Why Use Social Media?

Very recently, I wrote a post on using social media to promote your blog. What I didn’t really touch on was the main purpose of using social media. Indeed, why spend considerable time on these social media applications when you can use that time to actually work on your blog? The answer is simple – social media can have specific purposes that will benefit your blog in the end. The important thing is that you identify WHY you want to use a particular social media application. Here are some possible reasons. To gain insight about a particular community Not all social networks are the same – a particular network may cater to a specific group. On another note, many large scale social networks have subgroups with a particular focus. This fact is quite helpful if you have a blog which you want to promote within a specific niche. If you want to know more about a particular interest, then there are not too many places better than a social network to gain information. To gain visibility The idea is similar to the one above. If you want to gain visibility in a particular niche, then being active in a social network that revolves around the same interest is a very effective way to achieve this. Being active in a particular community can make people aware of your blog and what you have to offer in terms of content. A natural result of this is traffic – which is always welcome. Bottom line? Social networks are good for you!

Originally posted on November 21, 2008 @ 6:18 pm