All social networks are slightly essentially different [well, let me tell you some commonplace truth, you know] – a newb will first try to apply the same “proven” strategy once he joins a new community, while an experienced marketer will explore the differences first and will try to tweak a new social media marketing strategy. Here is a simple sample of the comparative social media analysis that can help you to define your techniques [to clearly see the pattern I was using green for default SM options that can help you with marketing, dark green for more or less neutral options and dark blue – if the absence/presence of the function might hinder your marketing efforts]:
| Default Options: |  |
 |
 |
 |
| New friend email notification | Yes | No | Yes | No |
| Mutual friends limit | No (*) | 200 | No | No |
| Link sharing | No | Yes (one by one) | Bulk (to all friends) | No |
| PM | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| New comment notification | No | No | Yes | No |
| (Default) Friend’s Update Following | Instant | Instant (they will appear on your home page) | No | No |
So judging from the color scheme, Mixx appears to be the easiest way to market. Let’s look further:
- The widely used social technique to attract attention to yourself is to send an invitation to befriend. While it can still work with some networks, that shouldn’t be your primary strategy now as [1] many networks do not send this invitation, so the members you “follow” may be absolutely clueless about your efforts (see StumbleUpon and Sphinn), [2] some sites have the limit of mutual friends (e.g. StumbleUpon), and [3] with some networks (*) people might be reluctant to add you to friends as this usually means they will be following each and every of your updates (see StumbleUpon and Twitter);
- Link sharing is a great way to generate votes and remind your friends of yourself. Again with Mixx it’s quite easy as the system allows you to share your link with all your friends at a time.
- Email notifications of new comments ensure your friends’ participation in the discussion. With Mixx you are updated of new comments in case you have posted a comment of your own. So this might be a good idea to sometimes comment your own submissions to keep track of the discussion.
- By following your friends’ submissions you will be updated on most recent and interesting news. With Twitter and TwitterFox this seems real fun to do. On the other hand, Twitter and StumbleUpon keep your friends constantly in touch with you, so keep up your great work there!
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While I agree with you on some of the drawbacks of Twitter and SU, I must say that I still find them to be the most useful/interesting to use out of these four.
Upon reading this post, I signed up for Mixx, and was not impressed. I’m tired of seeing sites use Digg as a general format. I never really liked Digg (not because of Ron Paul spammers) because it’s layout and community left something to be desired.
Personally, I think the others in your list, which have fewer useful features to the online marketer, are better services based on their design, community and innovation.
Hi, Syzlak. Ok, that’s my fault, I guess I was not clear enough. I actually adore SU and Twitter and use them much more often than Sphinn or Mixx. I was only talking business and marketing possibilities here and that’s it… While it took me rather long to build connections on SU (only time and quality worked there for me), I have just koined MIxx and already I am already pretty confident there.