social networking

is anyone using social networking as a tool to drive more customers to their websites? if so, which networks are you finding most useful?

I have used sites like the following:

forum.mailenable.com
www.asp.net
this one
www.crn.com
www.linkedin.com
and a few others

You may get some traffic.  Please, though, keep something in mind that you can do a variety of things to get boatloads of traffic to your site, but if they're not converting to clients then it means nothing. :)

thanks!

I mainly use paid social networks for personal and business purposes.  Here are my top favorites  http://www.squidoo.com/best-social-networking-sites-that-pay-users

I have found Facebook excellent.

Sheldon     writemymemoirs.com

hey sheldon,

what is so good about facebook? 

I mean specifially, how can I use mine to actually make money.... I have been tring to figure it out for months... with all of the apps that they make you approve when someone out of the blue sends you an invitation...

Can you help me figure this thing out....

the same goes for Twitter?

thanks.

dean

www.patternstudioa.com

hey Robert,

I appreciate your comments on these sites, witch I've visited, but I'm not an IT guy...

actually I'm just beginning to expand into other areas of sales and networking . other than fashion.  from my recently moved web site www.patternstudioa.com to a new host that will allow java script...

since 06 all of my web visits have been purley organic just by word of mouse... my question is how can I make money from crm.com and linkedin? or any of the 29 other social networks I'm in..

thanks.

dean

hi robert,

it's not necessarily about making money from the site directly.....

for example, i spent a lot of time finding the websites of clients that my company currently has and visit those sites frequently to see what they're doing. i noticed on these sites that there was a lot of conversation about using twitter to help their business and get in touch with resources for their business. so i joined twitter to better communicate with them. in turn our company started to be followed by those who are following our current clients, and so on. so i'm gaining clients because they see the company name on the same network that they have adopted for getting their business done. it's about getting out into social networks to be seen, be active and get your product out into their "world" on a consistent basis. :)

This is what I recommend: Find out what your competitors are doing.  Where are they listed?  How did they get listed?  Perhaps some of those will be social networking sites, but they might not.

I'm glad to hear that you're doing well with Twitter.  I have tried a number of them--CraigsList, CRN, LinkedIn, etc.--and found myself replying to a lot of posts, getting a little bit of traffic, but zero business.  I need--like others--ROI.  Spending 3 months in a list replying the posts and getting maybe a handful of visitors to my site and no clients and I'm consuming 3-5 hours each week, I can redirect that time for cold calling (cold calling like calling someone or visiting them in person) and get results almost every time.

Incase anyone is interested HP has a free online course for using social networking to promote you business.

Promote your Business with Social Networking.

http://h30187.www3.hp.com/sessions/overview/p/courseSessionId/126756/Promote_your_business_with_social_networking.htm?courseId=28669

Social Networking is working and now I feel like I have proof :) I just met, online of course, Rick Morgan who is an insurance marketing/developing guru. In the insurance world, he is a big deal and through social network I was able to get ISA out to an even bigger audience...

After reading Rick's recent article Web 2.0: Empowering a Cultural Transformation featured South Carolina Agent and Broker magazine, I emailed him my story at ISA and he posted it immediately on his blog...so check it out :)