Recently, The Wall Street Journal published an article about social tagging sites and pointed to the rise of a new stakeholder group: those online influencers who browse the Web and earmark (or tag in social media lingo) articles, photos and sites they deem worthwhile. The Wizards of Buzz, as coined by journalists Warren and Jurgensen, are mostly volunteers who take it upon themselves to be bastions of quality and newsworthy content. Visitors on Reddit, Digg, Newsvine and Del.icio.us rate content submitted to the sites and more often than not, the wizards’ submissions rise to the top as the most popular. They have a knack for knowing what will appeal to the masses. They are the new tastemakers.

Social tagging is rapidly becoming popular and bloggers are responding by either preparing tags for their entries and allow their readers to tag content they like with one click. Seeing the growing trend, a PR professional’s immediate reaction may be to think of ways to inform the wizards about a news story online. But we must remember that overt marketing is not the way to deal with social media. The new media pitch is not the lesson here. Here is where social tagging is leading us:

- Social tagging works hand in hand with search technologies. It makes content available and visible. As social tagging services evolve, they will become stronger contenders to algorithm-driven search engines that accept sponsored content. To get content to rise through the Web ranks, communications professionals will need to become search specialists who understand the connection between paid search, strong editorial content and social tagging/voting.

-Marketers will need to focus on their audience’s lifestyle characteristics and social views, rather than demographics. Popular stories on social tagging sites are those that appeal to interests (e.g., science-fiction, technology, politics), not to women 18-34.

- PR pros will need to be smarter about online crisis communications. With the availability of services such as social tagging, news travel faster and further. A story or blog entry uncovered by a wizard can become significantly more visible in a matter of hours. Online alerts and buzz monitoring systems will also need to take social tagging sites’ pulse.