This is new year’s eve so I will keep it short and sweet this time.

Finding relevant blogs to promote your website may be a surprisingly difficult task.

Here are 5 tips that can make your life easier:
I’m afraid I have no shortcuts here.
This is a tedious task – no doubt.

Nevertheless, here are a few tips that you may find useful:

1. Use blog search engines such as: Technorati, Google Blog Search, Wikio, IceRocket, Ask, and the like.
2. Expand your search if needed (instead of “criminal solicitors UK” try “solicitors UK”).
3. Add forums to your search (e.g. search: “criminal solicitors UK” forums).
4. Install a Firefox extension that highlight nofollow links on every page (among other goodies) – great time saver.
5. Read this article for some more tips.

Happy new year to you all!

Surely you’ve heard of sites like YouTube by now and the power of videos when it comes to Social Marketing. If you want to discover a powerful social marketing technique that is a highly-effective way to produce videos, and is actually far cheaper and less time consuming – read on…

Get other people to create your own promotional videos for you by announcing a contest and awarding the winners.The key is that the contest needs to either have a very entertaining element to it, or it needs to have a prize that’s big enough that people are willing to work on it even though it may not be as exciting.

The idea is to structure the contest so that people can logically relate to your product or website as a one-of-a-kind problem solver. For example, launch a contest that shows people’s faces when they discover your product. Shouldn’t be too expensive to produce now is it? That way the videos that get produced actually become commercials for your website.

It is recommended to run the contest through YouTube, so that the entries are posted directly on YouTube or some other video sites. That way people are adding lots of videos onto YouTube that promote your product or website, generating more traffic and search results.

A list of contests currently running on YouTube can be found at http://youtube.com/contests_main

Ideally, you should have 3-5 different videos that have viral power all their own and obviously own all rights to the winning videos.

Part of the judging process should involve social media, for example – take into account the number of Diggs or votes on YouTube received for each video. Anything that can turn the contest over to the social media is a blessing.

Here is an example for a video contest that invite people to give video testimonials. These guys got 89 videos in response! More at http://www.strategicprofits.com/blog/we-have-our-winners.

The key to success is to generate lots of buzz about the contest and draw people to sign in. To do so issue a press release, advertise the contest on social networks, blogs & forums, and try to get top bloggers to write about it.

After the videos have been produced you should distribute them to major video sharing sites. Here is a partial list:

• www.Blip.TV
• www.EyeSpot.com
• www.FreeIQ.com
• www.GoogleVideo.com
• www.Grouper.com
• www.JumpCut.com
• www.OurMedia.com
• www.Revver.com
• www.VideoEgg.com
• www.Vimeo.com
• www.vSocial.com
• www.YouTube.com

You may also want to consider video distribution tools such as TubeMogul or Kyte.

Social media is definitely on the rise. We hear a lot about the importance of blogs, forums and other social platforms such as MySpace.com, Facebook, YouTube, and many more.

When it comes to promoting your website, social media is not a channel you can afford to skip.
In this post I will try to address the key points you need to address when posting to other people’s blogs and forums.

Step One: Identify quality blogs and forums related to your niche

Here are some useful ways to build a quality list:

1. Search for “your keyword” + “blog”.
2. Use Technorati or Google Blog Search.
3. Ensure a Google Page Rank (PR) of 3 or higher and that the blog has been properly indexed by Google.
4. Check the number of posts, or registered members – the more the merrier.
5. Ensure that the blog is open for public comments or posts (sometimes you will be required to become a registered user first).
6. Ensure that the blog/forum allows adding Html links within the text body .

Step Two: Don’t be a stranger and don’t Sell!

Respect the blog/forum you crave a link from. Remember that your post will most likely be reviewed by the moderator and you are probably not the first one (nor the last) who tries to post something just for the sake of a getting a link to your website.

Make sure you add a RELEVANT and UNIQUE post to the blog/forum. That means you might need to actually read previous posts and response in an intelligent manner.

Address other members by name, relate to their stories, questions & answers. Don’t try to sell anything, be objective in your recommendations and get personal with other members. It may be wiser to become an active member and add a few “innocent” posts before adding a link to your website.

Step Three: Use your back links wisely

1. When including a back link to your website, make sure it uses the proper anchor text (the keyword you are trying to promote).
2. Don’t overuse your link. One link per one blog/forum is all you need.

Happy posting!