The Future Buzz

Disclaimer to Digg and Reddit users who also read my blog: this post is to educate those external of these communities. If you’re an active member of either of these sites, the content below may not be new to you.

Digg and Reddit are two of the most powerful communities of social media users on the web. They are the evolution of message boards and message forums that were the previous forefront of the social web (and continue to be popular as well).

image credit: csb13 via flickr

As you’re already well aware, the social web is the most efficient and useful tool the world has seen for sharing messages, insights, music, videos, information — whatever you want.

You certainly are a consumer of the conversations and interactions on the web daily. You’re reading this blog post aren’t you?

But if you’re a communications professional and not a contributor on a deep level, you’re missing out on something huge. You are turning your back on a scratchpad that is so unbelievably powerful, if you saw the results from the eyes of the contributer you’d wonder why you waited so long to actually dive in.

image credit: victoriapeckham via flickr

As someone who works at a firm with a diverse array of clients, I spend a good deal of time reading trade publications across industries. It is always interesting to me when they go into how the specific industry in question is using technology and the web.

The non-tech trade publications actually do a pretty good job of covering things their industry is doing on the web. Never quite as good as the web publications written by web pros, but of course those are written by people who work in this space 24/7.

Google recently launched an insight tool for search trends. It’s a like a revved up version of Google Trends and offers a deeper level of analysis of search trends with the ability to compare volume patterns across regions, categories and time.

Really neat stuff and huge applications for web entreprenuers, bloggers and businesses across the nation. Be sure to check out the utility and experiment around a bit - I was able to get some useful metrics almost instantly.

Yesterday I wrote on how the only way to build a sustainable web brand was not to play only to networks and try to get big spikes in traffic, but to build your brand slowly, methodically and organically. I stick by this.

Well, what if you don’t care about building a web brand or sustainable traffic. What if you really do want a one-hit wonder, or want to get a large amount of fleeting attention to just one thing or one idea. Today I thought I’d give you a quick strategy to do just that.

Please keep in mind this is the antithesis of yesterday’s advice for building a sustainable brand and sustainable traffic. This is a strategy to create a big hit for one specific idea, video, image, article – you name it. If you’re going to use technique on your blog, I highly suggest using it sparingly.

Yes, Digg is awesome. I know, I’ve had my content reach page 1 several times and send me 10,000+ absolutely unique visitors in one day.

But, unfortunately here’s the truth: Digg and other social media sites are not overnight king-makers of your brand on the web.

Sure, social media is fantastic for bringing your brand to the attention of a huge community of people and spreading your ideas. But, if your goal is to build a sustainable web brand for influence or monetization purposes you cannot rely on social media alone to build your traffic and hits.

Intro

I have strong thoughts and passion on this subject, and decided to put down just some in a feature connecting the music and news industries with a little history, the future and why everyone needs to come together and not fight change.

As both an artist and someone who works closely with the media industry, I believe I have a unique perspective on how similar the challenges are facing both of these industries and how it is unfortunate that the big players are using their positions of power to destroy a beautiful evolution of technology and communication.

This evolution ultimately will impact society in an incredibly positive way, bringing down the gatekeepers and creating a completely open and free cultural and information economy.

That is, if we (the independents) can win, and the laws are not bent to the fortune of the few when the power of the many is what will most benefit humanity.

A lesson in corporate blogging
I wrestled with whether I should blog about this – but I think it is worthwhile to write this up to show you a great example of what not to do on a corporate blog.

This is of course, my personal blog, and I have a clear disclaimer right at the top. I make zero claim to tie anything on this site to the firm I work with – these are entirely my own thoughts.

A corporate blog is a far different animal. Depending on what your corporation is, you may be able to venture into some debate, but at least do your research first, and be open to fixing something if you post the wrong facts.

Did you LOL yet?
Obvious part out of the way: Lolcats are a hugely popular internet meme. If you’re unfamiliar with what an Lolcat is, well it’s actually quite simple. The meme involves combining a photo of a cat with some quirky text to create a humorous image (I included a few in my 50 Viral Images article).

Here’s just one recent Lolcat photo:

There are an immeasurable number of Lolcat images floating around the web across platforms. If you Google lolcat, you’ll get more than a million results.

Yes, they’re popular. And yes, you probably secretly like them even if you complain and post negative comments every time one graces page one of Digg. Of course, I’m talking about lists (top 10 lists, top 100 lists, top 9000 lists, you name it).

Lists are a popular way to arrange content on the web for a number of reasons. Wait for it – I’m going to list them.

Lists:

• Are scan-able
• Provide easy to read and consume content
• Have the novelty factor
• Are many times “must-share” content
• Engage people
• Are at times humorous, entertaining or incredible
• Are a strong social web meme
• Get strong traffic