Some Great Social Proof Examples

I have in a blog post explained what social proof is,

I showed this picture:

You see, one persons starts looking up – then there’s added two more, some more people again – and then it start to get all crazy. That’s social proof.

Now, if you see @Mashable’s Twitter profile and sees his follower count, what do you think then? You think “He knows what he’s doing, so why not follow him?”

I have been doing some massive Twittering the latest days – and I really have gained some followers. I started at 500 now I have around 2000 – and that’s around two weeks – to see the stats just go to TwitterCounter.com. Anyway it is easier to gain followers if you already have a punch of them. Because of social proof.

Now 2000 followers isn’t that much, when you start to have a following base of 10,000 or so – you really start to feel the power of social proof.

If you on Twitter have around 250 followers you will instantly think that 2,000 is many followers and even if you’re listed on 50 lists – you really start to see, that this guy is tweeting with value.

I have seen some Twitter profiles that has around 7,000 followers but is only listed 3 times or so and if you have 2,000 followers and is listed on 50 lists – you can see the difference. I try to “judge” people whether they are delivering tweets with value or not by looking at the listed, because no spammer is listed and tweeps who only tweet links to their own blog aren’t listed that much (unless that’s the purpose of the Twitter account.)

Now my Google Friend Connect is on 20 members – that isn’t that much – I have seen lots of people having many more members, but I normally Google Friend Connect isn’t used that much, so yet it is some people who’s joined my Google Friend Connect (feel free to connect – in the sidebar, all you need is a Google account)

It’s just, if you have like 700 members on the Google Friend Connect you really are showing that you have some readers that cares about your blog.

Now, bloggers like Brian Clark (CopyBlogger), has lots of social proof to show. It amazing, if you see his posts, they get like 500 retweets each time. That’s also social proof. The comments on Darren Rowse’s (ProBlogger) blog is also social proof – some gets more than 300 comments.

That’s also why blogging gets easier for every day that goes. You get faster at writing (because of habits), you market your blog each day, so you get more readers who also promotes your blog (over time you don’t need to promote your blog posts as much as in the start).

The start of a blog, is the hardest part, because you need content, you need people to help marketing your blog (word of mouth) etcetera.

What is Blog Engage? And How You Can Use it!

I have known BlogEngage for several weeks now (3 I guess) it’s a blog directory, it’s Digg inspired. It allows bloggers to add their articles/blog posts to the directory (like Digg) when you have submitted your article. The Blog Engage memebers can vote it, retweet it and share it on tons of sites.

When I say that Blog Engage is inspired by Digg – Well I think that Blog Engage is much more powerful than Digg – for the bloggers that aren’t A-list bloggers yet.

Blog Engage is not that big compared to Digg, which also makes it possible to reach the frontpage of Blog Engage, my article: 10 Major Blogging Mistakes reached the front page of Blog Engage.

It’s my most visited article, most commented, most retweeted.

All these things because I did heck lot of marketing for the blog post. Really I worked, in hours to do this. Then I just thought about Blog Engage. Let’s try submit it here (I think this was like in the end of the day, around dinner time.) I just tweeted, that I’ve added my article to Blog Engage.

I think my article got 17 votes – and it hit the front page when I had around 9 votes. I was just browsing the Blog Engage published blog posts. The #1 right now only has 7 votes. The Blog Engage community has around 7800 users (where 1200 users is active) according to my resources. I’m not sure about the real amount of members – but it’s around that.

I just have a little picture that show how much traffic BlogEngage have gave me (I have only submitted two articles on the site)

Now I like Blog Engage, if you have a blog with WordPress I think you should download the Blog Engage WP plugin. With this you can add a handy button like this:

It’s very cool – now I hope you guys will Blog Engage this article about Blog Engage, I think you need an account to vote for the articles, but if you have a blog you will earn on this.

Blog Engage Benefits

There’s some benefits if you have a Google AdSense you really can earn from Blog Engage. Brian (the founder of Blog Engage) have this system that can share AdSense Revenue, which means everyone that visits your “story page” (where you have submitted your article) you will get the money if someone clicks.

I think it’s a brilliant idea. Now I know it works but not how great it works. I haven’t tried it myself, but I have spoken to a couple of people who have tried it and it worked for them.

The only thing you need to use the AdSense Revenue Sharing, is your AdSense pub-number, which you can easily find

So it gives you traffic and gives you money and it’s free, can it be better?

I recommend Blog Engage and I hope you will vote for my article here about Blog Engage and then create a Blog Engage account.

A Brief Guide To Twitter Lists

Today Twitter launched something new called Twitter lists.

It’s like creating a whole new Twitter profile, just in the same profile. You’re categorizing your followers, which makes Twitter much more productive. Imagine, you have 5 niches, to take care of. But you just want to follow all these, that can easily be a confusing thing. You can now create lists, to take care of each niche.

Right now I have one list called “TweetsWithValue” (follow that list, if you care), I just wanted to try it out, you know. I added I think 54 people on it. If I have forgotten you, just add a comment and I’ll probably add you.

You can choose to make the list private or public. If it’s public people can find your list through searches and so, if it’s private you can’t.

People can follow a list as well as they can follow a regular tweeter. Just with lots of tweeters and tweets, you can also easily remove these tweeters and the tweets, with one button.

Other tweeters can then subscribe to your lists. This means lists have the potential to be an important new discovery mechanism for great tweets and accounts.

You can try it out, on Twitter.com, you will probably see the Twitter applications gets updated. Just click on listed, you can also see how many lists the person you want to follow is listed on.

