One of the newest ways to interact with the rest of the web is with social bookmarking.  But what is social bookmarking, and how is it affecting the way people use the internet and find new websites?  Can your law firm actually make use of social bookmarking, or is it a fad that will fade away quickly?  What is social bookmarking going to look like in the future, and how can you plan for it?  This guide will answer all of your questions about social bookmarking so that you can start planning out which websites to post your social bookmarks on.

What is Social Bookmarking: History and Definitions

When web browsers started appearing in the mid-1990s, one of the first features they added was bookmarking.  Bookmarks allowed people to come back to a favorite URL again and again without needing to write down or memorize the web address of a particular website.  These bookmarks were stored in a file on your computer that was kept with the browser application you were using.  That bookmarking functionality stayed basically the same for about a decade.

In the mid-2000s, a new type of bookmarking appeared: social bookmarking.  Now, instead of just storing bookmarks on your own computer, you can actually store them on websites.  What's more, instead of keeping your bookmarks to yourself, these websites allow you to share them with other users.  Social bookmarking sites also often let users determine whether a submission is good or bad, and promote it or demote it accordingly.

What is Social Bookmarking Used For?

If you're going to start to use social bookmarks as part of your marketing strategy, you should know what is social bookmarking being used for by marketers.  One of the best parts about social bookmarking is that it can generate high quality, high PageRank inbound links that will make your search engine optimization efforts more successful.  Google and other search engines base your search rankings in part on the quality of your inbound links, so it's very important to have links coming from websites that are popular and authoritative—which many social bookmarking sites are.

Another answer to the question of “what is social bookmarking used for?” is that you can actually draw in new clients and business with social bookmarks.  If you're using the right websites and making contextual links to quality content, your linking could actually help you to score a new case.

Keep in mind that if you're not creating quality original content, it may not be very beneficial for you to use social bookmarking websites.  What is social bookmarking if not a way to show good content to others?  If your content could use improvement, work on that before starting to post your links to it.

General Social Bookmarking Websites

Some types of social bookmark websites are made to accept just about any type of link there is, and just about any legal practice can post links that would be relevant to their viewers.  For example, right now, there's no trendier site for social bookmarks than Reddit.com.  What is social bookmarking with Reddit?  After making an account on the website (a process that takes only a minute), you can start posting links to your content immediately to a wide variety of “subreddits,” each of which is related to a different topic.  You might want to use a subreddit like “law” for your post, or you might post it in a more general subreddit like “news” or “politics.”

Other general social bookmarking sites include Digg, StumbleUpon, and Delicious.  These websites are all different in their approach and interface, but serve the same purpose.  You can feel free to post the same content to several different social bookmark sites rather than just using a piece of content on a single website.

Specialized Social Bookmarking Websites

What is social bookmarking that is specialized, and what is it useful for?  Let's say that you work in the field of intellectual property litigation.  Instead of posting something to a general social bookmarking website like Reddit or StumbleUpon, you might want to try your hand at getting a story onto one of the most popular technology oriented social bookmarking websites: Slashdot.

Now, keep in mind, if you're able to get a story posted to one of these websites and it makes it to the front page, your website may get hammered—an effect originally known as the “Slashdot effect.”  Be sure that your web hosting provider is capable of providing the hosting you need before  you start making posts to social bookmarking sites.

Social Bookmarking Etiquette

What is social bookmarking etiquette?  In brief, every website that you use for social bookmarking will have its own way of doing things—and those ways can be very, very different.  Don't jump right in and post content onto a site that you've barely read or have never participated in before.  Get a personal account first, post a few comments, get comfortable with the website and the people on it.  Only then will you be properly equipped and knowledgeable about the etiquette that guides members of that website.  This will give you a much better chance of being listened to and having your link accepted as part of the community.

Why Social Bookmarking Is Here To Stay

One of the things many people don't seem to understand is what is social bookmarking's appeal?  Well, part of that appeal—and part of why social bookmarking sites have staying power—is that they become communities all of their own, with their own personalities, quirks, and moral codes.  This gives people a very strong sense of identity and belonging with the website.

This is why it's a good idea to choose a few social bookmarking sites and really get acquainted with how they do things.  It's better to post only to a few websites but to post with quality, relevant posts than it is to spam every social bookmark site that you can find with the exact same content, whether it's relevant or not.

Social bookmarks are such a new tool for most marketers that there haven't even been studies done on how many law firms use them.  Getting in on the ground floor of this new marketing technique is incredibly important for both your search engine optimization and just to improve brand awareness.  If you don't know a social bookmark from a social network, this is the guide to get you started.  We'll explore the world of social bookmarks, including how law firms can take advantage of this new tool to expand their inbound link presence and overall reach.

What is a Social Bookmark?

If you've ever clicked the star icon to bookmark a website, you know how convenient traditional bookmarking can be.  Social bookmarks put your bookmarks out into the public, on the web where anybody can see them.  Unlike traditional bookmarks, which are held in the configuration files of your browser software on your computer, social bookmarks are located on websites designed to be communities of bookmarkers.

