Most social media sites allow noteworthy or celebrity people to openly promote themselves while linking to their website. If you’re a mere mortal like the rest of us, don’t try to put your blog post on Reddit or Digg.
Your post won’t be displayed and if you ask why, you’ll get a curt admonishment not to SPAM the service. Yet, there are still hundreds of articles telling you to drive more traffic to your site by submitting your posts to these and other social bookmark sites.
Denied. Unless you’re the Washington Post or Conan. Then that taboo of saying “look at me” is conveniently ignored and the service gleefully endorses any website listed. For the masses, you’re supposed to involve yourself tirelessly in the community of whatever service and maybe in a year or so some other member will submit something about you.
Google has gone from a backlink being a vote for website authority to simply who has the most traffic and content is now listed highest. Big players have a huge advantage, while the average business must constantly develop new content through various video, photo, podcast, and written posts. The problem is effectively promoting your blog or website.
Blatant brags about yourself or your firm should definitely be avoided in real life and in any type of social media. However, the helpful article for potential customers that never mentions you or your company deserves some notice. Today, we’re mostly stuck with posting to a relatively few number of followers across a handful of top social media sites giving nofollow links. Alternatively, “affiliates” must submit our posts on other sites on our behalf or you play the silly comment game to try and get a link for little or no value.
Meanwhile, the big boys often get a free pass or use pay-per-click or press release services, leveraging large budgets and spamming the world with boring and obvious self-promotion. The decline of sites like Wikipedia signals the coming end of this double standard. It seems like we’re coming full circle in which you must have a traditional paid commercial to get noticed. What is your take?