Good news for link building with social media: Forrester says 23 percent of social users are ‘creators’

With Brafton's reports that search platforms such as Bing Social and Google Realtime provide online shoppers links to social results, it's clear that offering fans and followers quality content is a good way for brands to catch inbound links across the web. Now, Forrester Research's Global Social Technographics reveal that nearly one-quarter (23 percent) of social users are creators, and these active bloggers may help marketers with link building through social media.

Creators are active content producers, explains Forrester. They may publish a blog, maintain a web page and/or write articles or stories to post on the internet. They account for almost 41 million online U.S. adults. For marketers, these creators could be key to sharing links to content brands deliver through the social media – if a company posts something they like, they will likely link to it in the content they produce elsewhere on the web.

Forrester's creators are similar to ExactTarget and CoTweet's Megaphones. In their Subscribers, Fans and Followers report, the companies explain that nearly ten percent of social users are Megaphones. They frequently interact with brands on Facebook and Twitter, and – like Creators – the majority of them blog and link to source of insight.

Megaphones pride themselves on being influencer and educating fellow consumers, so businesses who gain fans and followers among this demographic may find they have eager brand advocates who will link to their social page. Also, Megaphones represent a pretty even split across genders and age groups, so there will likely be some Megaphones in the mix among any brand's target audience.

To catch the interest of Creators and Megaphones, marketers must remember that content is key. Business should demonstrate that they are thought leaders and offer their social followers compelling information that is worthy of links. Delivering content about the latest developments in brands' industries may be marketers best bet to attracting desirable social followers; according to Chitika, news content is the leading driver of traffic to Facebook and Twitter.