Many, but not all, of these social bookmark communities allow users to not only submit bookmarks, but also to vote on submitted content.  If content is judged by a large number of people to be good, it will become more visible for more users.  If people think it's spam, it can be removed by a moderator or will just become basically invisible to users.

Most places with social bookmarks also allow for commenting.  Submitting your social bookmark to a website can be a great way to get feedback for a particular piece of content that you've worked on before you link it from your Twitter or LinkedIn accounts.

How Do Social Bookmarks Affect My Blog/Site Traffic?

By having a social bookmark that links to your website's URL or that goes to your blog, you can get more readers to your pages.  Depending on which site or sites you post social bookmarks to, you could see a very small increase to your traffic or—if it ends up on the front page of one of the bigger social bookmark aggregators—a tremendous increase.

If you suspect that your content has the possibility of “going viral” after you include it among your social bookmark submissions, check with your web hosting provider before putting links on social bookmarking sites.  If you don't, there is a chance that a huge increase in traffic will be too much for the servers to handle, leading your website to go down in what amounts to a non-malicious distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack.  People who try to click on your website while it's down will just receive errors and won't be able to view your content until fewer people are trying to access it simultaneously.

How Do Social Bookmarks Affect My SEO?

The biggest reason that marketing professionals want in on the social bookmarking game is that social bookmarks have the potential to vastly improve your search engine ranking potential.  How?  Every time you create a new social bookmark, you're also making a brand new inbound link to your website.  What's more, since posting social bookmarks often requires only a very minimal sign-up process, it can be one of the fastest and easiest ways to make new links from high PageRank websites.

Keep in mind that you'll always need to have diverse links in order not to trip Google's over optimization detection algorithms.  If you're bringing in all your links through social bookmarks, you may actually end up being penalized.  If you use a social bookmark strategy as just one element of a larger SEO campaign, though, you'll have much better luck maintaining a rankings rise.

Where Can I Submit My First Social Bookmark?

One of the easiest places to start making social bookmarks is Reddit.  Part of the reason this is so easy is that the sign-up process can literally take as little as fifteen seconds—create a name, give your email address, and you can make a social bookmark right away.

When you create an account, though, don't try posting social bookmarks immediately unless you're already very familiar with the process.  Get a feel for the different communities within the overall website (they're called subreddits, and odds are there's one for your specialty practice area).  See how people are interacting, what they respond well to, and what seems to irritate them.  By doing this, you're getting valuable intelligence about what kind of social bookmarks are most likely to interest your target audience.

How Can Social Bookmarks Go Wrong?

When marketers first learn how to use social bookmark applications, they often start by posting some sort of advertising material.  If you haven't already learned this from social network websites like Facebook and Twitter, you need to learn it now: people don't want to see an advertisement unless it's very, very unusual and interesting.  Unless you have an ad that you know for a fact makes people talk, it's probably not good material for a social bookmark.  Some websites will actually delete your links if they think you are creating social bookmarks to benefit your own business.

It's also a bad idea to lie about who you are or who you represent if someone asks you about your connection to your social bookmark.  People who use these websites are very internet savvy, and if you're caught in the lie, it's unlikely you'll be able to create successful social bookmarks on that website for a long time to come.

How Can I Get the Most From My Social Bookmarks?

Making a good social bookmark is a lot like making a good blog post.  You want to have interesting content and a title that makes people want to read “below the fold”—or, in the case of social bookmarks, below the title.

You should also get a feel for the differences in each place where you put social bookmarks.  Check out the comments and community, rather than just using these tools to place your own social bookmarks.  If you're actively participating as a member of the community who's doing more than just advertising yourself, every social bookmark you make will have higher value and be read by more people.

Ten years ago, there were only about half a dozen active social bookmarking websites.  Today, there are thousands, and you may be considering getting social bookmarking services to help you understand the strategies you'll need to use them correctly.  Before you hire any social bookmarking service, though, you need to know about social bookmark etiquette and how your service should behave online.  If your social bookmark service is doing a lot of the “don'ts” and isn't doing most of these “do's,” you need to look for other social bookmarking services as soon as possible.

DO Use More Than One Social Bookmarking Website

Any good social bookmarking service will include submissions on several different websites.  This is one of the best reasons to get a social bookmark service, because multiple submissions can be time-consuming and very boring—exactly the kind of work that your firm might be very comfortable with outsourcing.

Social bookmarking services may post to just a few, or up to several hundred, different websites.  The value added that you get from these additional websites, though, may be not as much as you expect.  After the most popular fifty or so social bookmarking sites, the remaining sites have little traffic or activity.  You may be better off hiring social bookmarking services that give you better links on fewer websites.

