Last week I published a Blogging Priorities Funnel and asked my readers whether they would be interested in additional funnels. Many expressed an interest in traffic driving priorities funnels so this is the first of many where I share my priorities for driving traffic.

SOCIAL MEDIA PRIORITIES FUNNEL

Note that the most important priority on any funnel is at the bottom so start there and work your way up.

SOCIAL MEDIA PRIORITIES:

TWITTER:

I rank Twitter first because:

1. A Twitter username is a shorthand way for others to share how to reach you, more information about you, and your most important link. If I want to mention you in a comment and don’t know if a link is acceptable on that site (or maybe I KNOW they won’t approve a link) I can simply use @YourUserName to recommend you.
2. Twitter is where influencers connect with each other and how we can send visibility for a specific link or topic between influencers.  It is usually how I will ask someone to meet me on Skype or IM or call me and others who, like me, have overflowing email inboxes are far easier to connect with live on Twitter than anywhere else (except Skype or IM – and we use Twitter to make that direct connection).

Whether you have never even seen Twitter or are an experienced user you can use my Twitter Best Practices post to make your time spent their more effective.

TWELLOW:

Use Twellow to quickly identify and follow the specific audience you want to reach. See How to Use Twellow (linked from the Twitter Best Practices post mentioned above) and Geo-targeting Twitter. Also do this: Strategy for getting more Twitter followers interested in YOUR niche.

TWITTERFEED:

Feeding top content related to your niche directly into your Twitter account is the best way to grow your influence and maintain a consistent presence on Twitter which is essential to growing your influence there. You’ll never have to worry about being unfollowed because you’ve been too busy for any reason to sign into Twitter.

No that does NOT mean I recommend you not actually USE Twitter regularly – only that during times when you can’t be online (when you have a family emergency, are working on a major project, or are traveling) that your Twitter account will not be dormant.

See How to Use Twitterfeed for a consistent Twitter presence.

STUMBLEUPON:

StumbleUpon can drive a lot of traffic IF you know how to use it effectively. That includes first thumbing up what you want to share and then taking the time to write a short review. Adding an image can attract more clicks. Like any other social media site the more you use it the more powerful it becomes.

I use an unusual strategy to make the most of my time online.  When I want to share your post and send you more visitors than Twitter alone can, I write a Twitter length review on StumbleUpon that includes your Twitter username. That review is automatically fed to Twitter and Facebook and pulled in via RSS to FriendFeed.

If I want to really maximize who sees your post I will also manually add it to Facebook and Friendfeed and include an image – something that as of the past few days is no longer as simple as using the Share on Facebook or Share on FriendFeed tools. I noticed this over the weekend:

The option to share images has disappeared from both
Share on Facebook and Share on FriendFeed.

The workaround is to download the image to your hard drive and upload it manually! Facebook and FriendFeed are acting to make it harder to use their sites to share images that call attention to what you wish to promote – whether that is a blog, a good cause, or a small business.

If a cause, event or post is exceptional I will take the time to schedule additional tweets using StumbleUpon’s shortener su.pr. See how to use su.pr.

While StumbleUpon is not as powerful for driving traffic today as it was back in 2007 when I sent 25,000 Visitors from StumbleUpon to one blog post, it is still one of the larger sources of traffic available and it is easy to consistently send 50-200 visitors (depending on your Twitter reach) using su.pr.

SOCIAL MEDIA TIP: Include Twitter length sound bites
in your posts and you will get tweeted more often.
Posts with multiple key points that fit on Twitter = more scheduled tweets!

Excellent quotes are also quoted more often in posts and the media.

