chrisg.com

In marketing circles you often hear about “Sneezers” and “the Linkerati”, but what are they? Who are they? And most of all, why should we care?

Sneezers and the Linkerati are people who will spread your message or help promote your work by linking to you.

While the Linkerati are obviously going to link to your content, “Sneezers” are people who “spread ideaviruses”, which is a fancy way of saying they tell other people about your stuff via word of mouth, email, social voting or messaging rather than link to it.

Watch this short video by Rand from SEOMoz and all will become clear

So for you the Linkerati could be:

• Fellow Bloggers
• Writers
• The media
• Forums
• Webmasters
• Directories
• Social Media users
• Emailers

Why does all this matter?

Job 1 is to identify your sneezers and linkerati and delight them!

More than anyone else they will aid your promotion efforts by getting the word out, and a third party endorsement tends to be much more believable than blowing your own trumpet.

How do you identify them?

• Look where your links are currently coming from and who is talking about you.
• If you have a happy client or have recently done someone a favor, don’t be afraid of asking them to vote or link you up. What goes around comes around, so make sure you are giving the love before asking for it.
• Do you have fans in your comments and Twitter followers? Make sure you are keeping them nurtured and happy.
• Build new connections all the time. Network Network Network!

Bottom line: If you look after your sneezers, they will look after you

photo credit: Dr. Hemmert