Lately I have come to notice a great technique to keep users in a social web site and, better, drive them to provide more input.

As it is tradition in Web 2.0, people like to share stuff that reflects their way of thinking; show personal tastes, etc. Even better, is to be recognized by it. In this case, the badges concept comes into play. Sites like Blip.fm, Foursquare have implemented a way of promoting users by giving them badges for being the first, the most in something. This makes people work hard to get that recognition and, better for the site’s survival, makes people more reluctant to abandon the site and their profile with the risk of loosing all those recognition medals.

Recognition is something not to be discarted lightly…