Sharing is the key activity when it comes to proper social media participation and beyond. When you don’t share anything on the web today, you can’t compete with those who do. They get all the attention, links and ultimately sales or whatever they are after.
- So where are we sharing online?
- How do you actually share?
- What tools help you with sharing?
I compiled a list of 36 Social Media sharing resources that cover a variety of content types, such as how to articles, statistics, tools for business people.
How to share
Most people, it seems, have lost the ability to share. Instead, business social media users in particular tend promote themselves. They have to learn that on social media you don’t promote yourself directly but you share instead. You share content provided by others.
- The co-op business model: share whatever you’ve got | Derek Sivers
- Content curation in 13 minutes a day – Conversation Marketing
- Why I Share What I Share
- 12 Most Useful Sites for Off-Beat Shareable Content
- 4 Ways To Make Your Content More Shareable
- Social Friendly Conversions Using Facebook’s Open Graph As An Example | Hugo Guzman
Statistics
Some statistics show that most sharing online still gets done via e-mail, as in the early days of the web before social media. Facebook comes first or second, depending on the source. Google+ or automated sites such as StumbleUpon, which claim to bring more social media traffic, are far less important than you might think judging from the press they get. Some social media statistics show much more detailed insights into how sharing is going on.
- ShareThis Study: Facebook Accounts For 38 Percent Of Sharing Traffic On The Web | TechCrunch
- Does Google Use Facebook Shares to Influence Search Rankings? | SEOmoz
- Social Commerce: A closer look at the numbers | Eventbrite Blog
- Research Examines Who’s Talking, Who’s Listening on Twitter
Infographics
Most statistics and other social media related data tends to be a bit overwhelming. Some social media infographic do a great job at visualising what’s going on and putting things into perspective.
- Social Media Sharing Trends in 2011- Infographic | Jeffbullas’s Blog
- AddThis 5 Year [Infographic] | Flickr – Fotosharing!
- The Science of Social Timing Part 1: Facebook and Twitter Social Networks
- Word of mouth marketing [infographic] – Smart Insights Digital Marketing Advice
- Science of Sharing: 7 Types of Sharers | Beyond
Tools
Beyond the usual suspects everybody uses, i.e. Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, there are lots of tools out there that can simplify, streamline and analyse your social media activity. I won’t add the numerous social media analytics tools, but only those focusing on sharing.
- F1 by Mozilla Labs
- Twitter / Twitter buttons
- It’s now super easy to add a “Share on Tumblr”… | Tumblr Staff
- Infographics & Data Visualizations – Visual.ly
- Nimble social CRM Platform | Social Relationships Made Easy
- HootSuite – Social Media Dashboard for Teams using Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin
- Buffer – Be Awesome on Social Media
- Visibli: Optimize Your Social Media Engagement
- join.me – Free Screen Sharing and Online Meetings
Facebook is still the number one when it comes to social media or rather social networking. It has added numerous features and manifold changes recently. Using Facebook to share is already a science of its own. Especially dealing with the Facebook algorithm that decides who sees your shares is intriguing and complex to say the least.
- Most Shared Articles on Facebook in 2011
- Lessons of the Like Log: The big story and the nuances of shareability » Nieman Journalism Lab
- Facebook Timeline reveals the future of sharing – Founder of Altimeter Group, Author of Open Leadership, Coauthor of Groundswell
- Facebook Share vs. Facebook Like Button
- Building the Send Button
Google+
Google+ has received lots of attention, especially compared with its real size. Google is too omnipresent to let Plus fail. Thus I’d like to show you how Google adds features strategically to get the social ranking signals it needs, because clearly Google+ is not just a Facebook competitor but part of a bigger plan to get people to stay and share in Google’s own eco system.
- Is Google+ the Ultimate Content Marketing Platform? | Copyblogger
- Official Google Blog: Doing more with the +1 button, more than 4 billion times a day
- Google+ Public Posts Coming To Google’s Social Search Results
- Official Google Reader Blog: New in Reader: a fresh design, and Google+ sharing
- Share your Google+ Circles with Friends – The Next Web
- Google Photos Blog: Picasa 3.9: Now with Google+ sharing and tagging
- Google Plus One Button Shows Who Plus One-d a Page – Google, News – State of Search
All these resources will help you to plan and practice sharing on the social Web, the most basic part of your social media presence. Without sharing you don’t have such a real presence - you may practice customer service on social sites but as long as you don’t share anything beyond your own content you’re just doing promotion without truly participating.
* CC image by ryancr
















Thanks for the mention, Tad!
You’ve built a solid resource here. I’ll make sure to pass it along.
Some nice tips in here, though the whole +1 thing, is really a shot in the dark, you can`t really know if 10000 +1`s effect than a site that has 1 +1.
Thanks Hugo! Appreciate the feedback and the social media love.