Short, is good..

The Power of Social Proof in 4 Simple Steps

Social Proof, also knows as informational social influence is techniques you can use to increase your influence on human behavoir. So you can make people buy, click, follow you, etc., they would not have done if you haven’t showed them some stuff.

When you have the influence to make people buy, you should use it. I have some techniques ready for you to get more influence using informational social influence (social proof).

1. Get testimonials from customers

This is a great method, I know a guy who is selling a Twitter course called Twitter Influence. He had a great sales page and everything was fine, but he had no testimonials, no text testimonials, no audio testimonials and finally no video testimonials. He have had some sales, but it really helped when he added some video testimonials. The videos were from people who liked his product, and talked about its niceness

After he added those videos he tripled his sales and this is a technique, that is really useful. I doesn’t have to videos all the way through, maybe audio and just text, but be sure to make them add a picture.

2. Recommendations from Experts

This is a big difference from the testimonial. It might just be a sentence from an expert/guru in your niche. If you are in the make money with blogging niche the sentence could be something like this:

Full-time blogger: John Chow
”Mikkel Juhl’s book truly is a great book, it is the best guid I have found on creating a top blog from scratch.”

That is a great example of a sentence from an expert in a niche, who is recommending a book.
(Keep in mind, that this phrase was one I created and have nothing to do with John Chow)

So this gives you influence. That shows that you really have great content to give away, even the experts are recommending it. This gives social proof!

3. Pictures taken with Gurus/Famous people

If you are a blogger and do have a picture of Darren Rowse and you, really will give you influence. If I had a picture of me and Darren Rowse I will put it on my blog immediately, I might want to write a blog post about how I met him.

I would definitely make a headline on my about page ”The experts I have met in real life” and post all the pictures of me and famous bloggers.

4. Comments, Feed  counts, Page views, Twitter Followers, Moneys Earned

This is probably the method that can give you the most influence, if you have some of these things:

• A high feed count (above 500 at least)
• Many comments, people will see you as (above 50 at least)
• Show the number of how many times your product have been downloaded (at least 500)
• A big follower count on Twitter (at least 5,000 followers)

Every one of these numbers should be big, maybe bigger than those I have added to it right now, the bigger numbers, the more influence you have. So that is how it works, the bigger, the more influence you will receive.

How to Get a Consistent Rush of New Followers Day in And Day Out

We are in a time, which I like to call “Twitter-Period” which means every time someone mentions Social Media, you are thinking of Twitter. This is not a bad thing. Everyone is on Twitter, even some bicyclers have a passion for Twitter. Lance Armstrong, Andy Schleck including many other riders are on Twitter.

Now Twitter isn’t only for riders, many are using it. Including me and some of my closest Internet marketing friends. Actually I met one of the coolest Internet marketer on Twitter. His name is David King not to promote him, but he is one of the best Twitter-er I know personally, he is helping everyone.

He knows some of the keys to get lots of followers daily. He is getting around new 130 followers each day, by doing some of these tactics on Twitter.

Following Targeted People

This should make sense, to follow people and they will follow back.

But most people will only follow you back if:

• You have a profile picture of you (should be a smiling picture)
• You have a custom background (looks more professional)
• You are writing quality Tweets (you would be worth to follow)

Click to Get Quality Twitter Videos

So if you can pass on these things people are more likely to follow you. Well number one and three are the most important rules. If you have a profile picture, people will remember you for the picture. People remember picture better than text (it’s actually proven). So when they see that profile picture they will check the background (if there is one) and after that the Tweets.

After the Tweets they see the follow button, if they want to follow you. Now everybody haven’t set the Twitter notifications on, when getting a new follower, so they might not see that you are following them. How to do that?

It’s simple, just write them a reply. Write something like “@DaneBlogger Hello, how are you today? Hope you enjoy writing on your blog.” Be sure to praise the Twitter-er for his/hers work with the blog or something else that the Twitter-er is doing/working on.

Interacting With the Targeted People

When you are following them, they may not follow you back just like that. Even though if you have written a reply to them, then you have to try in another way to make them following you. It could be by replying to their tweets. Reply does not mean a tweet like this “@DaneBlogger That’s right.” You have to debate and give your opinion.

Interacting is one of the best way to gain new followers and to maintain relationship with your followers. If you interact with your followers they will feel that someone is listening to them, it is especially great when tweeps (twitter people) that doesn’t have that many followers get a reply. They really appreciate replies, because they don’t get them that often.

The reason why we are interacting is NOT only because we want to get followers. We want to build a relationship with the Twitter-er because if we have a strong relationship with our followers they will link to us, retweet our tweets, just being very helpful in general. So after you got the follow you still need to interact with them, because that will give you more influence.

Retweet Other Tweeps Tweets

Everyone appreciate to get retweeted, it is one of the easiest ways to get a reply to your Twitter account because they might say: “@DaneBlogger thank you for the retweet, I really appreciate it!” then you have a reply and tweeps that follow his Twitter account will see your Twitter account as a link and they may follow you then.

Conclusion

You actually just need to be active interact, follow and retweet, do it daily and you will get lots of new followers every day, it may take you around 1 hour (or more) “work” per day, but it is worth it, if you create a relationship with your followers, get trusted, they will retweet some of your tweets!

If you want to learn more about Twitter and how to get lots of targeted followers I can recommend these free Twitter videos, they are created by David King, remember the guy I told you about before ! Just keep in mind, these videos are completely free!

You can watch the free Twitter Influence videos using the link here. Hope you enjoy the videos, I know I did!