FACEBOOK:

We all know Facebook is used by the masses so we have to be there, but that site has so many usability problems it drives people like me to distraction to use it. I force myself to go there and I feed some content there and share some manually, but I am definitely no expert on Facebook. However, I do know some Facebook experts: I can strongly recommend:

• Kimberly Canterbury ~ @AskKim on Twitter ~ Kim has an extensive Optimizing Facebook category and offers a Facebook for Business Made Easy ebook
• Ron Cripps ~ @AffiliateXFiles ~ Ron has an extensive Facebook Optimization category and offers Facebook How-to Videos
• Ching Ya ~ @?wchinya on Facebook Customization

FRIENDFEED:

When I first started this blog I was extremely active on FriendFeed – until they sold out. Like any social network, if you are not active there regularly and personally you will get less attention and traffic from that source. I pop into FriendFeed off and on but not consistently these days and as I mentioned in the StumbleUpon (SU) section I pull my SU feed into my FriendFeed account.

Because I am not physically there very much any more it is not nearly as effective as it once was; however, I did share a link for these very unusual stone candles yesterday and almost immediately got four likes on that share so FriendFeed is still a viable option. We all must decide where to focus our time and unfortunately right now FriendFeed is not highest on my priority list.

LINKEDIN:

LinkedIn is extremely important for many businesses and would be a much higher priority for them (and me) IF they or I :

1. Were seeking employment.
2. Was involved in an industry that is highly impressed by higher education credentials or having worked for a specific company.
3. Desired connections with CEOs, COOs and other executives or consultants who work with Fortune 100 / 500 /1000 corporations.

The groups and question and answer sections on LinkedIn can be very useful for increasing your visibility and identifying others. If LinkedIn is one of your highest priorities, be sure to connect with Irene Koehler ~ @IreneKoehler ~ and consider LinkedIn Profile Optimization.

Be sure to fill out your profile there and start getting recommendations. (I still need to do that on my own LinkedIn profile so do as I say and not as I’ve done so far!) Do check out what I put in the Honors and Awards section for ideas to populate your own. That is where you can share when you are singled out for recognition so that others who look at your profile will know more about your strengths.

QUORA:

Launched to a ton of buzz and heavily used by many influential social media marketers, Quora is clearly serious about being important. The only reason it is so far down my list of priorities is lack of time. I have used it intermittently and will use it more consistently as time allows.

Several bloggers I can highly recommend have written about Quora so visit their blogs for more details:

• Louis Gray ~ @louisgray ~ on Marketing on Quora – Louis has many posts about Quora so see his Quora Information category for much more.
• Adam Singer ~ @futurebuzz ~ on Using Quora for Long Tail Traffic

iTweetLive:

If you have a business or are interested in marketing anything on Twitter you will want to check out iTweetLive ~ @iTweetLive ~ as a way to respond to keyword triggered alerts. You can manually reply to them or use their system to send pre-written tweets. I haven’t played with this in a while but it had major potential – especially if they would allow you to select from among your canned tweets to send the one most relevant to a particular tweet.

This video explains how it works:

More information in these posts:

• SlapStart on Using iTweetLive to Manage Your Brand on Twitter
• iTweetLive FAQ

These are the social networks I use most in the order of their importance to me. Your priorities may be different as I mentioned in the section about LinkedIn above. The most important takeaways regarding Social Media are these:

Social Media is about building RELATIONSHIPS!

You will always get the strongest results from
the social networks you spend the most time on.

This list does not include blogging communities or additional ways to promote your blog or business. I am creating funnels for more ways of driving traffic and publishing them later this week so be sure to come back. You can subscribe here or sign up for email updates here.

Feel free to share this information and use the images in your own blog posts. I do ask that you link back to the original post either from the image or using the phrase ‘Social Media Priorities’.

UPDATE: 9/19/09 ProBlogger Guest post I Came, I Saw, I Commented: Was It Worth It by Josh Hanagarne – The World’s Strongest Librarian – provides this additional confirmation that commenting does indeed work. He gives these stats:

The numbers after commenting:

• A 100% increase on RSS subscribers (160-320)
• Over 40 newsletter subscriptions
• A second traffic spike due to people returning to answer my comment on their own blogs

Note that HIS strategy was commenting on the blogs of those who commented on his previous ProBlogger guest post. Imagine what could happen if he had used the additional strategy explained below. Maybe he’ll read this, try it out, and let us know what additional growth his blog sees from it.

