is a simple service that lets you advertise your twitter profile for free. The signup service is as simple as it can be. Add your twitter profile, add an image you want to use and you are ready to roll. The service takes about 24 hour to approve your ad. Also at any given time this site adds only one twitter profile to its main page so each profile gets maximum exposure. I am not sure exactly how effective this service has been to twitter users but if you are looking for a way to gain some traction on Twitter, this certainly might be of some help.

Before we get started with the post I would like to say that personally I am not for this service. The only reason I chose to feature this on Nethackz is because we would like our readers to know that their are options to earn money via twitter. I don’t think the overall model of the business is bad but for some reason I myself am not comfortable using it.

Magpie is a service that lets you earn money from you tweets and the tagline makes that clear – convert your tweets into bling-bling. Magpie is an ad network for twitter that connects advertisers to possible targeted market on twitter based on what they are tweeting. As I have written above, I do not use this service so haven’t tried it yet but this is how it works.

• Advertisers get in touch with magpie
• Magpie looks for users that are tweeting things that might be based on advertisers products or services
• Magpie tweets a message from you on behalf of the advertiser.

The service is simple. As far as I know the service usually finds best match before it sends out a “magpie” ad. If you are talking about food, your magpie ad will contain a tweet related to food to keep it as relevant as possible. If you are up for making some money I would suggest you give it a try. See how it goes and may be I will come on board with you guys .

This is one of the most useful twitter apps for people who want to stay active on twitter but don’t have the time to keep at it. TweetLater does exactly what it says – helps you schedule your tweets for a later time just in case you might not be around to tweet something important. This is especially helpful for corporate users and other Twitter users as well since it allows you to tweet announcements, links and other information that might be time sensitive.

TweetLater is a free service and you have to create an account to use this service. The signup process is pretty simple. Usual signup process and you are ready to go. No email to confirm or anything. Once you are logged in you will have 3 options to choose from – manage your tweets, manage tweet keywords or get take a step by step guide. If you have never used this service we would suggest you take a step by step guide which guides you through the entire process.

Once you get to the dashboard simply click on “Add Twitter Account” and add your twitter profile using your twitter username and password and you are ready to go . Now you can schedule your tweets and get your tweets seen in the middle of the night while you are dreaming away. Pretty neat! I think this service can be extremely useful for active twitter users as they can schedule tweets and have it seen by their followers even when they are not around. The only thing is to make sure you use it wisely and not as a “spam machine.”

The other cool feature that this service offers is that it allows you to track keywords that you are interested in. Once you select the keywords you want to track TweetLater sends you an email letting you know how many times and who tweeted what you are interested in. Although I use twitter quite frequently I admit I just came across this site. Now if you excuse me I need to schedule some tweets for later .

Lets talk a little about PopURLs in case you don’t know about it. PopURL stands for “Popular URL” and this service is like the central hub where you can find all the URL that are popular on the web. The service pulls links from sites such as Digg, Reddit, StumbleUpon, YouTube among many others and neatly lists them under the service it was pulled from. The links are based on popularity hence the name PopURLs.

Now to the Twitter part . Not that we were trying to break our “Twitter Week” promise, we just had  to kind of layout the central idea before we talked about TwittURLs. TwittURLs is a similar service like PopURLs and the only difference which you probably already figured out is that it pulls popular links from Twitter. This service lists all the links that are popular on twitter based on number of views. the more it is viewed the higher placement it gets.

This site first lists links to content based on popularity followed by popular images and then videos. It seems like anytime you use Twitpic to send images to twitter, it shows on content category as well. Whenever you send a link to an image through twitpic instead of the title of the image you get “Twitpic – Share images on Twitter,” which is kind of a bummer as it would be nice to see the title. It is a pretty neat service and might be pretty helpful for bloggers to analyze how their links are doing. If its here your links are certainly doing good on Twitter.

Here we are once again with another cool Twitter service. There are so many twitter apps out there that some are completely useless and doesn’t serve any purpose whatsoever. Yesterday, while we were busy tweeting we came across a link that caught our eye. Twiffid is a pretty cool application that lets you track what your twitter friends are blogging about. Tiffid basically allows you to see what your twitter friends’ current posts are on their blog without having to visit their blog from the profile itself.

If you are a digg user or reddit user you know how important the title of a story is. This service can help these twitter users levitate traffic to their blog by giving them one more platform. The service is pretty simple to use. As with most twitter clients login using your twitter username and password.

Once you are logged in you will be able to see all your twitter friend’s latest blog posts titles. Just click on it and you will be at their blog reading that particular post.

I personally think that this service has a lot of potential. Its kind of like a feed reader so to speak where all the new blogposts written by your Twitter friends are updated regularly. If you happen to use this service, let us know what you think.