Basically, social bookmarking creates a true web of resources and connections—one that is not limited to individuals and their folders but represents the interests and judgments of a community of users.
1. What is it?
- Social bookmarking is the practice of saving bookmarks to a public website and “tagging” them with keywords. Basically it means that if you like something, you capost it to a social bookmarking site who'll then put it on their site. If other people also like it, they can vote for it and give it a better ranking and thus more prominence.
- Visitors to social bookmarking sites can search for resources by keyword, person, or popularity and see the public bookmarks, tags, and classification schemes that registered users have created and saved.
2. How does it work?
Social bookmarking opens the door to new ways of organizing information and categorizing resources. Because social bookmarking services indicate who created each bookmark and provide access to that person’s other bookmarked resources, users can easily make social connections with other individuals interested in just about any topic. Users can also see how many people have used a tag and search for all resources that have been assigned that tag.
Social bookmarking opens the door to new ways of organizing information and categorizing resources. Because social bookmarking services indicate who created each bookmark and provide access to that person’s other bookmarked resources, users can easily make social connections with other individuals interested in just about any topic. Users can also see how many people have used a tag and search for all resources that have been assigned that tag.
3. Which sites are operating social bookmarking?
Social bookmarking dates back just a couple of years, when sites like Furl, Simpy, and del.icio.us began operating. Here are some popular social bookmarking sites:
Social bookmarking dates back just a couple of years, when sites like Furl, Simpy, and del.icio.us began operating. Here are some popular social bookmarking sites:
- Del.icio.us
- Digg.com
- Furl
- Clipmarks
- StumbleUpon
- Newsvine
- Mixx
- Diigo
- Propeller
4. Who uses social bookmarking?
Lots of people. They are young and might be a bit geeky, but overall they are the people who are going to be contributing to your website. If you want user generated content, you can get this in here. Social bookmarking users not only go around bookmarking pages but comment on your pages as well. They'll make suggestions of things you can change. They'll blog about you on their own websites. These are the people who generate the noise.
Lots of people. They are young and might be a bit geeky, but overall they are the people who are going to be contributing to your website. If you want user generated content, you can get this in here. Social bookmarking users not only go around bookmarking pages but comment on your pages as well. They'll make suggestions of things you can change. They'll blog about you on their own websites. These are the people who generate the noise.
5. What are the benefits?
- Give users the opportunity to express differing perspectives on information and resources through informal organizational structures. It is a chance to build your personal branding as most of the social bookmarking sites allow users to develop your own page on their site.
- Allow like-minded individuals to find one another and create new communities of users. It lets people take advantage of the insights of other users to find information related to the topic you are researching, even in areas that aren’t obviously connected to the primary topic.
- Encourage users to keep coming back because the collections of resources are constantly changing, therefore, increase website traffic.
- Bring opportunity to get a better Search Engine Optimization (SEO) system, as social bookmarking sites help to build more relevant links easily. Normally, it is difficult to do that in a mass scale without going round lots of sites asking them for links or going around blogs and posting comments so that they'll link back.
6. What are the downsides?
- Social bookmarking is done by amateurs. There is no oversight as to how resources are organized and tagged. This can lead to inconsistent or otherwise poor use of tags.
- There is a risk of presenting a skewed view of the value of any particular topic because social bookmarking reflects the values of the community of users, For example, users might assign pejorative tags to certain resources
- Social bookmarking means storing data in yet another location that you have to maintain and update.
From all the aspects considered above, it is seen that understanding social bookmarking, taking its advantage and applying it properly can help marketers enhance their brand’s online performance and increase their social media campaign’s effectiveness.
