27,000 visitors from StumbleUpon in one week is my personal high score for generating social media traffic. 40k is my overall best in one day.

But if you ever look at my SU profile, by all outward appearances, I’m a pretty average user.

I don’t have 1000 subscribers, like Andy Beard, who can rock my server with one stumble.

And my both my Stumbling record and number of reviews certainly pale in comparison to someone like Zaibatsu.

And yet. Whether you’re talking social media or online news site, online reputation management or offline social networks, I seem to have a knack for knowing where all the pressure points are, and where to apply – or relax – force, to get the coverage that I want, and to pass that on to my customers and clients.

You can’t buy social media traffic, with the exception of Stumble Ads and Facebook Ads, which really aren’t the same as what I’d call social media traffic – even under those circumstances, it’s just not the same.

It’s the same way you can’t buy good vibes. Either you can get them, or you can’t. You can’t pay someone to genuinely feel good about your products, services, and customer support. Though I’m sure in this economy, lots of people would fake it really well if you offered them the right price.

As I get closer to retiring, I’ve wondered- and studied, what it is that I’m doing differently , more and more frequently. What  am I dong in half an hour on StumbleUpon that has the same effect as what some others do in 40 hours?

As it began to dawn on me, I started to take notes. This excerpt is from a PDF guide I wrote about what I have logically concluded, and repeatedly tested, to be the Secret to my Success in drawing social media traffic and generating massive traffic in general. [download it | pdf].

For the next 24 hours, I’m not going to ask for your email address or anything else in order for you to read it. After the opening day sale is over, there’s no more free peeks – you’ll have to give somethin to get somethin. wink wink.

Have a Happy Weekend. If you’re in the DC metro area, remember to stop by Faith Gifts and Stationery in Laurel Mall across from the Macy’s to visit me between 11 am and 2 pm. You can corner me and ask me questions about your web site.

photo credit: bitmask

I’m looking at what feeds to keep or delete in Google Reader and I discovered something.

I can pretty much tell what a site is about if I look at it in list view, which just lists the headlines in a feed. That’s helping me categorize un-categorized feeds. Which blog I’m writing in determines what I’ll prioritize reading that day, so being able to tell at a glance what a blog’s “voice” or “message” is strikes me as important.

You know how I think — would my blog pass that test?

And sadly, (though not surprisingly, given that I’ve been quiet in anticipation of my “retirement” next month), even if I take out our special Friday editions, I can only give a qualified yes to answer that question.

IF the person subscribing already knows a bit about traffic, they can tell my posts are on that topic from the headlines. If not, you can’t really tell.

Granted, I like to get creative with my titles. But headlines are everything. Am I losing the core audience this site was built for by leaning too much towards witticisms?

Could you gain more visitors by tweaking your titles?

Try this exercise on your own site and tell me what you found out.

People’s need to protect their own egos knows no bounds. They will lie, cheat, steal, kill, do whatever it takes to maintain what we call ego boundaries.

Dr. Andrew Samuels
Professor of Analytical Psychooogy, University of Essex

photo credit: h.koppdelaney

Recently I wrote that there is only one true power of social media.

Before that I said that the simple secret to social media is understanding that it’s about relationships, and that fixing, founding or forgetting a relationship with solve the majority of problems you have with social media.

Actually that applies to just about any type of traffic generation you’re going to do, whether it’s foot traffic to a local restaruant, or online traffic to a website.

Now what does any of this have to do with egos?

We’ll come back to that in a minute. First, riddle me this.

Who is the most powerful person in a game where gaining approval is the ultimate goal?

photo credit: Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

Is it the person seeking approval?

Certainly not.

If you’re this person, you’re asking other people to give you their power (of approval), which puts you in the position of need. So you’re actually the weakest person in the game.

Is it the person giving approval?

Not if they can only give their own approval. This person is just one vote of approval in a sea of many.

Think about it – if I wasn’t an all-around traffic expert, published in reputable expert publications, or didn’t have traffic advice that consistently works, you wouldn’t care if I blogged about some new resource.

You’d be thinking so what, what does she know, why am I even here? As you’re probably thinking with anyone who touts themselves as an expert without establishing that it’s actually true first.

We’re skeptical, and we should be. Not everyone is honest in business, sadly. Not that I’m some paragon of virtue, I just like to save time, and honesty? HUGE time saver.

Which leads us to the two exceptions to this rule.

If that one person’s vote has more weight than others, they are more powerful than another person whose vote only has regular weight.

And if their vote influences others, they are more powerful by the factor at which their approval moves other people to action. We see the former in the case of super delegates. An example of the latter would be a celebrity endorsement of a product that increases sales.

So. What person is most powerful in a game based on approval?

