My two favorite social networking sites

My two favorite sites for social networking are two completely different apples. They really are like night and day.

The first one is MySpace - naysayers be damned! I love MySpace! The important thing that you have to remember when it comes to MySpace is that it is called a social networking site for a reason. It is all about connecting with people! It is not about marketing! If you can remember that, you may come to love it as much as I do. I have not only made a host of new friends there, but, also have reconnected with a lot of people from my past. Neighbors, schoolmates, even my cousins! My boys both have MySpace pages and I keep them on my top friends so that I can keep an eye on them! And of course, I keep up with my beloved Punkymoms there, too! I’m telling you - I just love it!

Now - is it possible to market on MySpace? Somewhat. Take me for instance, the majority of my friends on there are moms. And for Halloween I was helping to sell a really cool Halloween recipe ebook. Did I tell my MySpace friends about it? Sure! I’m definitely not going to tell my friends about crap - and ask them to fork over money for it! So they know if I’m bringing it up, I have complete faith in it.

My daughter and I even had some fun making some of the recipes - I video taped her, and then I posted the video to MySpace! It was fun - the making of the recipes, filming my sweet daughter, and sharing it with my friends.

So if you just remember that MySpace is number one, about being social, you will do alright there.

Another thing that is really good about MySpace is that it is an awesome traffic generator! Let’s say that I am really proud of this post here on Lisa Marie Mary, and I’m worried that not enough people will see it. I can post about it on MySpace in my blog, and maybe even post a bulletin about it, if I haven’t posted too many lately! You definitely do not want to abuse the bulletin system - that gets downright annoying. And gets you knocked off of people’s friends lists. And if it is just too obnoxious, you’ll get reported, as well.

People can slam it all they want, but, I would be lost without MySpace - it is how I connect with so many different people!

Now, moving on the next apple, er, uh…site. It is one that I also really love! It’s called Squidoo. It is owned and operated by Seth Godin, a phenomenal marketer, who not only lets you market on Squidoo, he encourages it!

You can see my lensmaster page here: Lisa Marie Mary on Squidoo.

I just absolutely love Squidoo! It has all the aspects of social networking, but, you are allowed to market and promote pretty much anything you want - in lots of ways.

Say you don’t really have anything of your own to promote. No problem! Squidoo provides money-making modules for you! Perhaps you are the biggest Star Trek fan ever! And you know all kinds of thing about the show and the cast. Get in there and start filling out your lens, then add some of the Squidoo-provided money-makers, and you’re off! But, if you’ve got your own ebook, or your own blog, or even your own personalized letters for kids - you are free to promote those, too!

You will see that I’ve got quite a few lenses going on my lensmaster page. I’ve got a whole handful of lenses that I haven’t even activated yet. And each lens is always growing and changing. That is what keeps it fresh and what keeps your rankings doing well.

I owe every single bit of my Squidoo knowledge and comfort level and even passion to one great (not to mention pretty and sweet!) marketer named Tiffany Dow. She wrote an awesome how-to ebook all about Squidoo a little over a year ago. The book is so amazingly helpful and detailed! She walks you through, step-by-step, setting up your lenses. She knows all the tricks and she shares them in this book. Her ebook is so good that it was endorsed not only by Seth Godin, but, also by John Reese!  Those are definitely two marketing names that I trust!  I printed out my copy and put it on rings and it is so worn out, I might have to print it out again. I use it all the time in setting up new lenses.

The ebook is called Social Networking on Squidoo, and it is worth every penny I paid for it - and more! That is my affiliate link - I will earn some money if you buy through my link, but, every single thing that Tiffany puts together is gold, and this is no exception! (She’s got an awesome PLR site, PLR Mini Mart - I’m never disappointed with her articles! And that one’s not an affiliate link!)

I’m sure I’ll be blogging about both of these sites more here in the future, but, this gives you a little taste of my experience with them!