If you're anything like me, you've got two problems all the time...
1. Problem #1 - How can I consume all the content I want to read online?
2. Problem #2 - How can I create more content that is fast and easy for busy consumers to read that they love?
Lists can be the answer! Lists are definitely one way that I can consume content fast and a way for me as a blogger to make it easy for others to quickly scan and grasp information on a topic I'm writing on.
List.ly is a collaborative, multi-functional list building tool.
In short, List.ly is a way to create and share lists, as well as integrate collaborative lists into your own blog posts, acting as a crowd-sourcing catalyst for others to build upon and share!
A list is a great way of breaking up content and the value of List.ly is that it is collaborative and thus always fresh and expanding! It offers the opportunity of having a dynamic list that is community driven, allowing it to live on and on!
List.ly, according to co-founder Nick Kellet, is "true social curation with lists as a metaphor."
List.ly is all about creating and curating lists. You can create lists of tips or lists of websites or lists of anything you can think of that your readers would be interested in.
According to Nick, "From the time we're born and our name is chosen from a list of baby names, to the time we die and we're checking items off our bucket list, we're obsessed with lists."
When it comes to business, it's no different. We will read other people's lists regarding our business and industry. We can scan lists and find a point or two that we didn't know and come away with new insights and new items to blog about or content to share!
The challenge for normal blog post lists is that once published, with the speed of things online today, these lists can be outdated in just a few months, or even weeks!
List.ly, however, addresses those issues head-on by allowing you to start a list on their site, embed it within your blog, and then let other people continue to add to and update your list.
You can choose whether or not you want people to be able to add to your list, but the most successful List.ly lists are those that have allowed others to participate. Participation can come in the form of voting individual list items up or down, which helps reorder the list, and can also come by way of new list item suggestions.
Go to http://list.ly and click on Sign Up. Connect using your Twitter account and fill in some basic information like name and email. Now you're ready to create your first list.
Click on Make A New List button and a dialogue box will come up prompting you for the name and details for your list. Complete the details, then click on Make List.
Once you have your list started, you will see a pink button under your description for "Add to List." Use this to begin populating your list. You can add items with or without links. Each is added one at a time, with an option to describe the item in more detail.
To the right of your list name, if you mouseover the header, an edit gear icon will come up that you can use to revisit those advanced settings. The advanced options permit you to specify a header image, insert a link to an original article, tag the list, and set how you want to sort the list items. You can also disable likes, set moderation, and allow labels for individual items.
When you're ready to embed your new list into a blog post, there are two different embed methods you can choose from. To the right of the Add to List button is a link icon that will open the embed options in a new tab.
Your embed methods include WordPress and any other platform via JavaScript. If you have a WordPress site, first install the List.ly WordPress plugin and grab your publisher code using the links on the embed page. You can then simply copy and paste the snippet of code directly into your blog post wherever you want the list to appear. Choosing the other will provide a JavaScript code snippet that you can embed in any other website. Definitely use the WordPress plugin if you have a WP site!
List.ly has been specifically designed so that the content of the lists will be completely present within your site if you use one of those methods, allowing Google to completely index the list.
You can then choose from three formats: Full, Gallery and Short. Full will display the entire list, just as it is displayed within List.ly, while short will list item titles only. Gallery will tile the list items on the page.
Regardless of which format you choose, the list is completely responsive. Whether your putting the list in a sidebar or in a blog post that's being viewed on a mobile device, List.ly's lists will automatically resize to fit the space they're given and drop elements as needed in order to be viewed easily on any device.
List.ly solves many of the problems that exist with Twitter lists, so that they can have a much broader appeal.
Twitter lists natively have these issues:
As a result
However with List.ly and Twitter Lists people can:
[listly id="Bva" layout="full"]
- First, create a Twitter list (Does not need content to start)
- Next create a List.ly list, choose type = "Twitter" and pick your list to map to
- Turn on moderation if you want.
- Note: It will take about 10 minutes for additions to hit the twitter list
- It's in private beta, but anyone can add to your lists.
-SPECIAL NOTE: Don't add to your Twitter list directly (as that won't end up in Listly. Anyone can add to your Twitter lists by adding to the Listly list.)
List.ly is a tool you should give some time to exploring!
The value of crowd-sourced, ever growing new content on your blog can be a real "win-win" for content marketers.
Here's another list example, this time of top Social Media books in List.ly "Gallery" fashion!
[listly id="2Ea" layout="gallery"]
Have a look at List.ly and let me know what you think!
