Top 31 Social-Media Sites Essential for your Business - Timizzer

Top 31 Social-Media Sites Essential for your Business

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With the rise of Social Media and the increasing pressure on companies to produce engaging and regular content for social networks, it is key to use the available social tools effectively. By increasing their online presence and through engaging their target audience through a variety of portals, companies can create a loyal customer following, as well as forge new links and obtain new leads.

CXO?s 2010 survey has found that 70 percent of consumers want access to company experts and support via social media channels. It follows that the businesses which fail to use social media to interact with their customers do so at their own peril. This article is designed to help businesses to navigate the wealth of online social networks and websites and help them optimise their business?s presence online.

Discovery and Recommendation Portals:

• Reddit: Upload stories and articles on Reddit to drive traffic to your site or blog. With over 1.6 billion page views a month and over 21 million uniqu??e users, Reddit can help websites to get the exposure they need to grow. Frequent submission of quality content help to gain a more loyal following and increase your company?s presence on the site.

? ? ? ? ? In operation since 2005

? ? ? ? ? CEO: Yishan Wong; Founders: Steve Huffman and Alexis Ohanian

• Pinterest: Pinterest is a social networking site with a ?virtual pinboard? interface. Users collect photos and links to products they love, creating their own pinboards and following the pinboards of other people with whom they share interests. The invite-only website. hit 15 million unique monthly users in March 2012. With over 10.4 million registered users, the website is useful for businesses because of its extremely high referral rates. Businesses that succeed in creating interesting, visually attractive interest-focused boards, can gain exposure and build trust with their potential customers.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since 2010

? ? ? ? ?CEO: Ben Silbermann; Founder: Ben Silbermann

• Digg: Similar to Reddit, Digg allows users to post news and articles. Using crowd-sourcing and social links to help people find interesting stories, Digg relies on its optimised usability to give it the competitive edge. Since its homepage revamp last September, however, the website has lost a large number of followers to Reddit.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since 2004

? ? ? ? ?CEO: Matt Williams; Founder: Kevin Rose

• Del.icio.us: Originally founded by Yahoo in 2003 as a social bookmarking service, Delicious was purchased by AVOS in 2011. The website was rebuilt and re-launched later that year with a?new?focus on curation and discovery. Delicious allows users to organize and publicize interesting items through tagging and networking, which helps companies gain exposure

? ? ? ? ?In operation since 2003

? ? ? ? ?CEO: Chad Hurley; Founder: Joshua Schachter

• StumbleUpon: By adding the StumbleUpon toolbar to your browser, you?ll open your business?s online presence up to a whole new audience through interest-based networks focused on content discovery. Claiming to refer more social media traffic than Twitter, Youtube and Digg combined, the website also offers businesses the ?paid discovery? option which promises to send you an engaged target audience without clicking through ads or links.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since 2001

? ? ? ? CEO: Garrett Camp; Founders: Garrett Camp & Geoff Smith

• MySpace: In spite of the mass migration of its users to Facebook, MySpace remains a highly trafficked social media site that can be an effective marketing tool. In addition to creating profiles and getting friends, as well as connecting with relevant interest groups, the website also offers the use of group bulletins are useful as a means of connecting with both customers and potential leads.

? ? ? ? ? In operation since 2003

? ? ? ? ? CEO: Tim Vanderhook; Founder: Brad Greenspan

• Yelp: A fantastic promotional tool for any local business, Yelp allows companies to set up profiles, through which users can review your services. The user recommendation service can lead to quality leads.

? ? ? ? ? In operation since 2004

? ? ? ? ? CEO: Jeremy Stoppelman; ?Founder: Jeremy Stoppelman, Russel Simmons

• Technorati: Technorati is a network of blogs and writers that lists top blogs and stories divided into subject categories that are searchable for content in real-time. Registering your corporate blog with this site can be a brilliant way to direct more traffic to your website. Founded as the first blog search engine, Technorati has expanded to a full service media company, indexing more than a million blogs and providing services to the writers and social media sites as well as connecting them with advertisers. Technorati was recognized as one of the ?2010 Hottest San Francisco Companies? by Lead411.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since: 2002

? ? ? ? ?CEO: Shani Higgins , Founder: Dave Sifry

• Ning: ?The world?s largest platform for social network creation, it allows businesses to generate their own online communities, where they can bring together their clients, vendors, customers and co-workers. With a user-friendly interface, Ning allows you to create complete social networks with forums, events, groups and chat-room.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since: 2005