Want proof this strategy works for others too? Check out these two Tweets I received today (Mar 23, 2009):

PaulHassing@GrowMap Thank YOU! Yesterday my site traffic was double what it was last Monday. All I did differently was follow your advice. Great stuff!

PaulHassing@GrowMap It’s nice (& rare) to see an approach which is ethical & practical having an effect. For once, good guys don’t finish last!

Here is the step-by-step method responsible for the increase in traffic here:

1. Visit your favorite blog, preferably a dofollow CommentLuv blog.
2. Leave a high quality comment.
3. If the blog uses CommentLuv select the most relevant post to share or a post you wish to promote.
4. In a CommentLuv blog you can leave two links in a comment by changing the primary link JUST BEFORE you click submit. When you’re ready to send the comment paste the other link into the box and immediately send the comment BEFORE the CommentLuv system loses your selected post.
5. AFTER you’ve left your comment share the post at Twitter, FriendFeed, cliKball, StumbleUpon, Del.icio.us or on any other favorite Social Networking site or reader.
6. When sharing use an excerpt, image and title illustrating what YOU feel is the most pertinent information in the post. This will increase the number of new visitors the post will receive – and the number of readers who may read your comment or be interested in your featured post.
7. I often also share the best comment(s) or additional thoughts at cliKball and FriendFeed.

We all have limited time and the same number of hours in any day so maximizing the return on how we spend that time is critical to our success. If you already have quality content on your blog and a recent post worth sharing it is time to focus on getting quality backlinks from commenting to greatly increase your traffic.

NEW: If you don’t fully understand how CommentLuv works or haven’t registered your blog take the time to read this excellent post with screen shots on How CommentLuv works and the benefits of registering your site.

Combine our strategy above with the one from that last link to Peter Lee’s Work from Home blog and your time is guaranteed to generate incoming links, better search engine placement, higher visibility and more traffic to your blog.

For a more advanced strategy read How I Doubled the Pageviews of my Blog in Two Week – That post opens in a new window to make sure that BEFORE you do that you START immediately increasing your own traffic here:

The best way to learn something is to do enough of it that you will remember how and it will become a habit. The great thing about this strategy is that you can easily get started RIGHT NOW:

1. Just leave a comment in this post; the early commentators get the most exposure so go ahead and leave it now. It won’t take that long since you’re already here.
2. Be sure to include a link to your blog post. Make it your most recent post, the most related post, one you want to promote most OR one that your readers like best.
3. If you have a Twitter account here is an easy way:  Just click this Tweet This!
   
4. Then share it in your other Social Networking accounts and share it in your reader. The more you share the more it benefits you and everyone else.
5. BONUS VISITORS: If you want even more traffic publish your results and link to this post. We’ll find your new post, leave our own comments, and share it at Twitter, FriendFeed and cliKball.

BLOG COMMENTING:

• NEW: Internet Marketing Blog of Vance Sova – Increase Blog Traffic Using Blog Comments
• NEW: Social Media Training blog Velvet Connect – (Keith Jenkins) – Boost Your Reader Base by Commenting
• WordPress How To Spotter (TheSpotter) 3 Reasons Why Blog Commenting is Important
• FMS SEO Company – (Follow Karl)(Follow Kelly) – Blog Commenting for Traffic Generation
• ExtremeJohn - (Twitter) – 16 Reasons Commenting on Your Blog Sucks
• OES tsetnoc – (Twitter) – Blog Commenting – High PageRank

DoFollow CommentLuv KeywordLuv Blogs With Comments Moderated by GrowMap

I approve more comments to support small businesses, good causes and bloggers than most bloggers so being active in our blogs is to your benefit. They are all 100% dofollow from the first comment and have both CommentLuv and KeywordLuv installed:

• GrowMap (This blog) – Internet Marketing, Social Media Marketing, Blogging, Supporting Small Businesses, Local Search. See Best of GrowMap.
• GoodMillwork – Wood Products Manufacturer of architectural moldings including crown moldings, door and window trim, baseboard, chair rail, wood siding, exterior shutters. They can match any existing woodwork of any age for historical restorations, sell rare woods including cypress and genuine mahogany and mill mahogany moldings and ecofriendly TimberSIL.
• ExecGiftsBlog Personalized Gifts ~ Gift Affiliate Program ~ Wedding Store
• NoBogies Golf Store and Blog
• GrokHorses Horse Information Blog
• PSPLiving Living Healthier

In Louis Gray‘s latest post on the Valuation of Twitter he states:

“Twitter will find a business model. It will very likely include some form of advertising, even in a tough economy for ads.”