DON'T Use Social Bookmarking Websites You're Unfamiliar With

It's important for your social bookmark service to provide you with a list of the websites they plan to submit your links on.  It's very possible that a social bookmarking service would want to submit a link to a website that you might be uncomfortable having a presence on.  If this is the case, you always have a right to tell the social bookmark service to remove that website from the list of websites they're posting to.

Additionally, social bookmarking services should be able to demonstrate for you that they have a knowledge of how these websites differ.  If a social bookmarking service is using identical headlines on all websites or is otherwise treating them as a homogeneous group, you need to find a better social bookmark service.  The difference between websites can be huge, and social bookmarking services that don't recognize and compensate for differing web cultures will be unsuccessful in driving traffic to your site.

DO Set Up a Personal Social Bookmarking Website Account First

Before you even choose a social bookmark service to work with, consider setting up your own account on a few social bookmarking sites.  This will help you do a better job evaluating social bookmarking services, because you'll understand more of what social bookmarks are all about.

DON'T Post Too Often on Any Social Bookmarking Website

If you notice that a social bookmark service is posting very frequently and that your inbound link number is increasing rapidly, you might be ready to praise them.  However, the truth is, you're likely to be penalized by Google if your social bookmarking service posts too many links too quickly.  Google is getting very good at detecting when social bookmarking services are automating posts rather than making new headlines for every new post.

DO Post Relevant, Interesting Content to Social Bookmarking Websites

No matter how amazing your social bookmarking service is, it doesn't matter a bit if you're not making good content.  Bad content won't draw in new people, and even if your search engine rankings go up, your conversion rates will remain dismal.  Content is king, even for social bookmarking services, and if you're posting interesting entries to a blog regularly you'll have a head start on all the firms that are just posting to their company website or attorney biographies.

The more unusual your content, the more likely it is that a social bookmark service can make it go viral.  This is the ultimate goal for the best social bookmarking services, because virality will mean you get a huge number of additional views and inbound links.  A good social bookmarking service can help you develop a viral strategy based on what has worked for them in the past.

DON'T Post Ads—Well, Not Most Ads

If you have your social bookmarking service post links that direct to URLs containing direct advertisements, whether in video or text format, you won't see an increase in site traffic.  In fact, your social bookmark service probably won't be able to help you keep the link, because many websites will delete it right away.  Most social bookmarking websites are ad supported, and if you're trying to advertise blatantly for free, the sites have a good financial motivation to remove your posts.

The only time you should ever have social bookmarking services submit an ad is if you've made a very creative, funny, or informative advertisement.  A very funny lawyer ad could have the potential to go viral, even if it's submitted through a social bookmarking service.

DO Tailor Your Submissions to Each Social Bookmarking Website

Your social bookmark service should know enough about each of the websites you're using that there will be subtle differences in the headlines associated with each page.  This not only helps your social bookmarking service to get more positive attention from the users of each site (because it's demonstrating an understanding of their values), but also to evade Google's detection algorithms.

DON'T Keep Using Social Bookmarking Services That Automate

If you find out that the social bookmark service you're using is automating content submissions, find another service.  There are plenty of social bookmarking services that use manual submissions, and this type of social bookmarking service is much more likely to get good results.  

Automation through a social bookmark service shows that you don't seem to care very much about the communities you're posting to—it shows that you'd rather spam them than participate in a conversation with them.  Would you want to do business with a law firm like that?  You need a social bookmarking service that doesn't make potential clients feel like they're being ignored.
 

It's a sad truth of the search engine marketing world: most of the people trying to talk to you about the Next Big Thing are trying to sell you something.  Almost every review of social bookmarking software online is being produced by people who have a financial stake in making you believe that their program is the best social bookmarking software on the market.  If you want unbiased information about both paid and free social bookmarking software, you've come to the right place.  In this guide, we'll talk about several different types of social bookmarking software.  You'll also learn that in many cases, the best social bookmarking software for lawyers is no software at all—something that most other websites will never mention.

What is Social Bookmarking?

Social bookmarking is a new way of sharing content with other internet users. The lines between social bookmark websites and social network sites has become blurred in recent years, but in general, a social bookmarking site exists mostly for users to share links to content.  This means that before you use any social bookmarking software, you'll want to have content to link to.

The reason that law firms have recently taken an interest in finding the best social bookmarking software is that these websites can generate inbound links.  Inbound links created with paid or free social bookmarking software can then, in turn, make it so that your law firm is more likely to appear on the first page of Google search results (where over 90 percent of searchers find the answer they're looking for).

What is an Automated Submitter?

One of the most common types of social bookmarking software—and probably the most controversial—is the automated submission system.  Because there are so many websites dedicated to social bookmarking, an automated submitter gathers them all and allows for mass posting.  Often, this is not free social bookmarking software.  Some of the best social bookmarking software in this category, like Bookmarking Demon, can cost in excess of $100.

What Are the Advantages of Automated Submitters?

