Hello,

 Here we go with some more discussion of Microblog platforms, marketing, and reconiling the two. So far we've discussed the mother of microblogging platforms, twitter, and the different ways you can use it to reinforce or define brands, and we've discussed how to use Ping.fm to distribute information and meda to several microblog platforms. Today, I want to discuss creating your own microblog community using the white label solution, ShoutEm.com.

 Think of shout'em as a Ning for Twitter, like Ning is great for creating niche communities, so is shout'em so don't think your going to take out twitter but if you have a topic with an active comunity this might be a choice community platform (vs. a Ning Network, or a forum)

Like I've created CreativeNYC, which is a microblogging community for people in the NYC area to post events and discuss the arts. What are some of the benefits going this route for your website or brands community home?:

- The ease of Microblogging is a lot less intimidating than a full fledged network or forum

- Integration of facebook connect and other universal ID standards makes it easier for your target community to participate

- since twitter doesn't have a groups feature, this has the same effect and as well has built in photo a geolocation features to enrich the microblogging experience.

Now you do you need to create your own small community outside of an already established platform all depends on the dynamics of your target market, but if your dealing with a market sophistcated enough to move beyond the usual spots and go to a more private space for a deeper conversation of the brand or topic, then this is one way to create that private space.

An active passionate community that you hold the key too, in the end is every marketers dream :).

- Alex Merced