Your home base and outposts are where you’re spending most of your time and effort online, but there may be other places that you need to spend a bit of time just so you know what’s going on. I call these places listening posts. They help round out your Internet strategy by providing you with information and intelligence (think like an spy!).
If you’re only spending time on your home base and outposts, you’re probably missing a good portion of what’s being said online. Being an expert in your field means keeping up with new developments and insights. You probably already have a series of listening posts – sites where you go regularly to get news and information. Identifying these places as part of your Internet strategy can help you keep track of additional places where you might network or find leads – as well as serve as ideas for content.
Most of my listening posts are in Google Reader so I can easily scan them every day. Blogs, news sites, searches for my name and company name, etc. Together, they help me get an overall picture of what’s going on and who is saying what.
As your brand grows, it’s important to have conversations – both listening and responding. Having a set of listening posts that you’re already monitoring will help you identify and participate in conversations which are going on online.
What are your listening posts? How do you use them?
To wrap up this series, we’ll take a look at the overall Internet strategy from 10,000 feet.
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