Using automated submission social bookmarking software can save you hundreds of man-hours versus doing your submissions manually.  What's more, the best social bookmarking software in this category will be very likely to include listings for many more social bookmarking websites than you even knew existed (and most allow you to add more sites when you want to).

Another advantage that automated submitter social bookmarking software gives you is being able to quickly review your submissions.  It can be much harder to do this without downloading any free social bookmarking software, so many marketers are glad to have this part of their jobs fully automated.

What Are the Disadvantages of Automated Submitters?

The biggest disadvantage of using even the best social bookmarking software in the automated submission category is that Google is getting wise to these auto-submitters.  Google considers this kind of automation through paid or free social bookmarking software to essentially be a form of cheating, and will penalize websites they believe are using social bookmarking software.

Some of the makers of the best social bookmarking software for automating submissions claim that they have managed to find workarounds so that Google doesn't notice.  However, whether you're using paid or free social bookmarking software, loopholes get closed.  Workarounds are figured out and cut off at the source.  More than once already in 2012, Google has found listings that are being created by free social bookmarking software and taken away their link juice.

Other Types of Social Bookmarking Software

If you want to use the best social bookmarking software for the long term, automated submissions may be the wrong way to go.  Instead, you may want to consider using a piece of free social bookmarking software that just assists you with creating manual submissions.

Other social bookmarking software can help you to keep track of whether people are repeatedly commenting on or sharing your links.  By using the best social bookmarking software in this category, you'll find who your brand ambassadors are online.  There are both paid and free social bookmarking software solutions for tracking friends.

Where Can I Try Out Free Social Bookmarking Software?

There is very little fully functional free social bookmarking software that does submission automation.  Even if you were to find some, it would be far from the best social bookmarking software available.  If you want to use good social bookmarking software for free, try using Onlywire.  This is one of the few pieces of free social bookmarking software that allows you to partially automate your links, while allowing you to maintain a great deal of control.

Keep in mind that the best social bookmarking software tends to cost money because the research into developing Google-proof algorithms takes a great deal of time and effort.  Most software producers simply aren't willing to put that kind of work into free social bookmarking software, so freeware is more likely to be identified by Google, especially if it's fully automated.

Alternatives to Social Bookmarking Software

While social bookmarking software has certainly made a big splash in the search engine marketing world, questions remain about its efficacy in driving traffic to websites.  As a law firm, you can't afford to have your reputation or your search rankings damaged by using free social bookmarking software that later turns out to have been a bad idea.  Use extreme caution when picking your best social bookmarking software solution.

For many law firms, the best social bookmarking software is none at all—manual submissions are more personalized, more interesting, and less “canned” sounding than spamming many different sites with automation tools.  If you become a real part of just a few online social bookmarking communities, the people in those communities can do more to promote your website than even the best social bookmarking software on the market today.  People won't make spam go viral, but fantastic content combined with real community participation is the ultimate recipe for a campaign that markets itself.

Twitter, Digg, StumbleUpon, and Reddit: these four names are the biggest names in social bookmarking, and are used by a combined total of over 300 million unique users.  The biggest social bookmarking sites have become so successful that they've inspired thousands of imitators and a big new marketing industry.  In a quest for social bookmark submission, some law firm marketers have started to use automated social bookmarking submission service software.  But is this the right way to do social bookmarking submission, and are there alternatives that work better?  Keep reading to find out.

A Brief History of Social Bookmark Submission

Social bookmarking submission started with the first social bookmarking websites, like Digg.  Digg was the first truly open social bookmarking submission service, allowing anyone to submit a link of any type as long as it conformed to basic decency guidelines.

However, social bookmark submission has changed over the years.  As people began to use a social bookmarking submission service in order to get more inbound links for SEO purposes, rather than just to share something new and cool with their friends, users got more aware of spam and marketing materials.  Today, good social bookmarking submission is more difficult than it was in the past.

The sites that are most popular are changing as well.  While Digg still has the highest number of users of the “traditional” social bookmarking submission service websites (Twitter is excluded as being primarily a social networking site),

Do We Need Social Bookmark Submission?

Although some marketers considered social bookmark submission to be much less important than using social networks, social bookmarkers are among the best brand ambassadors on the internet.  They tend to be logged on more and have more connections to more people in more places—making social bookmarking submission much more valuable than it's often given credit for.

There's a reason that most of the time, viral content is started on these social bookmark submission websites and then picked up later by people using Facebook and Twitter.  The members of social bookmarking websites view themselves as content curators, and are actively working to create the newest big viral sensation on the web.  Facebook and Twitter users are more numerous, but they also tend to act like a herd, following viral trends that have already started and developed from a social bookmark submission.  While it can be relatively easy to automate social networks, a social bookmarking submission service can start to run into trouble.

The Automation Question and How it Affects Social Bookmarking Submission

The most common reason for a law firm to hire a social bookmarking submission service is that they want for their submissions to be fully automated.  However, there are some big problems with automating social bookmarking submission, and any law firm that is considering automation needs to take these issues into account.