? ? ? ? ?CEO: Jason Rosenthal; Founders: Gina Bianchini, Marc Andreessen

• Squidoo: Created almost 10 years ago by Seth Godin, a well known author and marketing guru, the website?s goal as a platform is to bring the power of recommendation to search. It is a social network that allows registered members to create a profile about any topic they choose. One of the marked advantages of putting your content on Squidoo is that it is more likely to be picked up and ranked by search engines.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since: 2005

? ? ? ? ?CEO: Seth Godin; Founder: Seth Godin

• WikiHow: WikiHow is a collaborative effort to build and share the world?s largest, highest quality how-to manual. It allows businesses to create how-to guides and tutorials that can help to share your company?s services with the public.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since: 2005

? ? ? ? ?CEO: Jack Herrick; Founder: Jack Herrick

• YouTube: with 790 million visitors per month and 100 billion page views, this Google subsidiary needs no introduction. Create a tutorial or a behind-the-scenes video about your company?s products and events to raise awareness of your business?s services.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since: 2005

? ? ? ? ?CEO: Salar Kamangar; Founders: Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, Jawed Karim

?Professional-Networking Sites

social-networking-site

These online communities can act as useful recruitment tools and can help your business to make the most of your professional social graph.

• LinkedIn: Launched in 2003, LinkedIn is now the largest professional networking site with more than 150 million members in over 200 countries and territories. It is a highly popular portal where alumni, business associates, recent graduates and other professionals connect online.

? ? ? ? ? In operation since 2003

? ? ? ? ?CEO: Jeff Weiner; Founders: Reid Hoffman, Allen Blue

• Ecademy: one of the oldest social networks on the Internet, Ecademy is a social business network that helps professionals to build relationships with customers and other people in the industry. With an emphasis on business networking, the website offers its users thee membership options which allow access to a variety of features such as Google indexing, blogs, groups, events calendar and events scheduling.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since1998

? ? ? ? ?MD: Daniel Power , Founder: Penny Power

• Google+:?Google+ has been on the lips of every online marketing professional since early 2011. ?With a base that has now passed?62 million users?and the integration of?Google+ into Google search,?it has become clear that Google+ is here to stay.?Many ?professionals are using Google+ as the alternative to LinkedIn to display more of their work history on their profile, and have the convenience of external interactions to these updates like a +1 or comment. It keeps their work history public and interactive without the personal conflict of Facebook. If your brand Facebook page is weak on engagement, Google+ may prove useful in attracting these individuals!.

? ? ? ? ?CEO: Larry Page

• Focus: Founded in 2005, Focus is a business focused social networking platform allowing its users to? freely access expert research in areas such as Information Technology, Sales, Marketing, Operations, Small Business, and Human Resources. This website is an open source of quality professional expertise and a ?peer-to-peer information sharing network.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since 2005

? ? ? ? ?CEO: Andrew Mosson; Founder: Scott Albro

• Xing: ?Xing is a social network for business professionals boasting more that 11 million users worldwide. Founded in 2003, the website provides a place for professionals from all kinds of different industries to meet up, find jobs, colleagues, new assignments, cooperation partners and experts to build links and generate business ideas. The network hosts around 50,000 specialist groups, where users can exchange and share information.

? ? ? ? ? In operation since 2003

? ? ? ? ? CEO: Stefan Gross-Selbeck; Founder: Lars Hinrichs

• Facebook: The most visited website on the internet,?Facebook?is now established as a crucial website for all businesses. From networking, knowledge sharing and event promotion to advertising opportunities, Facebook provides a wealth of promotional opportunities and options to suit every company.

? ? ? ? ? In operation since 2004

? ? ? ? ? CEO: Mark Zuckerberg; Founder: Mark Zuckerberg

• Gather: Founded in 2005 by Tom Gerace, this website creates an online community for those wishing to discuss social, political and cultural topics on a public forum. Content is divided into different categories, which helps to navigate the website. This portal can help your company tap into its target audience and find out what they want.

? ? ? ? ? In operation since 2005

? ? ? ? ?CEO: Tom Gerace; Founder: Tom Gerace

• Tribe: This website was founded in 2003 by Mark Pincus, Paul Martino and Valerie Syme. Tribe?s main aim is to make finding people easier. It works as a networking website, where people create communities around common interests or in order to network professionally and as a recommendation website for businesses and professional services.

