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1. Free Social Media Listening Tools
2. How To Gain Followers and Influence Tweeple – by Glenn Hilton
3. Tips to optimize your website easily

Twitter is a free service that lets you micro-blog at whim using just 140 characters to say something really deep – or something terribly shallow, depending on your mood.

For months, my Twitter page said the same thing: “Trying to find out what’s in Twitter for me.” My picture was the generic Twitter icon. Every now and then, I would look at people’s tweets, shrug and do something else. Then something changed…

Last February, I attended the Northern Voice blogging and social media conference in Vancouver. Looking around the room, I noticed that about 85% of the attendees were either live-blogging or tweeting. It was amazing to me that what would otherwise be considered rude behaviour was actually encouraged! (It was a blogging conference, after all.) After listening to the presenters and learning more about Twitter, I decided to give it a fair shot.

In the next week, I devoted more time to Twitter and things started to gel. I soon discovered that I was looking forward to checking the tweets of those I followed. After a little while, I added a comment here and there. It got easier and easier, and now Twitter is a guilty pleasure for me.

What’s in Twitter for me (and you)?

I recently spoke at a Women in a Home Office meeting on the ways to send more traffic to one’s website. Among other social media channels, we discussed what is Twitter and how to use Twitter.

I outlined the many ways that Twitter has been useful to me:

• I have made connections with other writers, marketers and SEO experts around the world.
• My followers read my tweets, which often leads them to read my blog.
• I use Twitter to promote my new blog posts, and other people on Twitter retweet (RT) me, which creates a viral marketing effect.
• I found a tweet for a time-limited offer to download an excellent ebook called SEO Secrets.
• Donna Papacosta, a writer in Ontario, was looking for a video cameraman in Edmonton. I just happened to know of one.
• I found an easy recipe for Pesto Chicken – that’s right, a recipe in 140 characters!
• I follow WestJet on Twitter to learn about time-sensitive deals on flights.
• I find new blogs through Twitter on topics of interest. If I leave comments, they link back to my site, thus increasing my number of inbound links.

Twitter is immediate and emotional and quite captivating once you get the hang of it. Twitter is used by real people in real time to talk about things that affect them and, often, the rest of the world. The latest events (like the election in Iran) are captured by real people – not biased media reports.

What I like most about Twitter is that I can leverage this channel in bits and bites. Just a few minutes here and there can net good results.

If you’re not on Twitter, but you would like to be, don’t worry about being new to the channel. Just take birdie steps and pretty soon, it will come naturally.

How do you Twitter?

If you’re on Twitter, how have you found it helpful in your business or personal life?

Related posts:

1. Free Social Media Listening Tools
2. Blogging. An excuse for poor communication?
3. 5 toys to make your blog more sexy

Wrong.

As I tell all of my clients, SEO is not a quick fix, but an ongoing effort. While it may appear to work initially, this could be but a blip in the radar. If you look away, your SEO efforts fizzle. And then you’re back at square one. Here’s why:

If your site wasn’t designed with SEO in mind in the first place, your SEO efforts are more of a band-aid. Perhaps you’ve had some new title and meta tags created and added some keyphrases in strategic places. But this will only take you so far.

A solid SEO strategy goes deeper into restructuring the architecture of the site, coding it in such a way that it is easy for the engines to read and follow, writing pages that specifically target highly researched keyphrases, using keyword-rich hyperlinks that lay down a scent and lead visitors logically from page to page, and much more.

If your site doesn’t have fresh, changing content, both the engines and your visitors eventually lose interest. Your site needs to be dynamic, with lots of juicy stuff for visitors to consume. As the engines see it, if your site is static, then it won’t be valuable for searchers. That means it eventually drops down on the results pages.

If your site isn’t popular with other sites, it won’t be popular with the engines. An oft-ignored SEO tactic is link building. The more links you have coming into your site, the more popular it is perceived to be to the engines. To get links, you need to engage in tactics such as online press releases and articles, plus social media channels like blogging and Twitter.

If your site isn’t engaging your visitors, they won’t stick around. The real reason you want to optimize your site is not to get better rankings and more traffic, but to get more qualified traffic coming to your site to buy your product or service.

A well-optimized, well-written and well-planned site will be a rich bed of content for your visitors. Your dynamic site will give your visitors what they want in the form of copy that engages them and offers a solution to their problems, and an active blog and/or articles that keep them informed. Other ideas include a free newsletter, ebook, white paper or report that they can download and refer to, a contest, a coupon or a free product sample.

If your website is offering what visitors are looking for, they stay awhile. Your bounce rate (the rate at which visitors leave your site) decreases. Your conversion rate increases.

If you’re serious about optimizing your site, don’t apply a band-aid. Your site wasn’t created overnight (I hope not anyway), and your SEO shouldn’t be either.

Related posts:

1. A neophyte guide to using keywords – Part 2
2. A neophyte guide to keyword research – Part 1
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In this frank discussion about grammar, Robin talks about many of the more common mistakes people make as well as some spelling issues that are specific to the web world. It’s well worth a read for anyone who is confused about web site vs. website or e-mail vs. email. And what’s the plural of e-mail anyway? You may be surprised!

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1. Blogging. An excuse for poor communication?

But often blogging, especially commenting on blogs, is done when the mood to say something strikes. And more often than not, people who blog aren’t professional writers or communicators. Does that mean it’s forgivable to construct a cloudy message or make the odd spelling error?

Credibility is important to your business. A carefully written and constructed blog will go a long way toward upholding your reputation. So taking a little extra time to ensure that your blog message is clear and purposeful would be prudent.

Tips for blogging to say what you mean

Write your blog posting in a text document first. Composing on a blank piece of paper comes easier than trying to write within a template with distracting links and instructions.

When your blog posting is complete, walk away before publishing it. Taking a break rests your eyes and your brain.

When you come back to your blog post, read through it again. Then, read it backwards to spot any spelling or grammatical errors. Reading copy backwards stops the tendency to skip words.

Ask a colleague to read your blog to be sure that, aside from it containing errors, your message is clear and understood by other readers.

Posting a blog comment

Posting a comment to a blog is a little different because you’re writing in an environment other than your own. How many times have you followed a thread where several responses were from the same individuals trying to fix their errors or explain what they meant in the first place?

Take your time to respond. Read your posting over forward and backwards. Ask someone in the room to give it a quick once-over to ensure it makes sense. Then, you’re ready to submit it, knowing with confidence that you won’t have to apologize, correct a mistake or clarify something you said later.

Related posts:

1. Top ten grammar mistakes on Web pages
2. At a loss for words when blogging?
3. Blogging. If it’s not part of your “here I am!” strategy – it should be.