The only reason it is a tough economy for ads is that most advertising is not targeted correctly. Many pay per click engines are intentionally selling poor quality traffic. That traffic does not generate any sales. When advertising doesn’t convert eventually advertisers WILL quit buying it!

There is a simple solution that every Social Networking site – including Twitter and FriendFeed – could implement without an enormous amount of difficulty. All that is necessary is to keep these points in mind:

1. Only targeted advertising converts!
2. Buying advertising that does not convert is a waste of money.
3. Therefore, only offer ad placements that are very specific to what is being offered.

Am I the only one who sees the elephant in the room when it comes to monetizing any Social Networking site? StumbleUpon almost stumbled upon it but eliminated it when they got bought out. Here are Nine Reasons to Monetize Social Networking with Targeted Advertising:

1. The big money is in advertising.
2. The best advertising CONVERTS.
3. The REASON it converts is that it is RELEVANT to those who see it.
4. SOLUTION: Use data mining to pull existing activity into pages targeted to specific niches.
5. Provide an easy way for your users to get to that niche information.
6. Offer advertisers ads that appear ONLY on the specific pages most related to what they want to advertise.
7. WIN ONE: Users get to find out about products and services related to their favorite interests.
8. WIN TWO: Advertisers get to reach those who are most likely to buy from them.
9. WIN THREE: Social Networking services become as profitable as Google AdWords.

Using a combination of algorithms, tags, data mining, and allowing trusted users to edit incorrectly placed information while they’re using the site could be implemented.

Social Networking sites can start offering what all businesses want and need: a way to reach their potential buyers while STILL providing their users with a quality experience BECAUSE people do NOT mind advertising they’re interested in – only advertising they do NOT want to see!

Everyone hates to be SPAMMED. Everyone hates “junk” mail which they define as anything they’re not interested in. Products and services related to what we love doing are not considered SPAM or JUNK.

RELATED POST: Social Networking Sites are Missing The Monetization Golden Goose

3/22/09 UPDATE: Steven Hodson wrote a post about Having a Problem With All This Social Media Crap that generated much discussion about the value – or lack thereof – of all the time spent on Social Networking. I made several comments in that thread including this one below which is related to the topic of THIS post:

The reason it takes so long to get minimal benefit from Social Networking is that none of the popular Social Media sites are providing content in an easily usable form. StumbleUpon almost did it right before they were acquired and then got rid of the most valuable content they had!

What SU had was pages based on keyword tags. Each tag had a page that showed the most popular shared sites for that tag based on clicks, reviews, and readers voting them up. It also showed the users who shared the most valuable content on that subject.

IF you knew how to get to those pages (it wasn’t that obvious) you could quickly and easily find the most knowledgeable users on that subject. Say you had questions about Ubuntu – you could go to the Ubuntu page and find the most valuable resources about it AND connect with someone who could answer specific questions.

THAT is what Social Networking is missing. Yes, there are search functions at Twitter and FriendFeed but that is not nearly as useful as using the power of computers to organize and present content in an easy to use way. The first Social Media site that finally gets that right will require far less time and give far more back!

When they do they will not only be an awesome resource for users – they will also provide what every small business needs and what will be their Golden Goose of monetization – a highly targeted niche audience. Ads there will convert and advertisers will line up to buy them. This is precisely how Google makes most of their money and how these sites should too!

