by Jon Wuebben
II. Types of Social Media Content
So if social media is any online media that allows users to interact with one another, there are probably many different types of social media right? Yes, that’s right. Here is a list of the unique forms of social media and which sites are the most important.
Social networking – Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, LinkedIn,
Social networking sites allow users to add friends, send messages and share content on either the “one-to-many” or “many-to-many” format. Typically, people on social networking sites get together in communities of like-minded interest. More on Twitter in a bit…
Social bookmarking – StumbleUpon, Digg, Delicious
Social bookmarking applications allow users to share their favorite online content with one another while by creating online bookmarks. The bookmarks are on a web site so other people can then see your bookmarks and ideally be exposed to something that they wouldn’t otherwise encounter. Some social bookmarking sites, like StumbleUpon and Digg, use a voting system that allows users to indicate what bookmarks they found interesting.
Blogs – WordPress, TypePad, Blogger, etc
Most people have interacted with blogs for many years now. Essentially they are online journals where a company or individual discusses anything they want to – reviews of products, opinions on industry news, interviews, etc.. and shares this with their blog subscribers. More often than not, subscribers and visitors to the blog are invited to comment and share their feedback on each blog posting…this provides great opportunity for interaction and exchange of thoughts and ideas with your audience/customers.
Wikis - Wikipedia
A wiki refers to content created online by multiple users working on the same content, but at different times and from different places.
Photo sharing – Flickr, Photobucket
Photo sharing sites allow people to upload and organize photo libraries to share with anyone they like.
Video Sharing – YouTube
Sites like YouTube have revolutionized online video, allowing users to share video content either privately or publicly. Conveniently, they serve as a free video hosting service by allowing you to embed your videos and other content from YouTube to your blog.
Presentation Sharing – Slideshare.net, Scribd
Have a Powerpoint deck that you want to share with lots and lots of people? No problem. Using a site like Slideshare, you can upload as many presentations as you like and even get some SEO benefit by doing so.
Obviously, in this “age of social media”, there are hundreds of sites to choose from. Selecting the right social media channels for your company or individual tastes is based on your specific preferences, goals and long term content strategies. If you are a business, you naturally want to go where your target market, customers and partners are. If you are an individual who simply wants to connect with friends, go to where they go.
Using Link bait in Social Media
So, I bring up the concept of link baiting. And if you have read my e-book, Writing Link Friendly Content, you’ll see this information there as well. It’s just too important to not include!
But what is it?
Link bait is used to describe viral, linkable content designed to attract thousands of links and is recognized as one of the most effective ways to build links – and relevance for a site. So link baiting is really building link‐friendly content. It’s also a great way to approach social media content – because it gets people interested.
The traditional way of getting links circa 2004 and before involved contacting other relevant websites, emailing the webmasters and asking for a link. You’d contact people you know – vendors, partners, customers, suppliers and “reciprocate” links. You would carefully explain in your email that linking to you would be worthwhile for their visitors and beneficial to them as well…and you’d spend hundreds of hours doing it.
Why didn’t someone in the know just explain to them that all they had to do was write solid content and the links would come? Of course, you have to promote it too, but perhaps they were looking for the easy way out. Ironically, the easier way is to write high quality, very popular, link friendly content. 
With link bait, you can do this.
First, as all the experts will tell you ‐ you need a good “hook” for your blog posts, Tweets or Facebook Status Updates. A hook is the angle or the way of grabbing attention from the reader. You do it by capitalizing on something that’s really important to most people – security, money, respect, gossip, new ideas, a secret, etc…and give it a little sizzle.
Types of Hooks:
- Tying in to what’s relevant – the News Hook
- Going against the grain – the Contrary Hook
- Taking the offensive position – the Attack Hook
- Providing something important – the Resource Hook
- Making people laugh – the Humor Hook
Tying in to what’s relevant - News Hook
- Find out who reports the news to the news reporting agencies – and then jump on it.
- Calling someone or something out – if you can expose a fraud or flaw in a news story, and report on it, that content you wrote could be very link friendly. You could have thousands of links very quickly.
- Giving your opinion on a popular news story
- Don’t rehash what someone else already reported though – give it your own slant
Going against the grain - Contrary Hook
- Are you a natural contrarian? Put it to use! Be the one guy that finds something to not like about a story, a product or service and then go off on them.
- “Why <insert prominent blogger or company name here> is WRONG about…”
- Find something that’s really really popular and then tear it apart. People will notice.
Taking the offensive position - Attack Hook
- Pointing out why a particular product or service is doing more harm than good
- Going after the government re. almost anything – they are a great target
- Standing up for an under‐represented or disadvantaged group
- Choose a topic that has a fair degree of truth on both sides and then write away!
- Make it informed, smart and very controversial.
You have to be careful with this one – you don’t want to write the wrong thing about the wrong person. A good idea is to go after a company or product instead of an individual. However, if you’re gutsy, have some proof for what you are claiming and really want to gain some instant traffic, it can give you instant credibility and build your reputation like wildfire. Most people love controversy and when you use an attack hook, you stir it up.
Providing something important - Resource Hook
- Develop a comprehensive list of blogs in your niche ‐ link out to them, and chances are they will link to you
- Create a useful tool related to your niche that people like
- The list concept: How to do ____. Make it substantive and link friendly!
- A compilation of news stories on a theme that you in turn analyze and create a post for
- Example: If you run a hotel, discuss all the places to visit in the surrounding area
Making people laugh – the Humor Hook
- Photoshop a funny picture or cartoon for the subject you are writing about and post it
- Post a list that takes a funny slant: ie “Top 20 Ways I’m Going to Work from Bed This Week”
- Post idea: “You know you’re a _____when…”
- Play off another funny bit that you came across: jokes, funny stories, etc.. People love to laugh right? They also need comic relief from the craziness of life on the web. Or life in general. If you have a natural way of lightening things up through your personality, you may be able to write that way too. Give it a shot. With your next blog post. You’ll create some link friendly content in the process.
Tomorrow in part 3 of this series, I’ll discuss other types of Link Bait and Twitter.
