“Use Social Currency Systems to Grow Your Blog” plus 1 more

Use Social Currency Systems to Grow Your Blog

Posted: 19 Jul 2012 01:00 PM PDT

This guest post is by Nathan Kash of Electric Blogging.

Whether you're new to online business or you consider yourself a seasoned professional, you recognize the fact that a good promotion strategy can go a long way in generating income for your business. Companies across the world spend millions, sometimes billions (in the case of companies like Heineken) on marketing, which shows just how important it is.

Now, in the days of social media, more and more companies are adopting social promotion strategies to reach a wider audience. Some have even gone as far as to launch their businesses wholly through social means, as did Dollar Shave Club, whose YouTube video became a viral sensation and put them on the map.

More recently, social currency systems have been developed that can add to your overall social marketing strategy. These tools have the potential to drive millions of customers to your site in a relatively short period of time.

What are social currency systems?

Social currency systems are online systems that allow readers to pay for products and services (usually ebooks, reports, and digital courses) using the value of their social network.

In other words, these products cost users the price of a social share.

Social currency in action

There are a few social currency systems available. Here are two of the most commonly used.

Pay With a Tweet

Pay With a Tweet is one of the first services to implement social currency, and it was built by Innovative Thunder.

As the name suggests, this system lets you “pay” for a product with a tweet.

For a customer to get access to a product, they click a button that takes them to a Twitter page. There they tweet the required message to their followers. Next, they’re automatically taken to a download page where they can claim the product in question. Pay With a Tweet has added functionality for Facebook, too.

Here’s how the call to action appears:

Popshop

Popshop is a new service by SYZYGY that claims to be “Pay With a Tweet on steroids.” Rather than just using Twitter as a sharing medium, it has functionality for other social networks like LinkedIn, Pinterest, Facebook, and Google+.

It’s a free, one-page, customizable WordPress popup shop theme that also features Facebook page integration. Here’s how it looks:

If you don't share the deal before you click the Get This Offer button, you see this message:

This ensures that the content gets shared before the users get access to the product.

Why social currency works

Social currency systems are being used more widely by bloggers and site owners, since they work so well. But why?

They appeal to our inner cheapskate

The majority of people have an inner cheapskate. Whenever you choose to buy something, you always have the urge to go for the cheaper option. That's just how our brains work.

Social currency systems have the same effect. The desire for a product is further increased by mentioning the price that the product should cost and explaining that, instead, you're offering it for a far lower price—just a share! It's a common but effective marketing tactic.

They provide a sense of value

This works hand-in-hand with my first point. People are not as drawn to things that are completely free as they are drawn to things that are "practically" free.

When you give your offer a price, no matter how small, it creates a sense of value. Something completely free seems less attractive because most of the time, it’s perceived as being of low quality.

Excellent promotion benefits

Social currency systems can be used by businesses to successfully promote launches and events.

A good strategy for ebook authors, for example, would be to release a "free" report or mini-ebook as a teaser for their final product. In return, they get shares and are able to create a buzz amongst millions of potential customers.

This tactic can also be used by bloggers to make blog posts and videos go viral, and this also drives traffic to their respective sites.

Other ways to use social currency systems

Authors can use them to sell excerpts to promote books.
Freelancers and job hunters can use them to sell work samples and access to portfolios or resumes.
Internet marketers can use them to sell free reports to create a buzz for upcoming webinars.
Speakers can use them to sell mini-courses for the promotion of workshops.
Consumer brands can use them to sell commercials to make them go viral.
Service providers and use them to sell basic versions of services, as a way to promote premium packages.
Musicians can use them to sell music demos and singles for upcoming albums.

All in all, social currency systems are underused but have enormous potential not only for promotion, but also for traffic and income generation.

Is social currency for you?

Social currency is gaining momentum. Have you used it already, perhaps to buy something, if not to sell it? Have you tried other social currency systems? Do you think you could use social currency to build buzz around your blog?

Tell us in the comments. We all love to learn.

Nathan Kash (@electricblogger) is a professional blogger who runs Electric Blogging where you can discover methods of traffic generation, writing excellent content, social media utilization and how to blog effectively. He also gives blogging tips to newbie bloggers and seasoned professionals.

Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger

Use Social Currency Systems to Grow Your Blog

Why Bloggers Should Freelance

Posted: 19 Jul 2012 07:04 AM PDT

This guest post is by Sid from GeeksMakeMoney.

Blogging can be a richly rewarding experience, and bloggers can sometimes get carried away by their success. I personally know bloggers who look down upon freelancing, but unless you are one of the top league bloggers known the world over, you should probably expand and diversify.

Freelancing gives you plenty of ways and opportunities to grow beyond the confines of being “a blogger,” and it can be of great help in your blogging career.

Whether you are new to blogging or have been in your field for long, freelancing on the side can open up opportunities and avenues that are not always available to ordinary bloggers. You can always tie your blogging activities into your freelancing activities—it’s not hard to figure out how one feeds off of the other.

The trick is to be open to trying out something new, taking risks and learning in the process.

Monetary flexibility

Well, straight to the point: freelancing pays. Blogging might or might not pay.

If you are a new blogger, this is a fairly obvious point. You can freelance on the side and earn some additional income while your blog is still growing and yet to produce significant income itself.

If you already have a blog that earns money, remember that earnings for most bloggers can fluctuate a lot, especially for the medium-sized blogs. Can you honestly tell yourself that you would earn as much or more from your blog a couple of years from now as you are earning today? There are so many factors—Google algorithm changes, established competition, shifting preferences of the audience and plenty more can devastate small bloggers (think Shoemoney or John Chow—if such A-list bloggers can lose audience, so can you).

With freelancing, you have the flexibility to scale up or down your activities and thus maintain your current income streams even if your blog’s earnings fluctuate.

Success story; Oni of YoungPrePro ties his blog and his freelance writing together really well. In fact, he’s now at a stage where he earns tens of thousands of dollars a month only through freelancing. Even though his blog is hugely popular, he prefers to earn money through freelancing because it is stable, reliable, and better paying.

Branding and publicity

If you can contribute your work to a more popular medium than your own blog, and people like your work, you are building your brand by investing in yourself. Freelancing is also a good medium for publicity, and I love any method that pays me to publicize myself!

Freelancing gives you the opportunity to produce high quality content under your name that others will like, and appreciate and present yourself and your expertise to the world. This, of course, is going to be of immense help to grow your blog as people recognize your authority.

Success story: Carol of Make A Living Writing is a prolific and well-known writer, and has written for Entrepreneur, Copyblogger, Seattle Times, and plenty of other popular blogs.

Many can instantly recognize her and her top-quality work, so freelancing helps her grow as a writer and helps establish a higher credibility for her blog at the same time.

Testing new waters

As a freelancer, you get to work on different fields within your area of expertise. If you are a writer, you can write on a variety of topics. This is a great way to explore new areas that interest you and learn more about different niches. You can pick up ideas that you think a blog in this niche should cover and then present your own perspective.

Many bloggers work for bigger publications, then branch out to start their own blogs once they understand the business and topic much more intimately.

Success story: Starre of Eco-Chick was a writer for popular fashion magazines before starting her own successful blog, which is in line with what she wrote for magazines, combining fashion and sustainability.

When she started the blog Eco-Chick, everything was already in place—she knew the field better than anyone else. Isn't that a solid start for your blogging platform?

Tricks of the trade

In addition to these points, you can also learn insider tricks of the trade when you freelance. When you work as a freelancer and are getting paid to do so, chances are, you are working at a company that is at least moderately successful. You can learn why, and they would be more than happy to teach you because they want your work to be put to best use.

This is a great way to learn how things are done and what works for successful businesses. And that knowledge can prove invaluable when you are actually starting your own blog.

Do you freelance and blog at the same time? Why? And what benefits does it give you? Tell us your stories in the comments.

True to his word, Sid is a blogger and freelancer and has written popular freelancing guides including oDesk Review and Elance vs. oDesk. He is starting out a number of different blogging projects, from understanding fashion to using python in finance. His oldest blog is about penny auctions.

Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger

Why Bloggers Should Freelance