FFholic provides search functions that can be used to find the most interesting folks to subscribe to at FriendFeed:

1. Type in your favorite user in the search box in the top right
2. Click the radio button for Users
3. Click search
4. On the search results page click on Has xxx estimated subscribers
   

After a short wait the search results show you the FriendFeed users following the person you searched on ranked by those who have the most subscribers. Using this search you only need to have one favorite person to find the FriendFeed users who also find your favorite person interesting.

Here are some searches to give you the idea:

• See who subscribes to GrowMap at FriendFeed.
• Robert Scoble is number one at FriendFeed; who are the most active subscribers to Scobleizer?
• Finding FF users by subject is not easy. Ernie Yacub suggested Michael Linton for his expertise on community currencies and open money systems. I doubt I’d ever have found that myself.
• Sean McBride shares his expertise on the Middle East. See Sean McBride’s subscribers.
• Some assist us in their choice of handles: bankwatch specializes in banking.

If you can find one active FriendFeed user who posts about your favorite interests you’ll be able to find more through them. The down side is we don’t know whether their followers actually SHARE anything on that subject; only that they also are interested in it.

I’m hoping if we keep suggesting it that one day we will be able to search FriendFeed by interest to find both the most popular items shared and conversations had AND subject matter experts by expertise!

That would greatly benefit all their users, create quality pages to bring in search traffic, and allow small businesses to offer their products and services directly to those who are truly interested in what they do.

It is still fast and simple to locate popular sites by subject in any search engine or on the StumbleUpon site. Simply search for +stumbleupon and +your interest. For example: Golf or Tennis or Ubuntu or Horses.

StumbleUpon really erred when they changed how they displayed sites by tag though. In the “old days” you landed on a page where you could read excerpts of the reviews, see how many other users liked them, and could easily identify which StumbleUpon users were experts in any subject.

Those pages were the most useful on StumbleUpon – and the ones advertisers would have gladly paid good money to advertise on because they absolutely would have converted. Apparently the new owners didn’t recognize what they had and eliminated them instead of monetizing them.

Whichever Social Networking Service decides to add the ability to quickly and easily find content and users by interest will become THE most popular Social Media service with both users and advertisers. I would love to provide beta testing and input for that service, spreading the word and recommending them to advertisers and users alike.

RELATED POSTS ABOUT FRIENDFEED:

• Twitter and FriendFeed Quick Start – (Includes links to the Unofficial Guides to FriendFeed)
• Want to Be Read? Jazz Up What You Share At FriendFeed
• How Using FriendFeed Benefits You – (Don’t Miss These Top FriendFeed Users)
• Top Ten FriendFeed Friends Challenge – Adding Your Own Favorite FriendFeed Users in this thread benefits you and them
  
• Why Use FriendFeed? You Could Exchange Messages Directly With Robert Scoble
• Social Networking Sites Are Missing the Monetization Golden Goose

Get up to speed right away at Twitter and FriendFeed with these posts. To make it simpler I’ve linked only to the best Getting Started posts I found.

Getting Started at Twitter:

• Twitter Term Definitions You Need to Know (like Tweet, RT, feed, etc.)
• SearchEngineGuide: From Twits to Tweeple: Why I Embraced Twitter and You Should Too
• MichaelHyatt: The Beginner’s Guide to Twitter
• Remarkablogger: Video Tutorial: Basics of How to Use Twitter
• Want some excellent tips on how to use Twitter in a businesslike way? Read Jeremiah Owyang‘s How to Use Twitter.
• How to Use TwitterFeed to Create a Consistent Twitter Presence
• Comparison of Tools to Manage Multiple Twitter Accounts and links to posts on how to use them

Who to Follow at Twitter:

• Exceptional Bloggers who are Twitter Influencers for #FollowFriday
• Influential Twitter Users who interact with their followers and have ~10,000+ Followers
• Want to find all the power bloggers using Twitter or Twitterers in other niches? Use Twellow
• Forty-eight Niche Twitter Lists (More on the TwiTip site linked from it.)

