Does your business, organization or event use social bookmarking sites like Digg, Delicious or StumbleUpon?

Have you ever sent a friend or colleague a link to a website that you thought was interesting or useful?

If you have, you’ve done something similar to social bookmarking. Here’s Wikipedia’s definition of social bookmarking:

Social bookmarking is a method for Internet users to store, organize, search, and manage bookmarks of web pages on the Internet with the help of metadata, typically in the form of tags that collectively and/or collaboratively become a folksonomy. Folksonomy is also called social tagging, “the process by which many users add metadata in the form of keywords to shared content”.

In a social bookmarking system, users save links to web pages that they want to remember and/or share. These bookmarks are usually public, and can be saved privately, shared only with specified people or groups, shared only inside certain networks, or another combination of public and private domains. The allowed people can usually view these bookmarks chronologically, by category or tags, or via a search engine.

Here is a short “Plain English” video explanation of the features and benefits of Social Bookmarking sites like Delicious.com produced by Commoncraft. (I always enjoy Commoncraft’s “Plain English” videos!)

Five Reasons You Should Use Social Bookmarking Sites

1. Increase Your Traffic
   Articles and links that you bookmark on these sites are public and can be rated by other readers. In most cases, the more votes a link receives, the higher its ranking on the first page of that social bookmarking site. The more readers and votes a post receives, the more traffic to its original location, your blog or website. You’ve just help increase the ability to make your link go viral.
2. Network With Others
   Some sites, like Twine, provide groups of people united by a like interest so that they can share bookmarks on the topic and build a community. It is also a great way to gain attention from a diverse audience of like-minded peers, potential customers andclients.
3. Increase Your SEO Rankings
   Google and the other search engines love quality backlinks from popular websites and backlinks that come from the top social bookmarking websites. Social bookmarking allows quick and easy access to anything you bookmark. For example, some sites allow you to add tags to your favorites, providing a quick and easy way to find and organize like sites.
4. Create Community
   Social bookmarking sites allow others to comments on specific bookmarks and links, thus the “social” aspect of social bookmarking. This is a great way to develop community and increase engagement and discussion about specific articles and posts.
5. Organize Your Favorite Links
   If your search habits and Internet readings are anything like mine, I’m constantly forgetting where I bookmarked a site. I have lists everywhere. Social bookmarking allows quick and easy access to anything you bookmark and your tags. For example, some sites allow you to add tags to your favorites, providing a quick and easy way to find and organize like sites

There are many other reasons to use social bookmarking sites. Share yours reasons and your favorite social bookmarking sites in the comments section.