If you're automating your content across many different social bookmark submission websites by using a social bookmarking submission service, what do the users of those websites think of you?  You can actually tell by looking at whether, on the bigger social bookmark submission websites, you're actually getting upvoted or upmodded.  If you're not—and if you're using automation, you won't be—you aren't actually getting links that people are following or even seeing.

Social bookmarking submission is tough to do effectively through automation because the people who use social bookmark submission websites are, for lack of a better term, internet nerds.  Many of them have grown up using the internet, and know the telltale signs that a link came from a social bookmarking submission service rather than being submitted organically.  They're very tough to fool, and getting tougher by the day.

Google Penguin Strikes Back at Automated Social Bookmark Submission

It's not just users of social bookmarking submission websites that are ticked off at automated social bookmarking submission services.  Google has made its displeasure with automatic social bookmark submission known by penalizing links made with these services (an algorithm called Google Penguin).  If you use a social bookmarking submission service, even if it works at first, it could stop producing any link juice with absolutely no warning.

One of the biggest ways that Google detects non-organic social bookmarking submission is by looking at your overall traffic and your number of inbound links.  A brand new website would never naturally have 1000 different people with accounts on different social bookmark submission websites suddenly recommend it.  This kind of unnatural behavior very clearly shows that you're using an automated social bookmarking submission service, and Google won't hesitate to “sandbox” your site (penalize its rankings so that it's no longer getting any benefit from the non-organic links).

Community Matters: Social Bookmarking Submission as Community Building

If automation isn't the answer for social bookmarking submission, what is?  Keep in mind that if your goal is content virality (which will drive the highest number of new links to your website, and can be 99% organic after your initial “push”), you should consider social bookmark submission websites to be your #1 priority.

After a particular social bookmarking submission site has been around for a while, they consider themselves to be much more than a social bookmarking submission service.  The members consider themselves part of a real community.  On some social bookmark submission websites, members have banded together to give very real financial help to people in hard times, or have used their connections to get interviews with some of the most powerful and famous people in our time.

When you use an automated social bookmarking submission service, you disrespect that community by telling it that it's not worth spending real time or effort on.  It's like sending a tape recorded message of your voice to a partners' meeting instead of coming on your own—unlikely to be received well, and likely to reflect very poorly on your level of commitment.  

Instead, participate actively.  Answer people's questions, build a real presence on several websites.  Not only will this be a great deal more fun than social bookmark submission through a computer program, it's also likely to lead to better networking opportunities and more chances for your content to go viral.

Even the very biggest social bookmarking website, Twitter, is only being used by just over one in four law firms.  Making use of a social bookmarking tool can make your job easier when you've been assigned to create a social bookmark presence for your law firm.  As inbound links have become more important, social bookmarking tools have proliferated all over the web.  Before you decide to purchase any social bookmarking tool, read this guide.  You'll find out why not all social bookmarking tools do what they claim—and why some could actually be damaging to your law firm's marketing campaigns.

How Does Social Bookmarking Work?

When you create a traditional site bookmark in your web browser, you can come back and visit a website any time you like, even if you don't remember the URL. When you create a social bookmark, you're not just marking a website for your own later perusal, you're also showing it to other people who might be interested.  They, in turn, can share it with their friends, and can also comment on it to make their opinions on your link known.

Because so many links come into the biggest social bookmarking hubs every minute, the people using these websites need some way to sort through the links and determine which ones are most likely to be high quality.  The solution used by most social bookmarking websites is a voting system that allows people to vote on their favorite submissions.  Whoever gets the most votes (based on a weighted system that takes time since the submission into account) has their link displayed first.  It's very easy to put a link onto a website with a social bookmarking tool, but it can be very difficult to get a link on the front page of these sites.

Types of Social Bookmarking Tools: Buttons For Your Site

One of the most commonly used types of social bookmarking tool is the humble button.  You have probably seen these buttons on blogs and news websites, asking you to “digg it” or submit a link to Reddit or Twitter.  These buttons are very harmless social bookmarking tools, and can be useful for nearly any law blog.

If you already maintain a blog, it is very easy to find some code to put these buttons on your website.  Often, social bookmarking tools to create these buttons will also include code to help you track what is done with them and how often they're clicked.  Don't use too many buttons—choose just half a dozen or so of the buttons from your favorite social bookmarking tool for button creation, or you'll have the potential to overwhelm your visitors with too many distracting graphics.

Types of Social Bookmarking Tools: Automated Submitters

Now we'll go from the most harmless social bookmarking tools to the one that can cause potentially the most harm to your website.  An automated submission social bookmarking tool probably sounds like a great idea the first time you hear about it.  Many of these social bookmarking tools automate the entire process of posting your link, from creating an account to making the posts.