How to UnFollow at Twitter:

• ExtremeJohn Blogging Tips (Twitter) Twitter Unfollow Tools

Getting Started at FriendFeed:

• The Unofficial Guide to FriendFeed – What Makes FriendFeed Special
  
• The Unofficial Guide to FriendFeed – Getting Started
• How-to Get Started on FriendFeed

Who to Subscribe to at FriendFeed:

• Top FriendFeed User Lists

More on FriendFeed:

• Jazz Up What You Share on FriendFeed Using the FriendFeed Bookmarklet
• How Using FriendFeed Benefits You; Don’t Miss These Top FriendFeed Users
• Why Use FriendFeed? You Could Exchange Messages with Robert Scoble
• Everything by Louis Gray on FriendFeed (Louis’ new posts appear at the top followed by all previous posts.)

MORE TWITTER RESOURCES:

• Twitter Resource Super List
• The Most Useful Marketing Links About Twitter

FriendFeed Users We Recommend:

These are the people who post frequently about how to use FriendFeed. There are many others worthy of your subscription in the FriendFeed Challenge Lists (ours and others’).

• Mike Fruchter
• Louis Gray
• GrowMap
• Robert Scoble
• AdamSinger

Share your Favorite FriendFeed Friends and discover which users others recommend in our Top Ten FriendFeed Friends Challenge.

HOW you share in Social Networking sites is just as important as WHAT you share because only those who read what you post benefit. Take a little longer and you’ll see a huge uplift in who follows your finds and comments. Using the FriendFeed bookmarklet makes it easier so install it first to use the tips below.

Tips for FriendFeed Posts Others Will Love to Share:

1. Found a new writer you really enjoy or a best-of or new post at one of your favorite blogs? Select their best or most recent and relevant post.
2. Highlight an excerpt that you most agree with or that reflects what that article covers.
3. If the first excerpt was short you may wish to use more than one shorter excerpt. Copy and paste more from the text after the first excerpt. I connect these with three dots (…) and be sure to add appropriate quotation marks.
4. Click on the Share on FriendFeed bookmarklet.
5. IMPORTANT!!! Wait…and wait…and possibly wait some more until the excerpt and title appear in the bookmarklet. Do NOT click on an image or do anything else until it is done or you’ll be starting over. If you’re impatient like me, switch to another tab or computer and do something else while it loads.
6. Check the Title - if it doesn’t include the Title from the post or a good description of what is found there CHANGE IT.
7. Point at all available images and select the one that best reflects the author or article you’re sharing. Don’t click on any image that doesn’t have a blue border and the “Share an image on FriendFeed” text in the top left corner as those will not work and again, you’ll be starting over. Sometimes there are no images you can use. If you’re feeling generous you might send them the link to my FriendFeed Quick Tip for Getting More Traffic from Social Networking.
8. Click Post and your optimized FriendFeed shared item will appear in your FriendFeed thread.
9. If you have more to say about what you just linked in consider adding your own comments to get the discussion started at FF.

You can see plenty of examples by visiting GrowMap at FriendFeed. One that uses all of the above tips including more than one excerpt is for Mission Driven Marketing – Emotionally Connecting with Your Target Audience.

The FriendFeed bookmarklet did NOT pick up their title Spin on Cause Marketing Strategy Stirs Controversy from their post so it is important to add a title for them when sharing. Often I use their titles; sometimes I use a different angle. One may increase SEO value while the second enlarges their target audience so I believe both have merit.

I hope you can see now that what excerpts, images, and titles you select plus the comments you make add great value to what you share.  These all combine to make it more likely that others will read – and share - your posts.

My thanks to those who are making submitting their Top Ten Favorite Users of FriendFeed a priority. The first submission is already in and Derek Semmler’s FriendFeed choices are excellent.  I first found Derek at StumbleUpon so I was pleasantly surprised to see he has included many of my old SU favorites in his FriendFeed list. Some of them I hadn’t found yet at FriendFeed.

