I have heard about social media optimization (SMO) but I guess I just don’t fully understand the concept. What are the advantages of it for someone like me who makes niche affiliate marketing websites?
Although it sounds confusing, social media optimization is basically generating traffic to your sites through social media websites such as Facebook, Twitter, and submission sites like Digg. This could mean that you sign up for a Twitter account and you add a Twitter feed on your blog or auto-post your new blog posts on your Twitter page.
It could also mean adding a Digg button on your website to allow your readers to submit the article to the social media community. The way that this works is that if it gets enough digs on the site, it will be featured on the home page or category page and more people will be aware of the article and will come visit your site.
Other social media optimization features could be YouTube, Ning.com, any forums, and blogging communities. The advantages of using these are that you draw more traffic to your website. More traffic to your website may lead to more affiliate sales for you.
Since you are setting up multiple niche websites, you most likely are not using your real name on the sites or not letting people know that you own all these affiliate websites (this is how most people do it). So some of these social media sites may not work for you if you want to maintain your anonymous site. Check out www.mattbacak.com as he has some great advice on social media and affiliate marketing.