In operation since 2003

CEO: Mark Pincus; Founders: Mark Pincus, Paul Martino and Valerie Syme

• Ziggs: Ziggs? mission is ?organizing and connecting people in a professional way.? Ziggs allows you to join interest/focus groups as well as make new contacts in order to increase your company?s presence online and develop your career. The website markets itself as a one-stop source for building your online brand, marketing yourself on the web and simplifying communications with people. In 2004 Reputation, the world?s leading online reputation and privacy management company has acquired Ziggs.comi n order to introduce the website?s users to its own product offering of reputation and privacy management services.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since 2004

? ? ? ? ?CEO: Tim DeMello; Founder: Tim DeMello

• Plaxo: Plaxo is an?online?address book?and? a social networking service?system that imports all your contact information across various sources, automatically cleaning and updating it. It can synchronise your address book with any device, so you can access it whenever you need it. All the information is securely backed up in the Plaxo cloud, so you can always restore all of your important contact information. The website also helps its users to stay updated with feeds from Digg, Amazon.com, del.icio.us and more. Plaxo Inc. is a subsidiary of Comcast.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since2002

? ? ? CEO: Justin Miller; Founders: Sean Parker, Minh Nguyen, Todd Masonis and Cameron Ring

• NetParty: Netparty functions as the entry point for a network of parties held in 17 U.S. cities,?aimed?at professionals in their 20s and 30s. It allows business people to connect with qualified, up-and-coming professionals online, then meet them at a real-life event where you can pass out business cards, pitch new job openings and more. The events are designed to combine business networking with social fun. Other services offered include: Webinars, Job Postings, Speed Networking, and Social Events.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since 2000

? ? ? ? ?CEO: Jeff Strank; Founder: Jeff Strank

• Networking for Professionals: Networking For Professionals is a community that combines the online networking with social real-life events. The website allows its users to post photos, videos, r?sum?s and clips which all help to create new business links. Networking for Professionals was started by a group of industry people who saw the limitations of traditional networking.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since 2002

? ? ? ? ? Founder: Theresa Todman

Niche Information Social-Media Sites

These focused websites help to share specialist knowledge and network with people from a particular industry and with similar interests.

• Tweako: Tweako, promoting information sharing for the technologically savvy is?a user-powered community website and a social network which specialises in all aspects of computing, technology, and the Internet. It allows its users to submit articles and links to outside websites.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since 2007

? ? ? ? ?Founder: Mike Stefanello

• ?Inbound Marketing University: Inbound Marketing University is a news and education website, powered by HubSpot, a marketing software company. It is a fantastic place for marketers to learn, share?knowledge?and build relationships.

? ? ? ? ? In operation since 2010

? ? ? ? ? ?CEO: ?Brian Halligan; ?Founder: ?Brian Halligan

General Social-Media Sites

The following social-media sites provide excellent exposure-generating opportunities?for businesses to advertise, share knowledge and promote their services.

• Wikipedia: As well as a place to create a reference page for your, the website also creates networking opportunities through its Community Portal.?A Wikipedia profile can become an important component of any business?s SEO strategy and Wikipedia entries tend to rank high in the search engine results. Also, having a Wikipedia entry for your can lend credibility to your business.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since 2001

? ? ? ? ? Founders: Jimmy Wales, Larry Sanger

• 43 Things: This site markets itself as ?the world?s most popular online goal setting community.? Through publicizing your company?s goals and ambitions, you can gain a following of customers, investors and promoters who will cheer you on. Also, users are connected based on a similarity of their goals, which can be a useful networking and information sharing tool. Founded by the Robot Co-op

? ? ? ? ?In operation since 2005

? ? ? ? ? Founders: Erik Benson, Josh Petersen, Daniel Spils

• Wetpaint Central: This website allows its users to create their own wiki pages? that can help businesses to reach their target audience and increase their company?s presence online. The website allows you to easily organize articles, contact information, photos and other information to best promote your business.

? ? ? ? ?In operation since 2005

? ? ? ? ?CEO: Ben Elowitz; Founder: Ben Elowitz

• Twitter: Twitter is an enormously popular social networking and microblogging service that allows you to sending short text messages 140 characters in length, called ?tweets?, to your friends, or ?followers.? It is a useful tool for updating your potential customers about what your company?s plans and strategies are, as well as allowing other users to comment on your activity.

? ? ? ? In operation since 2006

? ? ? ? CEO: Dick Costolo; Founder: Jack Dorsey

• Yahoo! Answers: Created to replace Ask Yahoo!, this website is a potentially useful marketing tool. By answering users? queries regarding to your industry, you can help your business gain credibility and exposure.

? ? ? ? ? ?In operation since 2006

? ? ? ? ? ? Founder: Yahoo!

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