I know we’re all busy so I want to remind those reading this of the good participating in challenges like our Favorite Top Ten FriendFeed Friends Challenge can do for you and others:

• Gain more readers - Isn’t that why we write? To share what we’ve learned with anyone else who is interested? You want them to find you, right?
• Learn new skills - There is already someone who knows what you want to learn. Why reinvent the wheel when they’re willing to share what they know?
• Increase Your Social Networking Velocity – Those you follow online are not created equal. The more power users you know the faster your own networks will grow – exponentially instead of serially!
• Maintain Relationships – FriendFeed is far superior for having real online conversations to any other Social Networking site we’ve seen.
• Converse with Enormously Popular Bloggers - There are some people who are so successful – and so busy – that the only place you’re likely to ever have an actual interaction with them – much less an extended conversation – is on FriendFeed.

Why can you talk to the rich and famous on FriendFeed? Because it is THE best place to talk to anyone. Not using FriendFeed yet? It is really easy. Start here:

• The Unofficial Guide to FriendFeed Part 1: What Makes FriendFeed Special?
• The Unofficial Guide to FriendFeed Part 2: Getting Started

Even if you’re just getting started you CAN participate in our Top Ten Favorite FriendFeed Users Challenge! Here’s how:

• Check out FriendFeed Lists others have posted, visit those FriendFeed users and select those who write what you’re interested in
• Use the links at ffholic to find FriendFeed’s Most Popular, Most Discussed, Most Liked, Most Active, or Most Commented.
• Search ffholic to search entries, users and rooms for the subjects you are interested in. You’re bound to find at least ten favorites from among the many users of FriendFeed.
• Have a blog or site? Maximize the benefit of entering by posting your list on your own site and then adding your link in the comments of the FriendFeed Challenge.
• No site? Add your Top Ten list directly into the FriendFeed Challenge comments.

You can make your list really useful to yourself and others by researching the niches you are interested in and making your list niche specific. Can’t find enough in one niche? Feel free to subdivide your list into several niches, or your niche and top Friends. Use your imagination. We’re looking forward to hearing from YOU!

Additional Resources: Why Use Social Networking?:

• Why Use Social Media – How Social Media benefits your other strategies such as link building, SEO, and building and maintaining relationships.
• Why Social Networking – Linda Roeder’s About.com page explaining various aspects of Social Networking and Niche Marketing.
• Washington Post: Business Gets Personal Online – Tips from three Social Media Strategy Firms
• How to Promote Your Blog Using Social Networking

TwiTip’s Top Ten ‘Must Follow’ Niche Twitter Lists were such a hit that I’m proposing a Top Ten FriendFeed Friends Challenge and would love it if YOU would participate. I’ve added a post on How Using FriendFeed Benefits You as further encouragement.

To kick it off the challenge here are my choice of exceptional Top Ten favorite FriendFeed users:

1. Louis Gray – Who else to kick off the list but our friendly neighborhood FriendFeed expert himself. Check out the latest post in his blog by guest writer Jesse Stay: Pull Your Blog Into FriendFeed and Increase Exposure.
2. Robert Scoble – I really started using FriendFeed because I wanted to join Robert Scoble’s discussion and talk to him directly. Read Scoble on Tech on the FastCompany blog. Visit his FriendFeed discussions any time or the ScobleRoom on Thursdays.
3. Mike Fruchter – Check out his series of FriendFeed Users to Follow on his Michael Fruchter Blog. You can start your FriendFeed profile by checking out his first thirty recommendations. (Direct links at the end of this post.)
4. Tamar Weinberg – From StumbleUpon to Twitter to Friendfeed to all her blogs, who doesn’t love Tamar? Catch up with her wherever you hang out. You won’t regret it. Be sure to check out her Avatar at StumbleUpon for your grin of the day!
5. ProBlogger – Did you know there is a Problogger Room at FriendFeed? If you’re serious about blogging this is one room you’ll want to frequent.
6. LifeHacker – Popular LifeHacker blog offers Tips and Downloads for Getting Things Done – [NOTE: Tamar and others have pointed out that they are NOT active at FF. I selected them on the quality of their blog but they only have a feed at FF.]
7. Zee – a prolific blogger on cutting edge technology.
8. Tim Hoeck – everyone can use a good programmer friend. Check out Tim’s blog and you might even finally figure out How to Use Yahoo Pipes – or maybe not (unless you’re a true geek).
9. Hutch – You’ll find some truly interesting tech posts and a dose of humor in his Hutch Tech Blog.
10. Gregory Lent – Read his insights on PostLinearity Beyond Linear Thinking

Why use FriendFeed? The number one reason for me is that you can have a discussion with people who are usually inaccessible because they’re so well known and so busy. You can sometimes chat with them live and other times weigh in on a conversation whenever you’re available and see the answers later.

