I just finished reading the new free ebook from Seth Godin called Flipping the Funnel. While it’s obvious his motives are to promote Squidoo’s value and uses, he points out the phenomenon that’s currently starting to be understood more and more by companies and bloggers. That phenomenon is using new social tools to help promote your company.
It’s really caught on with the smart bloggers. They are now specifically creating posts with the thought in mind that they want their post to get tagged by del.icio.us users, dug lots on Digg, and linked to from bloggers everywhere. You even see links at their bottom of their posts (such as mine) inviting their readers to post their articles to these various sites.
For people who are aware of this concept, Seth’s ebook isn’t going to tell you anything you don’t know, he writes about it in simple ways as an introduction to a non-clued in audience. Keeping that in mind, I think it’s a good free ebook for that audience. Pass it along if you’ve got some people in your organization who don’t get the “empowering your customers with tools” idea that’s working so well for people today. Seth also wrote custom versions for politicians and non-profits.
His discussion of Squidoo is interesting. I like the concept, and I’ve even made a lens. I don’t know yet though if I’d want to spend the time to promote there yet without there being much of a traffic payoff. I think Squidoo can get there, but I don’t know that they are there yet. However, this graphic showing their Alexa rating vs. Ford.com sure shows you the power of word of mouth and the blog/web 2.0 world.
Thanks for pointing out this new site. Given your interest in the space, you might also like to check out http://www.blinklist.com. If you do, would love to hear your thoughts on our new service. Our chart does not yet look as impressive as Seth’s but we don’t have his reputation (yet) either. Mike