Social Media Best Practices Part 1

Top 3 Social Media Best Practices:

Make sure your profiles have an actual picture, avatar or Logo so people can identify you on the various sites by these logos. Also make sure to completely fill out the profile.

Don't just join a site and start massively adding random friends. Take the time to learn about the site and actually connect with the community there.

Don't Submit your own content to sites like Digg and Reddit. If you ever do submit your own content to a site at least submit other sites as well not just your own. Be active, read others content and comment and most people are more than happy to return the favor.

Top Users on Digg, Reddit and Mixx

On Digg.com the top 5 users for the last 365 Days are as follows:

1. Maki Maki
2. MrBabyman
3. Msaleem
4. Jaybol
5. SirPopper

On Reddit the All Time top 5 users are:

1. qgyh2
2. neoronin
3. maxwellhill
4. rmuser
5. anonymgrl

On Mixx cGt2099, SilentJay74, Webaddict, katharinec, and s_lockyer are 5 of the sites Super Mixers aka Top Users.

What Businesses Should Look For When Hiring Social Media Consultants

Every site has top 100 or top 1000 Users but as social media continues to explode in popularity I don't think you have to be one of "THE TOP USERS" on all the major sites to be considered an expert or guru. I think what matters most to people who are looking for experts or help with social media is that you have profiles on all the major sites that reflect social media best practices. We surveyed 100 business people who have hired social media consultants in the last 6 months and the top 5 things they looked for when selecting a person is listed below.

Complete professional profiles on major sites such as Facebook, Linkedin, Digg, Stumbleupon, Mixx and Reddit.

Active accounts on the major social sites. By active, we mean recent activity, quality submissions of multiple sites and not just your own sites and proof of success in using the sites which is easily seen in the profiles.

Good reviews and comments from multiple other people and clients.

Examples of quality submitted content on a variety of sites.

A pattern or history of successful social media campaigns which shows they understand the power of social media and how it should be used.