If you're considering using a social bookmarking tool that sounds like this, stop and reconsider what you're doing.  Keep in mind that these are social websites, where people will talk about your site.  Do you want people's impression of you to be “that lawyer who spams Reddit”?  Or would you rather have it be “that lawyer on Reddit who's always really helpful to people going through a hard situation?”  Now you begin to see why it's not always a good idea to use this kind of social bookmarking tool.

Google isn't fooled, either, and that's where the other part of the harm equation comes in.  Not only can automated social bookmarking tools hurt your reputation with individual people, it can also make your website stick out like a sore thumb when Google looks at it.  If you've got far more links to your website, from a huge range of social bookmarking accounts, than your traffic would indicate is possible, you'll be penalized.  Organic social bookmarking links made without the use of social bookmarking tools tend to generate traffic as well as links.

Types of Social Bookmarking Tools: Friend Tracking

Another kind of social bookmarking tool that is relatively safe to use is a friend tracking tool.  These tools can help you to identify who is taking notice of your posts.  Many social bookmarking websites allow for people to list you as a “friend” and follow your posts.  By using social bookmarking tools like these, you can identify who your most useful friends are (the people who are giving you additional links and comments the most) and try to cultivate more friends using similar techniques.

Beyond Social Bookmarking Tools: Rules To Avoid Getting Banned

The worst thing that can happen as a result of your social bookmarking tool use is that you could be banned from a website.  While it's sometimes trivially easy to make a new account, people who do this repeatedly (especially using automated social bookmarking tools) will end up being IP blocked, making it much more difficult to get new accounts in the future.

In order to avoid getting banned, commit to only using social bookmarking tools that are white-hat and help you make good links with quality content.  You should also work on comments, not just post creation, and put real effort into your comments.  It doesn't take much for someone to notice that your history is a string of “good article” and other generic comments that don't necessarily have much to do with the conversation.

The more that you put in to social bookmarking websites, the more you'll be able to get out of them.  That's the ultimate rule to keep in mind no matter what social bookmarking tool you decide is best for you.  Garbage in equals garbage out, every time—so make sure you're not just polluting the communities you're posting in.

Free social bookmarking has created a new landscape for web marketers hoping to increase the number of inbound links coming to their websites.  With so many spammers trying to post links on free social bookmarking sites, though, it can be difficult to market good links effectively without being seen as just part of the spam problem.  In this guide, you'll learn how to do free social bookmarking in a way that enhances your firm's reputation, rather than diminishing it.

#1: Be a Lurker First

One of the easiest mistakes to make when using free social bookmarking sites is finding out about a new site, signing up for an account, and then posting your first link right away.  Before you do this, stop!  Think about what you're doing.  This would be a lot like coming to a party where you didn't know anybody at all, and then immediately trying to make yourself the center of attention.  It's a lot more likely that you'll get kicked out than that you'll find yourself making friends.

Instead, do what the free social bookmarking community calls “lurking.”  Read some free social bookmarking sites that strike you as interesting and potentially useful, so that you can see how people interact there. You may want to write notes down about each of the free social bookmarking sites you're interested in so that you can more easily keep track of them in your head.

#2: Know Your Audience

Audiences for different types of free social bookmarking content can be very different from one another.  For example, it's fairly rare for attorneys to post on free social bookmarking sites like Pinterest, not because these websites are bad or have too small an audience, but rather because their audience is simply interested in different things.

Free social bookmarking will come much more easily if you take stock honestly of the audience you have, not the audience that you want to have.  On many free social bookmarking websites, you can actually post to a much smaller sub-audience by putting posts into particular categories.  In the same way that you lurked on free social bookmarking sites to begin with, you need to lurk in these sub-groups to find out their individual etiquette and what could lead to a ban.

#3: Don't Just Post—Comment!

If your free social bookmarking account just posts links that are related directly to your law firm, it won't be long before you're caught out as a spammer.  Depending on which free social bookmarking websites you're using, the penalty for spamming could be as mild as deletion of your posts, or as severe as an IP ban (which will prevent you from registering or posting under any new account names).

In order to show that you really understand the concept of free social bookmarking and aren't just a spammer, you need to contribute to conversations.  Making comments about other people's posts is an absolute necessity on most free social bookmarking sites if you don't want to be seen as a spam linker.  What's more, your comments need to actually contribute and show an understanding of the discussion going on.  If you just make generic comments, this is an immediate red flag to other free social bookmarking users and you could find yourself banned.

#4: Build Connections and Track Friends

If you've followed the first three rules in this article about joining free social bookmarking websites, you should at some point start to connect with other users.  Perhaps someone often comments on your posts, or responds to your comments.  These people can be some of your biggest allies when it comes time for linking new posts to free social bookmarking sites.

You can get free social bookmarking tools that will help you to find out who your friends are and who is following you on any particular free social bookmarking websites.  Once you find these people, try sending them a private message (called a PM for short) that introduces yourself and attempts to make a more personal connection.  If you're successful in building these connections using free social bookmarking websites, you'll have even more sources to post your new inbound links.

