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What can you find on del.icio.us? Anything from reference materials on nearly any topic, to hotel and restaurant recommendations for business travelers, to local business web sites for the plumber, hair salon and the appliance repairman.
I use del.icio.us to keep track of web pages about copywriting, search engine optimization resources, and web site development, to name just a few. Up until a few months ago, that meant only bookmarking sites that I wanted to find again. But then I discovered that in addition to browsing my own bookmarks, I could search the bookmarks of other del.icio.us users. I learned that dazzlindonna posted top notch resources on web site development, and that finnstone’s bookmarks about advertising were really interesting. So I joined their networks, and now I have access to all of their public bookmarks. How’s that for a sweet deal?
Subscriptions
Another useful tool is the del.icio.us subscription feature. By subscribing to a tag, you’ll be able to see and keep track of all new bookmarks saved with that tag.
You may have noticed that I have a natural interest in local search. Well, I was curious as to what was being bookmarked in and around my hometown, so I searched for and subscribed to tags for each nearby locale. Voila! A snapshot of local business sites that people (possibly customers) wanted to be sure to find again.
Thought leadership
As you bookmark sites, keep an eye out for those you’d like to share with your site’s visitors. Tag sites that you’d like your customers to see with at least one easily remembered and unique keyword. Provide a short note as commentary that explains why you’re sharing the site. (What’s in it for your site visitor?)
Now here comes the fun part: Go to your bookmarks. Click on that tag you want to share. Notice there’s an RSS icon at the bottom of the page holding all of your entries for this tag. You can subscribe and receive this feed in a feed reader or burn the feed with Feedburner, copy a bit of HTML to your web site, and share highlights from that feed on your web site. Use this technique to share relevant industry news or anything you deem important to your audience. By the way, I’m using this same principle to post the title and first few words of each of my blog posts to my main web site’s home page.
Next up on this topic
Using del.icio.us as a public relations resource
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on Feb 12th, 2008 at 11:59 pm
I actually haven’t taken advantage of del.icio.us yet, but it sounds like maybe I should!
Interesting post.
on Feb 13th, 2008 at 8:50 am
Yes, as a writer, I know you’ll find many uses for del.icio.us. It definitely simplifies the research process.
Thanks for visiting, Michele!
on Mar 26th, 2008 at 7:45 am
[...] What Can You Find on Del.icio.us? [...]