I’m not a big social media cheerleader. Social media can be hugely important for B2C folks who need to attract consumers, but those of us in the B2B realm have the luxury (so far) of being able to tone it down a bit. Especially for us 1- and 2-person shops, the last thing we need is another task to eat into our 10-15-hour workdays. Social media works best for us when it takes the least amount of time.
Just like passive income is the golden fleece for the entrepreneur, we need social media outlets that let us stay in touch with the world with as little effort as possible. Passive social media. Passive is not a bad word. Yes I respond and get involved as much as I can, but it has to take as little of my time as possible for me to be able to participate at all.
This blog is a big part of my social media effort: I have my company LinkedIn profile and I have this blog. Every week I Tweet about my blog (and sometimes about other stuff I run across), and those Tweets are listed on my LinkedIn page. It’s a circle.
Well now I’ve added a third piece to my social media puzzle: StumbleUpon.
I’ve used StumbleUpon for a few years to share great web finds with my family. But in the last year or so I’ve also been using it to find great articles, blogs, tutorials, and other content that interest me professionally. A few months ago I began to add to that stream, “Stumbling” my better blog posts to try to get them in front of more people. I’ve already invested the time into writing the blog, so why not invest just a moment more into Stumbling the page when I’ve written a particularly relevant post?
It seems like every time I turn around there’s a new webinar or white paper coming out telling me that I must be promoting my company using social media in order to be relevant. The latest news is very interesting: As reported in an article on GigaOM by Colleen Taylor, StumbleUpon has overtaken Facebook as a traffic driver, according to StatCounter. How did I find out about this? A colleague Stumbled it to me.
I love StumbleUpon and applaud its success. If you haven’t checked it out, you’re missing something. Install a mobile app or add a StumbleUpon toolbar to your favorite web browser, then the next time you see something on the web that you want to tell someone about, Stumble it to them. Here’s a brief guide on how to use StumbleUpon, including some very good tips on enhancing a page’s chance of actually being seen by other people.
The moral of the story
StumbleUpon is another tool in the social media toolbox that lets us stay in touch with the world with as little effort as possible. And now that it has surpassed Facebook as the leading social media tool, your Stumbles may be seen by more people than ever.
