Wikipedia defines social bookmarking as:  “…a method for Internet users to store, organize, search, and manage bookmarks of web pages on the Internet with the help of metadata”.
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Most internet-savvy users are familiar with bookmarks that can be saved on your Internet browser.  For Internet Explorer users, this is your “Favorites”; for Firefox, it’s “Bookmarks”.  Social bookmarking sites work similar to this function within your browser – except that your bookmarks live on an external web site’s internet server (outside of your personal computer) so you can access your bookmarks from any computer, at any time, anywhere.  All that is needed to recall your bookmarks is an internet connection and the login information for your free social bookmarking site that you’ve joined.  Social bookmarking sites also allow users to “tag” their saved items with words for easier recall later on.
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So, now that you know what Social Bookmarking is, you need to know why Social Bookmarking is important.  There are several reasons:
1.  Sharing
2.  Link popularity
3.  Page Rank
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Sharing
Social bookmarking sites, such as Digg or Delicious, allow users to bookmark their favorite articles, web sites, images, videos, blog posts, etc.  But what’s more important is that users can view another user’s bookmarks with a simple click.  Once you’ve saved an item, you can see which other users have also bookmarked that item.  You may find they have discovered other sites or blogs that you have never seen, which you then bookmark, and the cycle continues.  Additionally, many social bookmarking sites provide a feed service, which can automatically notify users when another user saves a new bookmark.  It’s easy to see how just a few bookmarks of your blog or web site article can grow exponentially and increase your marketing power and reach.
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Link Popularity
Link popularity has become increasingly important for ranking organically within search engine results.  Social bookmarking sites allow users to save your link on the external site, giving your web page, article or blog an added (and free!) incoming link.  In addition to providing users with one more way to find your site, you’ll see a gradual increase in your organic rank as the number of people who’ve bookmarked your site increases (with other SEO efforts, too, of course).
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Page Rank
Beyond the normal link popularity advantage of social bookmarking, the number of bookmarks of a certain page, article, or post on your site will also help increase your page rank.  Page rank is used by search engines, especially Google, to judge the quality of the content on a page.  The higher the page rank of an individual page, the higher it will appear in the natural (organic) search results.  When users bookmark your page, you get one vote closer to winning the popularity contest.  Search engines see that users have saved your content on well-known social bookmarking sites (Digg, Delicious, Technorati, StumbleUpon) and determine it must be worth sharing, hence the increased page rank and increased placement in organic results.
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How To Get Started
Social bookmarking sites will often give instructions and pre-built code to place on your page, including an icon so users can recognize their favorite bookmarking site.  Some of these codes will automatically pass the URL through to the bookmarking site, while other pre-built codes will require that you specify some elements in the code before placing it on your page.  For more information on placing these icons on your page, visit a social bookmarking site such as Digg, Delicious, Technorati or StumbleUpon and visit their “Help” pages.�
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Other Resources
Once you’ve mastered adding bookmarking sites to your pages, you can venture into MySpace and Facebook icons (if appropriate for your audience).  Codes to place these icons on your site are noticeably more complex, but the reward is great.  When users click the icon, they can post your web page/site/blog info directly onto their MySpace page or Facebook profile.  For more information on using these social networks to promote your site, visit www.MySpace.com or www.Facebook.com.
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For more information about Social Bookmarking and How it can help you Contact the Internet Marketing company Bayshore Solutions

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