With all the talk of Digg, its top user and our own inability to make appearances on the site — thanks to a wicked ban from the Digg folks — I figured it was about time to talk about social media’s long term viability. With more and more bloggers — and even larger PR firms — reaching out to Digg, Reddit and Stumble Upon (the “big three”) it’s hard to figure out if all the attention is anything more than a small, yet very vocal, community tooting its own horn. Adam Singer brought up social networking the other day on Future Buzz. He offers up this opinion: Continue reading Social Media’s Long Term Viability

Posted in Social media

Social Media Marketing is often talked about in terms of traffic generation.

Of course this is an obvious and huge benefit, especially when you consider how fast you can attract this flood of traffic, and how much ten, or twenty thousand visits would cost even using lower cost Google Adwords.

But Social Media is not just about traffic. There are other strong benefits also. Continue reading How Your Business Can Benefit from Social Media Marketing

Posted in Social media

Note from Khalid: This post is by Social Media Insider who is an active user user on the big 3 of social media (Digg, SU and Reddit). SMI will be blogging regularly for Invesp on topics related to social media. The words might be a little harsh but it is our policy not to edit content submitted to us by our authors. Enjoy!

Social Media has become a hoard to become the champ, to rank on the top. Although most of us use social media partially for that reason, that’s not the only thing we are here for. Know the meaning of social media and how to utilize it to maximize opportunities for yourself, rather than wrecking it for everyone once and for all.

Continue reading Suggestion For Diggers and Trolls

Posted in Social media

By now I expect you have seen Khalid’s interview with Digg top user where the mystery user says he charges handsomely for submissions and promotion. Digg needs to take careful note, there could be some profit in it for them …
Continue reading A Profitable Idea for Digg

Posted in Social media

Well, here is the interview I promised couple of weeks ago to publish. To set the record straight, there are couple of things I wanted to point out:

The top Digg user only agreed to do this interview if we kept his identity secret. I am honoring this agreement since I think some of the information he shares will hurt his relationships with the Digg community. I also paid him for the interview. I do not see an issue with this because we do pay our writers for good content. Also, the answers this user provides are not true for every top user on Digg. I know some of the top users via both personal and professional relationships. The information is not reflective of how they deal with the Digg community. Finally, whether you agree with this user or not, what he describes are common practices. Love them or hate them, they do exist. I think the Digg system and its lack of transparency will always foster such behavior.

Continue reading An interview with Digg top user

Posted in Social media

Two weeks ago I posted a blog about whether or not to publish an interview we conducted with one of Digg’s top users. The response I got, as I expected, was mixed. I received any emails and comments encouraging me to publish the interview, and as many angry emails and comments telling me not to publish it.

The other consideration we had was with the top user. They had a lot of concerns around a community backlash if we proceed with publishing the post.

I see several options on the table: publish the interview to our RSS subscribers or our mailing list, publish it on our blog in full, or skip publishing the interview all together.

After talking with the team and the top digg user, we’ve decided to move forward and publish the interview in full on our blog. We will publish the interview this coming Tuesday 9/4/2008.

Posted in Social media

We are almost there. It is about time to publish an interview I conducted a while ago with a top Digg user. If you are active in the Digg community, chances are you voted on his/her submissions. I conducted this interview a little while ago but did not want to publish it because I felt that it acknowledged many of the hidden actions of top Digg users. I didn’t know if I should illuminate these actions and had mix feelings about it. I am also sure that we will get a lot of heat for publishing it, which made me hesitate as well.

The interview that will make some of the top Digg users very upset

Instead of telling you more about the interview, I will let you read few of the questions I asked:

Continue reading Don’t Digg this: The real story behind Digg top users

Posted in Social media