#5: Handle Criticism Professionally

Not every link you put up on free social bookmarking sites will be a winner.  In fact, it's quite likely that at least once or twice you'll receive harsh critical comments.  Some of these comments may come from “trolls” who intentionally try to make people upset.  However, some are likely to be genuine criticism.  You need to be able to separate the two and understand that criticisms aren't meant personally.  Don't attack your critics, even if they are trolls—remember the old saying: don't wrestle with a pig, you both get dirty and the pig likes it.

#6: Don't Astroturf

Some companies that start using free social bookmarking tools try to artificially inflate their presence on free social bookmarking websites using a technique known as “astroturfing.”  Usually, this involves getting several different free accounts, using one to post, and using more to comment (usually with effusive praise).

The problem with astroturfing is that it is all too obvious to longtime users of free social bookmarking websites.  Astroturfers leave behind several telltale clues, like when the poster and commenters all signed up for their accounts within a week of each other.  If you're found to be astroturfing on free social bookmarking sites, expect a ban—and possible public humiliation as the story comes to light.

#7: Keep Up With Internet Memes and Trends

In order to have the best chance of succeeding with your account on free social bookmarking websites, you'll need to keep up with the things that are being talked about there.  “Memes,” which happen when a piece of content spreads virally and becomes used as a catchphrase or inside joke, can be a great way to connect with your free social bookmarking site audiences.  By knowing their inside jokes, you'll be showing that you're one of them, not just a business person who is only interested in using their website and vanishing.

When you're trying to narrow down a list of hashtags, how can you tell which one is best to use?  For that matter, how do you put together a list of Twitter hashtags that will be most likely to lead to the biggest increases in business?  Creating a Twitter hashtags list is a great way to start your tweeting on the right foot so that you don't have to do a big search for hashtags every time you make a new tweet.  In this guide, we'll explore how to put together a list of Twitter hashtags, and learn why not every list of hashtags is equally useful—especially for lawyers.

What is a Twitter Hashtags List?

Before starting your list of hashtags, you should be fully aware of what these tags are and what they do.  Any word preceded by a pound sign (#) is considered to be a hashtag by Twitter.  Typically, these tags are used to tell people what the topic of a particular tweet is, and to help to connect it to other people talking about the same thing.

There are several reasons that you might want to start compiling a list of Twitter hashtags for your own use.  Having a consistent list of hashtags that you use repeatedly can improve brand awareness and make it more likely that one or more of the entries on your Twitter hashtags list will go viral, making your topics even more heavily discussed.

Using Your Own Private Twitter Hashtags List

Developing a list of Twitter hashtags that is already greenlit for your employees is a great way to go if several people have permission to post to your Twitter account and you want to significantly restrict the topics they can post about.  This is especially useful if some of your employees aren't yet familiar with Twitter, and could make a mistake if they deviate from your list of hashtags.

To create a private Twitter hashtags list, mix up a few of your own hashtag creations and some relatively popular law related hashtags.  Any list of Twitter hashtags you use should also include some way of identifying how many times you've used a particular tag.  You don't want to overuse any item from your list of hashtags, or else your audience could start to feel spammed and alienated.

Creating a “Do Not Use” Twitter Hashtags List

Just as important as knowing which entries on a list of Twitter hashtags you should use is knowing which ones are best left to other people.  Especially if multiple people are able to update your Twitter account, it's a good idea to take a look once or twice a week at currently trending topics and add some to your “do not use” Twitter hashtags list.  This ensures that all employees at your law firm are on the same page and that there's one comprehensive list of hashtags that are considered inappropriate.

You won't need to include every inappropriate term on this list of Twitter hashtags.  Generally your staff should be competent enough not to include obviously scatological or sexual terms.  However, there may be some terms that would reflect an attitude your firm shouldn't have (think #dealwithit or #whatever) that you may want to include on the list of hashtags.

You should also check TagDef.com for information on the definitions of any tag on a popular Twitter hashtags list that you don't understand.  Sometimes, you will find out that a hashtag has a meaning you didn't know about, and that you should add it to your “do not use” list of hashtags.

Using a Twitter Hashtags List For Lawyers

If you don't want to develop a list of Twitter hashtags related to law, here's a bit of good news: some websites have already done a lot of the leg work for you.  By doing some Google searches for lists of legal hashtags, you can find more than one list of Twitter hashtags that have already been compiled by legal marketers.

What's more, you can take this list of hashtags and run each of the tags through a website like Tagalus.com, which will give you automated suggestions for related tags based on a comprehensive similarity finding algorithm.  This kind of search tool can help you to greatly expand upon a pre-made list of Twitter hashtags for lawyers—and it'll give you an edge on people who are just using the list that they were given.

By using your list of hashtags effectively, you can build new followers and make it much more likely that your Twitter feed will be seen by interested people.  Studies have shown that a law firm's Twitter presence has a great deal of predictive value when it comes to search engine rankings.  Tweeting can be very economically useful if you're willing to take some time and do your homework to make a really great list of Twitter hashtags.

