Comments on: Home Bases and Outposts – How I use Social Media in My Blogging

By: frank

frank — Mon, 11 May 2009 02:43:20 +0000

Having a solid outpost in Twitter has helped me a TON as I’ve launched a new blog with the company I work with. The relationships and network of people I’ve built on Twitter have been very supportive and helpful. I’m not sure of the exact numbers, but i bet at least 30% of our current traffic is based on sharing via Twitter.

linkedIn is a distand second and facebook a distant third.

What I’ve found to be most effective in an outpost strategy is to:

1) Figure out where the people are that you need to be reaching with your blog

2) Create accounts in the places you identified based on #1 above

3) Once you are set up with your account spend a LOT of time watching what is going on, listening to people that are already there and researching things to see what people have found to be effective/ineffective.

4) Once you have spent a good amount of time listening start sharing, engaging, talking to people – all with the intent/focus on helping others and adding value to those who listen to you.

If you can start out this way things seem to start to fall into place and the outpost becomes a place that will not only drive traffic to your blog it will also become a place where you gain a lot of insight/knowledge to make your blog content even better!

http://twitter.com/franswaa

By: Joni Hubred-Golden

Joni Hubred-Golden — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 18:42:04 +0000

Excellent post, loved the visual – this is exactly what I have been working on for the past few weeks, and your post helped me fine tune my approach. Very helpul, thanks!

Joni

(All of my connections are here:
Forum Communications
http://www.jonihubredgolden.com)

By: Neal Wiser

Neal Wiser — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 15:04:37 +0000

Great post. really helps to put the various tools and types of services we use into perspective. However, I’d like to paint a slightly broader picture of the Social Profile and add:

- TouchPoints: such as various Instant Messanger and Email Accounts.
- SIGs (Special Interest Groups): Such as the various groups one might belong to in LinkedIn, for example.

Each ToucPoint and SIG helps to play a vital role in my online profile and are vital tools I use to keep in touch with different groups.

Thanks,
Neal

Find me online at:
- My new Blog: “HyperTense” at: http://www.nealwiser.com
- Follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/nealwiser

By: Yemoonyah

Yemoonyah — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 17:22:35 +0000

I also heard Chris Brogan use the term “outposts” and it makes much sense to me as I use my social network sites the same way.
And now with services like http://ping.fm and http://pixelpipe.com, the friendfeed facebook app etc, managing all these different outposts becomes much easier.

By: uwak

uwak — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 09:47:41 +0000

very useful learning…..thanks for great posting

By: Pam Abbazia

Pam Abbazia — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 16:27:26 +0000

I love the way you put this: “Relationships, ideas, traffic, resources, partnerships, community and much more emerge from the outposts – much of it making my home base stronger.”

At DBE, we’ve been encouraging clients to think of social media properties as “Digital Outposts” so they can protect, fortify and build their brands in the social media sphere. For further reading, here’s a blog post from Niki Fielding which uses Digital Outposts as a framework for understanding social media marketing: http://dbesem.blogspot.com/2007/10/digital-outpostsa-framework-for-web-20.html

By: Michael Cayley

Michael Cayley — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 16:11:48 +0000

Hey Darren,

Aside: We may have come across a few of the same folks in Toronto.

This is a great post. The model really matters for all corporations and individuals, as increasingly, perception emanates from scaled up forms of social capital (i.e. social media) rather than broadcast and off line word of mouth.

I hope that you will download my recent ChangeThis manifesto and ebook at: http://socialcapitalvalueadd.com/about-scva

It seems to me to be a continuation of this blog entry. I would be grateful if you reviewed SCVA on your blog.

Cheers,
mc

By: David B Katague

David B Katague — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 17:31:12 +0000

I learned a lot from this blog about home bases and outposts. As a new blogger, It sounds complicated to me. I hope I can apply all the ideas in this blog, The more experience I have as a blogger, the sooner I will be able to apply the social media to increase traffic in my blogs.

By: Sachin

Sachin — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 05:30:44 +0000

very very useful post indeed

By: Carole Cohen

Carole Cohen — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 04:54:09 +0000

The graphics you used are fab and ‘This Post is Half Over’ had me spitting my wine lol. The outpost/home base makes a lot of sense.

The only thing I would add from my experience is that I tried to put about 15-20 spokes er, outposts on that social media amoeba but in reality I can only successfully work about three and peripherally about two more. I’m still signed up to about 30 of them but i am lucky to even remember their names! And I also found that two years ago the outposts were different. The only constant for me is LinkedIn and a Real estate network; I have a feeling Twitter is a keeper and I get the feeling Triiibes may be too.

It sure is exciting to watch it all progress.

By: Dimitri

Dimitri — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 00:47:44 +0000

This such a great post! I’ve used Web 2.0 tactics for some time, but it was connecting everything into one base that brought the most success. Thank you very much…

By: Lee

Lee — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 00:34:21 +0000

It’s hard to keep track of the outposts. Like staying interested in twitter and plurk and all of the other places.

I find myself interested in spurts, and then having my interest wane.

By: اناشيد

اناشيد — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 21:04:22 +0000

Social media is the best way to get traffic.Right?

By: surendera

surendera — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 05:02:01 +0000

Social media is the best way to get traffic.Right?

By: Young Che

Young Che — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 04:28:40 +0000

Everyday I learn so much about social media and the rabbit hole its created. I’m baffled by how much there is to experiment with and never run out of more goals to “accomplish” or things “to do” in order to be truly “effective” in this realm. Then I talk with a “real person” who hasn’t bothered to give any of this a second thought. We must really be from the future.

By: Joni

Joni — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 03:18:38 +0000

@Blue Duck Copy … I used to think that too, but I’ve made some really interesting connections on FB and Twitter that ended up leading to jobs or at least some nice referrals. So .. yeah, you CAN waste time on there, depending on what you’re doing, but you can also look at it as just another way to press the flesh so to speak. :)

By: Blue Duck Copy

Blue Duck Copy — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 03:11:30 +0000

I’ve been shying away from social media, mostly because I can’t shake the thought that I am wasting time that could be invested in writing, researching, reading other relevant blogs, and commenting to share ideas.

Perhaps I need to rethink that belief. Thanks.

By: Joni

Joni — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 01:00:24 +0000

I have separate accounts for my personal life and my business life. I find it unprofessional to be blogging about personal things when I have my business hat on. When I’m just “me,” though, I let my hair down. I don’t do this so someone won’t find the “bad girl,” but just to have some sense of professionalism for the biz and to also allow you to get to know the real me. Make sense? I have dual accounts for Facebook, Myspace and Twitter. The only place where I have just one identity is LinkedIn.

It turns out Twitter was invaluable to me during Hurricane Ike (I live in Houston, which took a pretty direct hit). The news media were twittering the night away and in the days following, were instrumental in pointing out what areas had power, which were still flooding, where we could get ice, gas, etc. I have new respect for it since that time.

My business partner and I use Facebook as a viral marketing tool to some extent.

By: Mr Javo

Mr Javo — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 22:02:05 +0000

Social Medias are an important aspect for any blog. Through they, your online presence start growing more and more each time someone shares a post of yours with its friends…

May be a good strategy is to be friendly and helpful in that kind of websites, as Chris says…

By: Mr. P

Mr. P — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 16:57:30 +0000

This is the first time I have ever read your blog. I’m building a site and getting ready to build another site (community) and this blog post has really helped, thanks.