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logo1.gifI am becoming a big fan of the organic approach to StumbleUpon (SU) and the ways you can connect with members finding like minded users in demographic and interest areas.

The StumbleUpon social tool was built for discovering webpages that are recommended by your network of friends. The site allows for networking and the toolbar allows for finding and discovering new great content on the web. This is a powerful combination of Internet function and social web.

After using SU for a long while it seems that the tool will be able to grow in its use as a localized marketing tool. And though outwardly commercial sites tend not to get a great amount of traffic (rather fail miserably) – it’s all in the approach.

SU has been tested for the value of its traffic in a number of scenarios and discussed in relevant ways over the course of 2007. At 10e20, Tamar did a very thorough review of the benefits of StumbleUpon and how it can be used for business as a whole. Dosh Dosh did a really comprehensive guide to the ways and means of SU and how one can monetize and Loren Baker spoke of fun and useful techniques to employ in SU to bounce traffic to your site.

The Paid advertising program of SU allows you to purchase Stumble visits for 5 cents per. Others have looked at the paid program and assessed it, but buying traffic from Stumble just doesn’t interest me. SU is about finding users with like-minded interests. They are there for a conversation and a dialogue to find new and interesting content, stories and information. That’s why I think the local aspects and drill downs of geography in SU can be tremendously powerful for social networking and marketing a local business. Users want to know about new things. They are there for discovery. If you show a user something local, they will get excited about it and probably talk it up. Just like with all Social Media – you get the most out of it when you put a lot into it.

So how does one leverage SU for getting local? SU allows you to go to pretty much any state and find people who are there. The way I like to think of it is like Craig’s List or any other site where you might find others who have similar interests and needs in similar locations. Except, unlike Craig’s, SU is good because it has so many great social features like viewing avatars, photos, videos and so much more that people have tagged and thumbed up.

Say for example, I’m opening a new retail store location in Brooklyn, New York – perhaps a new restaurant or a new boutique. SU can be a great tool to get word out about a new store to a local community. Just drill down and get to know the people who are there:

State –New York (38,284 people from here)

http://www.stumbleupon.com/state/new_york/
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City –Brooklyn (2,060 people from here)

http://www.stumbleupon.com/city/brooklyn/
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Furthermore, you can drill down by gender in these city areas. That’s pretty cool targeting.
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It takes work, but it could very well be worth the time spent, as you can make actual connections. After you’ve made good local connections, messaging and blogging within this audience can be tremendously powerful. Note: if you have trouble finding a state (sometimes SU’s search features are cumbersome) you can just use the (.com/state/new_york/) at the end of the URL to get where you need to go; similar action can work with city (.com/city/brooklyn/.)

As in the boutique retail example above, if for example you’re opening a women’s accessory boutique in Brooklyn, New York you may want to sort by City (Brooklyn) and Gender (Women) and begin friending these users and getting the word out about your opening, location, website and your products, by tagging and submitting your site, product images and other sites related to Brooklyn and the other users likes and interests. And, begin thumbing up pages that this group of users have submitted and showed to you. Do make sure your profile page indicates what you’re all about (your site, interests etc.). After you’ve made good local connections, using the messaging and blogging tools within SU can be tremendously powerful to engage this audience and get word out.

So not only is SU helpful for bouncing your site traffic, but you can also connect with very targeted users on a local geographic level, gender and topical interest areas to bounce your foot traffic. You may find that this social media tool can help you grow your foot traffic in a local business and get the word of mouth buzz that you need to launch something new. Who says Guerrilla Marketing can’t be accomplished online? If I were opening up a location in Brooklyn, the 2,060 users from Brooklyn, NY are some of the first people I’d want to get in touch with!

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