Problems to Avoid When Using a Twitter Hashtags List

Of course, one list of hashtags may be much more useful than another.  For example, if your Twitter hashtags list is almost exclusively composed of tags that are extremely popular, with thousands of posts made every day, it's very likely that your tweets will get lost in the shuffle.  

You should always have a good variety of tags in your list of Twitter hashtags, including both some with very high popularity and some that are more niche oriented and will be less popular.  These niche terms may get less traffic, but the traffic they do bring in is more likely to follow your Twitter feed and more likely to take positive action.

You should also check TrendsMap.com before you commit to a list of Twitter hashtags.  This website can help you to make sure that the hashtags you're planning to use are useful not only nationwide, but also right in your area, where you're trying to target new clients or other attorneys.

About a third of companies today are using some form of link building to help them get noticed on the front page of search engine results.  If you want to get to Page 1, you'll have to do some link building of your own.  There are two different types of link building that are available to web marketers: one way link building and reciprocal link building.  Keep reading this guide to find out what the differences are and which of these types of links you should be focusing on as you seek better search rankings.

The Difference Between One Way and Reciprocal Link Building

Let's say there are two websites—a  law blog and your law firm site.  If you planned to engage in one way link building for your law firm website, you could try to have the law blog give you a link—perhaps based on a recent victory in a case, or some other aspect of your practice.

However, reciprocal links building is a bit different.  In reciprocal link building, the blog would link to your website, but you'd also have a link somewhere on your website that linked back to the same blog.  This is a good example of two way link building.  Three or even four way reciprocal links building is also done fairly commonly online.

Reciprocal Link Building: How to Get Started

The basics of reciprocal links building are so simple that just about anyone can get some reciprocal links.  You can start by talking to people that you know who also have websites relating to legal topics.  Context is important whether you're doing one way or reciprocal link building.  If you're doing reciprocal links building with websites that have little or nothing to do with the law or your practice area, Google is likely to take notice and penalize your site.

By asking to set up an exchange of links with friends, colleagues, or former classmates, you can build your link presence quickly and without needing to rely on automated link exchanges.  Reciprocal links building should be done at a steady and slow pace initially, so that your linking strategy doesn't seem like it is artificial.  Ideally, you want for your reciprocal link building to be viewed as entirely natural and contextual by Google and other search engines.  This gives you the best rankings rise.

One Way Link Building: How to Get Started

One way link building, like reciprocal links building, needs to be contextually based in order to give you the best results.  If you want to get started on building one way links, you can start by filling out information for profiles on websites like Google+ Local and any attorney directories hosted by local or state bar associations in your area.

If you've already made all these profiles and want to do more one way link building instead of using reciprocal link building, start using social networking to your advantage.  Not only are social networks one of the best places to build buzz for your legal services, they're also a great resource for getting the one way links you need.

Forms of Reciprocal Link Building to Avoid

No matter what, you should always avoid any kind of reciprocal links building that is completely automated.  Why?  Because if it's automated, that means it didn't have the level of quality control that you probably want representing your law firm.  Keep in mind that when you do reciprocal link building, you want linking partners that you can be proud of—or at least that you can justify on the basis of their website's content.

You should also avoid all reciprocal links building that revolves around non contextual websites, or that  goes to websites that sell goods or services that might be considered problematic for your customer base.  Keep in mind that because this is reciprocal link building, you'll need to provide a link to their website too, and your clients might see this as an endorsement of a scam product or service.

Huge reciprocal links building projects are also to be avoided.  If you create too many links through reciprocal link building, this sends up a red flag to Google that you're just trading links—which they perceive as only a little better than buying them outright.

Forms of One Way Link Building to Avoid

Just like reciprocal links building, one way link building can be of high or low quality.  If you're just building one way links anywhere you can, without any regard for the content of the websites you're getting links from, you may face penalties for over optimization.

Other types of one way link building that can lead to the same kind of over optimization penalty include trying to build too many links all at once, or trying to use too many links that come from the same IP address.

The general rule of thumb for both reciprocal links building and one way links building is that if your techniques could be interpreted as spam, you probably shouldn't use them.  Google is working every day to make it more difficult to game the system, so instead of trying to just get big numbers of high ranking links, you may want to focus on quality.

Which Should I Do More: One Way or Reciprocal Link Building?

While using bad techniques can get your website penalized by Google whether you're doing one way or reciprocal links building, it's important to realize that having too high a percentage of one way links is, on its own, a red flag.  Because of this, while you could implement a 100% one way link building strategy, any 100% reciprocal link building strategy is doomed to fail.

Usually, the websites with the best search engine optimization results are the ones using quality, “white hat” techniques to generate both one way and reciprocal links.  There's nothing wrong with doing some reciprocal links building—just keep in mind that you need to balance it out with a greater amount of one way link building afterward.