Social Bookmarking is probably one of the toughest ideas to get a grip on, in the field of digital marketing.

Some explains that Social Bookmarking is all about sharing content and clickable links on the internet. Then again, these people will not count Facebook or Instagram as potential social bookmarking platforms.

On the other hand; some very rigidly asserts that the present day social bookmarking has got merged with social networking, and is currently accepted as a sub part of Content Sharing and Marketing, all-in-all.

In this post, we will be understanding the very basics of Social Marketing. We will discuss social bookmarking platforms, social bookmarking rules, social bookmarking and social networking, and of course what will be your best social bookmarking practices to make your business marketing easier.

At Velarudh, we try to come up with the crispiest of information in Digital Marketing, Web App Development, and other computational solutions!

Do keep bookmarking our posts, and comment down below to leave behind your valued thoughts. 

What is Social Bookmarking?  

 In a very normal sense, bookmarking is saving or marking a certain page in a book, for later reading or remembering the last read.

There’s another modern meaning to ‘Bookmarking’, in terms of Internet and Web Browsers. We all bookmark our favourite websites and web pages in our web browsers (like Google Chrome, Safari, Firefox, etc).

By bookmarking specific links, we can get back to these websites and webpages whenever we want to.

But Social Bookmarking is not equally same to the conventional meaning of Bookmarking. One simple way to understand it, could be found in the following explanation.

Busting the difference between social bookmarking and social sharing:

Suppose you are reading a book, that is shared by a large group of people. Say for example, a whole class refers to this text book, from time to time.

And, you just bookmarked a certain page in this book. The bookmark could be for an easy look at a very special mathematical formula listed on this page. 
You can even put a signature beneath the formula, so that people get to know that you have created this bookmark!

That way, you are not only helping people with a very useful bookmark; but also increasing your value that way.

You can very well say, that’s how social bookmarking is done! But in the digital world of internet, you will be using social bookmarking platforms and 

On the other hand,

Social sharing is a broader term, which very well includes the term social bookmarking as a subset!

Social sharing tallies with the term Content Sharing. To successfully increase your brand value over the internet, you must take a look at Content Marketing. It is sharing contents for marketing your business.

The act of Social Sharing is very well reflected when you share an image, video, post, link, or text on social media handles and any content sharing website (like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Youtube, and so on).

You can pretty much use social sharing and social bookmarking interchangeably; if you believe bookmarking is not only about posting your favourite links, but also every media content you share- be it a piece of text, an image or a video!

However, Social Bookmarking requires its own special attention.

Social Bookmarking Sites and Social Media Platforms:

In the present world of Internet, only a few actual bookmarking sites are existing. Since Facebook took over the real definition of social networking; most of the conventional social bookmarking sites have lost a significant number of daily users, or have shut down completely!

Social networking platforms are the new type of platforms that serve both the purpose of social bookmarking and content sharing.

Most importantly, social networking sites also holds the proof of having more users and features than plain bookmarking sites. 

A list of some popular and original Social Bookmarking Sites and platforms:

  • Stumble Upon:

This platform is currently shifted to Mix, which has received mostly negative reviews both from existing and new users.

Stumble Upon claimed a good number of users, back when it was an active social bookmarking platform.

But as of now, you can consider this platform to be defunct.

  • Reddit:

This is presently one of the best social bookmarking sites. Many however still find it difficult to totally comprehend every community/sub-reddit guidelines.

This makes Reddit a bit critical App of it’s own. Though at Velarudh Infotech Pvt Ltd, Kolkata; we encourage the use of Reddit to practice ethical digital marketing techniques, for gaining authentic organic traffic.

On Reddit, you can post links, images, videos, text contents; and comment, upvote/downvote on the shared contents as well.

However, not every community accepts all type of postings. They have their own set of rules. Overall, Reddit is a good experience for doing your share of social bookmarking.

  • Medium:

Another strange platform, which can be considered a bookmarking platforming that has its own content database.

You can follow users, upload your contents and can use those contents for back linking to your website. You can follow other users, and save or react to their content as well.

One inert nature of Medium is that you can’t post or bookmark any article or content that has been published elsewhere.

However, some may still argue that Medium is not exactly a social bookmarking site; so please type in your comments below to share your tweets on this!

  • Twitter:

The most rapid of all social bookmarking platforms.

This is not original, rather the most aboriginal concept of social media and social bookmarking infusion.

Limited by characters, every single tweet can be strategically used to bookmark or share a certain link from the web.

Twitter has a huge active user base, and is a great tool for business marketing as well.

  • Pinterest:

This app is the most popular social bookmarking platform among women, as they make up the significant 80% of its total user percentage.

You get to create your own Board, where you can pin your favourite posts, links and articles. These pins will be viewed by other users, and will be clicked if they find interest in these pins.

You can increase your creativity and design your boards to make them look attractive.

Can Facebook and Instagram be counted as social bookmarking platforms?

If you want to take a modern approach towards Social Bookmarking; then yes you can use Facebook and Instagram for bookmarking your links.

Typically, both Facebook and Instagram are popular as the most used social media platforms. They have the highest number of users, who can interact with each other personally as well.

So, with these two social media platforms, you get the power to share and bookmark your posts; and along with be able to connect with people.

Instagram, in comparison to Facebook, functions a bit differently. Here you can only upload Photos or Videos, other than Links, posts, or Text articles.

However Instagram does allow you to add long captions and descriptions for your posts, which you can use to include links – that will act as bookmarks!

And as of Facebook, you get the full freedom to create Pages, Communities, and Groups, when you can increase the users and bookmark your contents or links right away.

Benefits of Social Bookmarking in terms of SEO and Business Marketing:

Every time you post a link of your website on any social bookmarking platform, or social networking site; your website gets a pingback!

This means your website is supposed to see a new rush of visitors from that bookmark.

Search Engines are constantly indexing the uncountable amount of contents strewn all over the Internet. Your bookmarks will also get counted in them too.

Whenever a search engine, say for example Google, will see that your website is getting bookmarked on several places and that too with positive responses, then it will definitely increase your website’s visibility.

This truly serves the true purpose of Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) for your website.

Similarly, social bookmarking also boosts your business marketing, as if you share or post links of your products and service pages; then you are inviting a good chunk of web traffic from these backlinks.

**How are Bookmarklets different from Bookmarks?

This small part is a bonus inclusion. Bookmarklets typically have nothing to do with Social Bookmarking. In fact it has nothing to do with Browser bookmarking either.

These bookmarklets functions quite similarly to those of Plugins and Extensions. However since they are stored as Scripted code in the Bookmark section of your Browser, hence they are called Bookmarklets.

With that we have come to the end of this post! Do keep checking our blogs from time to time!

>> Content Marketing Digital >> Branding Digital >> Social Bookmarking >> Social Bookmarking Platforms >> Social Bookmarking Practices >> Social Bookmarking Sites >> Social Media Marketing >> Social Media Promotion >> Marketing Search Engine Optimisation >> Social Sharing