In the race to find new ways to entice people to view your site, just as much time can be spent reading as it can be writing. There is just no end to the amount of information at a person’s fingertips thanks to the Internet. Back in September of last year I was attending a conference on the subject of Search Marketing with Social Networks. During the conference I heard an expression known as linkbaiting. Linkbaiting is a term that refers to a post or an article that has been specifically written with the intention of receiving inbound links from sites who think that the content is so good, it just has to be linked to. In turn this increases your Google ranking and leads to high visibility in organic search engine results.

But how is this possible? The answer is through social media sites. The biggest site that offers the biggest ‘linkbait’ rewards is Digg. The finishing line at Digg is successfully managing to ‘make popular’ an article, feature, photo or video. ‘Make popular’ refers to getting to the coveted front page of the site. The result, for the site submitted, is an excessive amount of traffic and many links from other sites based on the quality of the article content. Along these same lines are Reddit, Mixx and Sphinn to name but a few of the many social networking sites that are rapidly growing.

Getting to the front page of Digg has become so big that SEO consultants have started to specialize in Digg submissions. Digg however, in the guise of fairness, have changed their algorithms to give new users a better chance and to stop the monopolization of ‘power users’ and the Diggerati elite. Nevertheless, Digg is still a powerful marketing tool and, as such many companies allocate large sums from within their PR budget to find ways to get onto Digg and the like. After all, wouldn’t you spend a small fortune to get free site traffic?

The social aspect of Digg and sites in the like is the fun in commenting on other people’s posts and the ability to ‘bury’ a post. One second you’re on the front page with imminent site traffic and in the next breathe, young 16 year old Johnny from Ohio decides to bury your strategically submitted feature – oh well too bad! I guess it’s not the winning or the losing it’s the taking part that counts.

On the other hand however, there’s Blog Catalog. It sounds like just a directory listing for blogs but it’s not. First off everyone seems to understand why they’re there. Why are they there? Many reasons, ranging from getting creative ideas, joining in discussions, starting threads, getting good advice, making friends and to shamelessly promote their respective sites with no sense of guilt. After spending some time on Blog Catalog earlier today I felt that the people I was speaking with genuinely wanted to help. I asked questions to people with very popular sites and they were immediately answered. I posted threads and was immediately befriended and answered. Above all I had fun and relearned the meaning of online social networking. I could promote my site without thinking I was doing something underhand unlike the ‘linkbaiting’ tricks on Digg.

As more people find their voices on the Internet and begin to share their life experiences, professional endeavors or personal highs and lows not everyone will be looking to drive thousands of visitors to their sites. Some may just want another human soul to read their words and others, well, others will stop at no end to promote themselves and be seen by the widest audience possible.

Marketing, similar to these experiences is making known to people services or products that can better their lives. Not trick them into buying something that has no value and was something they really didn’t want in the first instance. As the means of communication widens and reaching people becomes easier, it is the responsibility of the marketer to use this knowledge wisely and act accordingly.