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Everyone has heard of the main social networking tools such as Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin, but did you know there are also social networking tools for smaller, more niche groups such as investors? If you are interested in joining a social networking site and mixing it up with other investors and traders then these four sites are a good place to start:

(1) Marketocracy – Marketocracy was one of the frontrunners of the competitive social networking scene and was launched way back in 2000. It now has more than 100,ooo users and is still growing. Once you join Marketocracy you can build up a record of investments (fictional) within the site and those that perform the best are then invited to join the M100 group, an elite group at the top of the pyramid. The best of that group are then asked / offered the chance to manage the actual funds, which in turn are offered back to the larger Marketocracy Community at cost price.

(2) Covestor – Covestor is one of the more exclusive investor networks and requires you to have $100000 just to get an account opened. Once you get an account you are then able to see watch and learn from the investment tactics and strategies of many leading fund managers and you can also subscribe to automatically trade in the same way as they do. In addition to your minimum 100,000 the site will also charge you a management fee which it then splits with these managers.

(3) CollabInvest – CollabInvest is a tool for social networking that accompanies the Personal Stock Streamer financial software. Investors who use the site can pick and grow a network of site friends and then get alerts when they are on the site, interact with them and share tips on stocks and shares as well as charts and research. A really nice online forum and a friendly atmosphere for planning investment strategies.

(4) Collective2 – Collective2 has nearly 60,000 members all of whom invest in virtual portfolios on the site. As with Marketocracy the track record of the investors is visible to everyone else and the best investors in the community are then recruited in order to manage the real money for the community. The site claims that around $300 million is invested every week.

Alex is a freelance journalist and financial blogger. He loves to write about baseball and jazz but spends most of his days writing about mortgages, markets and umbrella companies .