It’s a person who can influence people to give their approval but does not need this approval themselves.

Here’s where all of the traffic and social media talk has to do with egos.

The social media world is based on the shifting of group approval. If you can predict or control the sway of a group’s approval, yes, you do have some power. But if you’re constantly spending the votes of the people you influence on your self, three things happen.

First, the group you’re interacting with catches on that you’re only interested in their approval so that you can get more approval. The more sophisticated your product or services are, the more sophisticated your audience is, and the faster they’ll catch on to this.

At that point, they stop listening. And you lose.

Second, you aren’t banking or growing your voting back account. It’s always depleted, and it’s always going to the same place.

Your investment isn’t growing. What could have been an asset is now a liability. You lose again.

Third, the influencers in your approval sphere eventually abandon you. Why should they wield their influence to assist you if you’re not wielding yours in reciprocation?

Losing the influence over the influence? All bad. Third time loser.

And why would we spend all that approval on ourselves? Many reasons – almost all of them lead back to the ego. By definition in our purposes: your consciousness of what your own identity is.

The ability to gain approval from others defines us as humans because we identify our egos as ourselves. If you think this isn’t you, consider the last time you tripped in public or said or did something embarrassing.

Think of the last time someone admitted they look up to you publicly. Remember what you did to get the last person you wanted to date to notice you. Consider what you’d do to get a new customer or client.

A huge percentage of our interactions with others has to do with gaining the approval of others. This carries over into our social media activity. We’re so much ego whether we like it or not.

(Which isn’t Actually your identity, but if you want to get into that discussion, go rent Revolver. Excellent thinking man’s action picture. If you don’t get it the first time, watch it again with the director’s commentary on.)

That doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing to build up an influencer profile and then spend some of that influence on yourself, to spend it on clients now and again, or even to build one just for the sake of self importance. Not to do so would be like going into business with no intention of making a profit.

Sharing just because you care is great, but if you can personally gain from it sometimes, why not?

It’s just — that can’t be your sole point of doing it. It simply doesn’t work.

Now what happens if you are able to master your craving for power, and utilize social media without the constant need for approval.

Three things.

photo credit: Katayun

1- The group is naturally drawn to you. Ponder – do you do more business with the high-pressure salesperson more, or the person who helps you make an educated buying decision?

2- The approval you get becomes collectable. People start to follow you to see what you will suggest next that benefits or entertains them. You can get repeated votes from the same people. You wield influence. You can invest it, spend it or save it for later.

Kind of like currency.

3- You influence the influencers AS an influencer. Your clout increases expontially with each influencer who follows you. And instead of having mediocre results the one time you desire (rather than need) attention for a resource that is based in self-interest, the easier it is to get them to help you.

Now you know WHY you ought to master your social media ego.

Which leaves us with the question – how do you balance your specific selfish interests with your more social ones?

Simply take your ego out of the equation. You can do this by investigating what your own ego boundaries are, and adjusting them as necessary. You can give yourself some artificial ratio for promoting yourself (only once every 25 or 50 shares is a good target.)

Or you can just ask, with each time you use social media, who is going to have more short-term benefit from this? Me or the person reading this?

As often as possible, the answer should be, both.

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Well. If you’re a blogger anyway…. it means yet another way you can increase your blog traffic is by covering the news.

No, it’s not a new concept – I’ve been harping on that for at least two years, as all you regulars know. What’s new is that Technorati is helping blogs get featured on AP News sites.

After having the pleasure of witnessing a friend of mine hit the Associated Press newswire last year, it’s great to see that Technorati is going to be partnering with Associated Press member sites. That means that the next time a friend of mine is covered by AP, I can blog about it and possibly appear in one of the links to the stories.

From Technorati’s Weblog Post:

The new service will bring blogger commentary about AP news stories to communities large and small throughout the USA, giving bloggers a voice in trusted local papers throughout the nation. For many news readers, this will be their first exposure to the blogosphere with national, international, business and sports news presented along side links to blogger commentary and perspective.

So what does that mean to you? If you have any reason to cover stories that pop up on the AP wire, then sugar… dumpling … blog about them. Link naturally, and not just because of the traffic – it’s an extra boost, not the whole point.

What I’m really hoping is that this bold venture will help build bridges between bloggers and reporters. In some trades and local dailies, you can almost feel the animosity towards bloggers coming off the page. I just had a conversation about this with the folks over at Real Estate Blog Sites, who set up MyST Blog sites specifcally for the high end real estate industry. It seems that in some online newspapers, you still see a blog backlash – some play down their effectiveness in generating leads, others warn big companies to fear the blogosphere instead of reach out to it.

Anyway. Before I dive headlong into that tangent, just though you should know.