It is also a fast, easy way to see all the posts someone has made in each of their blogs. If they have several (or many!) you can view them sequentially by just clicking on the orange feed buttons that look like this:

(Not everyone knows about feeds yet and we like to help everyone get up to speed.)

Special thanks to Derek Semmler for being the first major blogger to answer our challenge. Don’t miss the major Social Networking experts on Derek Semmler’s Top Ten Favorite FriendFeed Friends List (some of which I should have remembered to include on my own!).

NEW: Thanks to Joe Dawson for jumping right into second with his favorite FriendFeed Friends in the comments. Check out Eric Berlin’s Online Media Cultist Blog whose Follow These Ten People on FriendFeed and Your Social Media Powers Will Be the Stronger For It came in a close third.

There is an additional benefit to the challenge that we hadn’t considered. Each of the bloggers who’ve entered so far have added comments on their favorite FriendFeed users AND their take on why and how they use FriendFeed.

One of the best is Software Developer April Russo’s Cranial Soup‘s entry My Top Ten FriendFeed Friends. If you’re new to FriendFeed read her post

We’re off to a good start, but we can do MUCH better. We would love to hear from YOU too!

UPDATE: ELITE FRIENDFEED FRIENDS LISTS:

• Robert Scoble’s Top Tech Blogger FriendFeed Social Media List
• Elite Bloggers Joining FriendFeed in Droves

TOP FRIENDFEED FOLLOWERS LISTS:

• 10 People to Follow On FriendFeed for the Month of January
• 10 People to Follow On FriendFeed for the Month of December
• 10 People to Follow on FriendFeed for November
• 20 People You Should Follow on FriendFeed
• 14 People to Follow on FriendFeed for Eye Candy
• Online Media Cultist – Top Ten to Strengthen Your Social Media Prowess

RESOURCES ON HOW TO USE FRIENDFEED:

• NEW: How to Get the Most out of Social Networking (Posted at Mashable, written by Wendy Boswell.)
• 15 Secrets of FriendFeed Power Users (Posted at LouisGray, written by Daniel J. Pritchard of Sharing at Work)
• FriendFeed is Google Bait + 25 Ways to Use It

So many Social Networking sites and so little time. We learned tonight that FriendFeed is a great way to interact directly with bloggers we may only wish would follow us at Twitter. We have Robert Scoble to thank for giving some Twitter users a lesson tonight in using Twitter and FriendFeed together. We simply followed a link to the discussion he started there.

If there are bloggers you would love to have a conversation with, FriendFeed (FF) is a much more likely answer than any other Social Networking site. Simply search for their membership (or follow the little FF emblem from their blog or other Web site) and check out their feed. See if there is a pattern to when they start discussions and pop in on the next one.

There were some really helpful FF users in on the discussion who pointed us to a treasure-trove of FriendFeed posts over at LouisGray.com: 689 of them to be exact. [Correction: Not really – see the first comment below from Louis Gray himself.  See all of his posts at Louis Gray FriendFeed expert. Here are some of the best How to Use FriendFeed posts we’ve selected:

• 25 Different Uses for FriendFeed
• How to Use FriendFeed as a Collaborative Business Tool
• 15 Secrets of FriendFeed’s Power Users

FriendFeed is easier than most sites to figure out, so just jump in. It is easy to add your blog’s feed and even easier to filter the feed of any FF user to just see their blog posts similar to the way you would see them in an RSS feed.

ADDITIONAL TWITTER and FRIENDFEED RESOURCES:

• Twitter Still Beats FriendFeed on Real Time Topic Tracking