The Macro Dynamic of Social Classification

Web Hosting Provider Explains - Get Your Website Tagged

In the dog-eat-dog marketplace known as the world wide web, site owners are doing anything and everything they can to get a little notice, and maybe you’ve been looking for the next big thing to shine the spotlight on your site.

Well, the next big thing is here and well established, especially among the most knowledgeable computer users – a highly-desirable demographic. They’re the users who buy stuff online.

What Is a Macro Dynamic?

Macro dynamics are trends that change the way large numbers of people act and react. The web itself is the perfect example of a macro trend with more and more users and more sites showing up daily. Just 20 years ago, the “Internet” wasn’t much more than a bunch of bulletin boards where owners of an Apple 2e could post their thoughts.

Today, the web (which, btw, is just one part of the Internet as a whole) is indispensable. It has created thousands (millions) of jobs, it’s changed the way we send mail, order food, research and shop. Without the W3, you wouldn’t be reading this.

In the three-dimensional world, a macro dynamic can take years and even decades to evolve into an identifiable “movement.” Not so on the web where trends develop almost overnight. Recent macro trends include blogs, increased site interactivity, fresh content, social sites like MySpace and FaceBook, site animation (thanks to the deep penetration of DSL and cable web hook-ups) and user generated content found on sites like Flickr.com and You Tube, Google’s recent $1.8 billion dollar acquisition. Those Google guys know which way the web winds blow and, clearly, Google management recognizes the macro dynamic of user-generated content.

Tagging: The Next Web Macro

Up until recently, web sites were assessed for quality and classified mechanically by digital spiders that crawled each site, identified certain pre-programmed characteristics and, using search engine algorithms, sites were indexed or classified within the search engine database. All very clinically digital.

And, if the algorithm criteria (top secret information) were met, a site would rank higher than one with overstuffed HTML tags – even if the content on the offending site was much better than the content on the conforming site. Search engines didn’t provide any indication of site quality based on human sensibilities, except for the sensibilities of the few mathematicians and programmers who created the algorithm. So, the search engine designers simply created certain dos and don’ts, built them into a complex mathematical formula and, if the site designer adhered to search engine regs, the site would perform well in SERPs.

No more. The next big thing is here and it’s here big. Tagging. Let the people decide what’s worth viewing and what isn’t. Sites like Digg.com, Reddit.com and del.icio.us are sites that enable members (yes, you have to sign up) to “tag” certain sites based on how useful or entertaining or easy-to-use they are. The point is, these sites are de facto social search engines with rankings determined by the people for the people. Democracy in action on the W3.

And these social search engines are growing like mushrooms. If you scroll to the end of this blog entry you’ll see 42 tagging icons, each one leading to a people-powered search engine. And more are sprouting everyday. (There are no new ideas.)

What Can Users Do?

Screw up your existing business model.

Two ways. First, these social search engines enable users to assign keywords to a site. Visit You Tube and in the upper-right-hand corner of each clip you’ll see some of the words viewers have employed to classify a particular video. For instance, conduct a You Tube search for the rock group, Pink Floyd, and you’ll see “viewer-generated keywords” such as “rock,” “David Gilmore,” (lead guitarist), “concept rock,” “awesome” and “junk” (obviously from someone who doesn’t think Gilmore is a guitar god).

The problem, here, is that viewers bring their own preferences and biases to the process of classifying a site. Some actually tag with excellent keywords – keywords you might not have even considered. Others mis-categorize sites because of bias, level of education, geographic location and other unknowable factors. And because the factors used by viewers to classify site content are unknowable, there’s not a whole lot a site owner can do to address being improperly indexed on a social search engine by visitors who use incorrect or inappropriate tags - keywords.

The second way that visitors can unravel your online business is through ignorance, stupidity and general cluelessness. There’s a belief, at least in democratic countries, that all people have the right to an opinion, and we see that belief put into practice through site tagging by visitors. Indeed, we all have a right to an opinion.

However, many taggers confuse their “right” to an opinion with the quality of that opinion. All you have to do is check out some of the comments left by taggers to discover that the anonymity of the web enables people to spew forth vitriolic reviews complete with misspellings and grammar that would make an English teacher cry. In other words, many taggers are complete idiots. Bigots. Hate mongers. Trouble makers. Site stalkers. The web is crawling with these taggers who now have the power to make your site the topic of the day or send it spiraling to the bottom of the social search engine SERPs.

What Can Site Owners Do?

Meet and exceed the expectations of visitors – expectations that expand as quickly as a viral RSS feed.

Keep it simple (very). Keep it engaging, humorous, provocative, thought-provoking or just plain interesting. There’s no need to appeal to the lowest common denominator. These individuals are lost causes before they ever reach your site. But the knowledgeable tagger understands that with each recommendation comes responsibility – responsibility to the Digg or Reddit user and to the site owner. And fortunately, many web users take this responsibility seriously.

It’s easy to distinguish between tags from thoughtful taggers and the 12-year-olds who are just “fooling around.”

To attract a better visitor demographic, quality counts more than ever. Quality of content and freshness of content. If both are good, your site will be tagged. Services, freebies, fun and games, goo for site stickiness – all of these will be recognized by the thoughtful tagger and even some of the morons who now have the power to make or break a site.

If you want to get Digged, keep your site moving forward editorially, graphically, technologically, and keep it socially hip. Tagging isn’t really something that casual computer users even recognize as a macro dynamic, but the generations that grew up in front of a computer CRT know how to use the web and how to exercise their increasing power.

Don’t dumb it down but provide content that appeals to different reading levels (the average American reads at an eighth-grade level, believe it or not) and to different interests within the overarching topic of your site, whether you’re selling goods, services or a message.

Finally, determine how important social search engines are to your business. They may not be important now but their power is growing exponentially and it’s only a matter of time before these democratic search engines have an impact on your site’s success. So, if you can’t beat ‘em, at least make ‘em happy.

Make it easy to tag your site, individual blog or forum entries, even individual features within the site. Provide the racks of social search engine icons you see below. Using these iconic links, with a single click a visitor can “vote” for an element of your web site. Collect enough votes and you’ll see your site on page one of Digg’s SERPs – at least for a day or two. Hey, the public is fickle and what was hot yesterday is stone cold today. Just keep posting and provide the one click option to get a blog entry tagged and indexed on del.icio.us.

You’ll eventually see increased traffic via social search engines and you’ll learn a great deal about how visitors see and feel about your web site. You might even pick up some keywords to add to your list.

Finally, visit these social search engine sites to see what’s hot and what’s not. It’ll change everyday based on what’s happening in the news or on the celebrity social scene. (DUIs seem consistently popular with taggers of celeb sites.)

And perhaps some of these topics can be added to your site content. Or maybe you’ll discover why your bounce rate is so high.

In any case, the next macro dynamic on the web is here. It’s tagging – the furthering of the power of the user.

And, as a site owner, you have to wonder how long algorithmic search engines will wield the power they currently have. Isn’t it just a matter of time before Digg, or one of its competitors, becomes the source for finding quality content – content that’s received the stamp of approval from other web users?

Think about it. It’s happening now. And this is a macro trend that’s just going to become more “macro” in the months and years ahead. Get ready. The people are going to have their say.