Build Your Social Empire

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photo credit: Maximus_W

When I was in college, I majored in history and political science. I had started as a bio major, but I realized that I loved history more.

While in many of my history classes, I learned about these crazy people trying to make empires for themselves. And it was interesting. Each group tried to forge their empire in their own way and all of them failed.

It got me to thinking about the aspects of an empire. The first is your conquering army. Then you’ve got your delegation that goes in and arranges the treaties. And then you’ve got your forts that listen to complaints and attempt to keep the people happy.

In the above picture, you see Darth Vader checking out some Stormtroopers. He used his massive army of troopers to ensure that no one revolted, but the more he and the Emperor tried to stop revolution, the more the Rebellion grew. And, because of that Rebelion, a twirp of a Jedi (I am a big Star Wars fan, fyi) shot a rocket and destroyed the the Death Star.

And then it got me thinking…By owning a blog and spreading out with that blog, I have an empire. How? Keep reading.

Your Social Media is Your Empire

When you conquer a territory, you tend to leave a base there as I said above. So, let’s say that we are going to “conquer” Twitter. That means that I am going to go in and start a Twitter account. If I just make a Twitter account, it’s not likely that I’ll benefit from it.

However, if I leave behind a delegation of people there–otherwise known as me participating in Twitter–then I’ll start to see positive results.

Unfortunately, we can’t do things the way the Empire does in Star Wars. If we even attempt to be rude, violent or any of that on our social media pages, we’re bound to lose. Therefore, you need to treat the newly conquered provinces of your empire with respect to maximize the return you’ll get.

To do that, you’ll need to follow a few important rules.

Secure the Home Front

It would be absolutely foolish for me to try and expand onto Twitter, Facebook and all of these other social media pages if Blog Revolter wasn’t first taken care of. If I don’t have a complete website done, why would I even bother wasting time on other sites?

You never know when another site might change its rules, close down or something else that is undesirable. If your home front is a social media page, if they change their rules, you lose.

But, if you have your home front–your blog–completely secured, you’re going to be able to spread out and know that you’ve at least got your website to offer you support. Rome never really revolted against the the Roman Empire because that was the home front.

Secure the home front and then move into other territories.

Scout the Territory Before Invading

There are a ton of social networking sites on the Internet. According to WikiPedia, there are…Well, I decided to stop counting. In other words, there are a lot. It would be absolutely preposterous to try and manage profiles on all of those social networking sites.

That’s why you want to scout the territory before you invade. Perhaps you make an account and see what’s going on. Is there a feature that you think would be beneficial to your site? Are you seeing people talk about a topic similar to your site’s topic?

You want to get all of this information before moving in because invading takes time and resources. Rome never went into the Arabian peninsula because there was no gain in resources for them–yeah, oil didn’t matter then. In other words, don’t go somewhere if it won’t benefit you.

Collect the information on which social networking sites are good and then move in to stake your claim.

Be a Total Part of the Site

If you’re going to conquer a new territory and expand your empire, you need to be a part of that territory. Don’t just go in, take over, make a page on the site and then leave it. You need to participate. You need to have a complete profile. You need to be open to communication with the people of this territory.

By having that communication and having a complete profile, you come off as a friendly individual. Even though your ultimate goal might be to make money off these people, you’re still friendly in their eyes because you are trying to become part of their community.

Put an image in your profile. List your interests. Put a link back to your site. Make the profile look complete so that you look like a genuine member of the community. Just because you are expanding your empire doesn’t mean you have to be cruel like Darth Vader.

Learn the Culture

Just because you might be the boss of your blog doesn’t mean you’re the leader of everywhere. On other sites, there are other people who are the big guys of the community. Don’t try and stake your claim over them because loyalty takes time to develop. If you create problems, they’ll run you out of town.

Because of this, you need to learn the culture and the language. What behavior is appropriate on this site? What things can be talked about and what things are dangerous? For example, it’s dangerous to be a Republican on Digg. Chances are, you’ll be blasted out of town. Learn that culture of the site and you’ll be safe.

In the same breath, learn how to communicate. On one site, certain speak is acceptable. On another site, you’ll lose all respect for using that same speak. Therefore, spend some time learning how others speak on the site to ensure you fit right in with the community.

Make Alliances

You might be on Twitter and you might be doing a pretty good job building your followers. However, if you had someone else whose interests could coincide with yours, you’d have an even stronger force to expand into social media. Because of this, you want to make alliances with other people on the social networking sites.

For example, if you can get a collection of people within a similar niche as you who agree to retweet each other’s stuff, you’ve naturally increased the likelihood that anything you post might go viral.

These alliances need to be beneficial to both parties. If that means that you do a lot for them and little for yourself to begin with, that’s fine. Once you’ve fostered the relationship and that person knows you’re reliable, they are going to return the favor. That’s the way of social networks.

How Does Your Empire Look?

It’s important to take a step back and look at your empire. Has it grown to a good size that you are able to utilize the newly acquired territories to send traffic to your site? More importantly, are you fostering good relationships with the readers of these sites so that you are getting quality people to your site? Or, have you gone in, wrecked havoc, spammed the heck out of people and are now about to lose everything? Chime in below and let me know what you think.