Eventually, though, should one decide to take a vacation there comes the question about what to do about your social profiles, especially if you use them to promote your business. Will people stop following your Twitter if you don’t post for a few days? Will the ranking results of your blog be affected if you don’t update as regularly while you’re gone? Perhaps worse yet, will anybody notice you’ve been gone at all?

When taking a break from work, should weaning off Twitter and Facebook and other profiles apply as well? A long weekend, for example, shouldn’t merit too much concern – you may miss a few gems from favorite “Tweeters”, but depending on the regularity of their posts it may not take too long to catch up on their news. Facebook allows you to parse friends into different lists, so if there are people you wish to follow more closely you can set that up easily and check the site sporadically if the urge to log in to the Net usurps the call of your destination’s amenities.

If you plan a lengthy break from work, which may include time in places where the Internet is not accessible, you may consider preparing advance promotion tactics to keep visitors and readers informed of your business. Blogs provide the ability to queue posts to release on scheduled dates, allowing you the flexibility to map out future material. Twitter widgets such as TweetLater works on a similar model, assuming you have not imported an RSS feed into your account.

If you work alone, you may also wish to consider hiring a temporary “ghost Twitterer” to handle keeping your online persona alive while you enjoy your vacation. It’s not uncommon for celebrities to have people tweet in their stead, and a quick glance through an online freelance database will reveal hundred of freelance writers and SEO agents ready to bid on your work.

Depending on the length of your absence from the office, smart advanced planning can keep you socially active on the Internet even if you aren’t logged in. Take advantage of the tools available to you to keep your social status thriving.

Kathryn Lively is a freelance writer specializing in articles on social media optimization and Virginia web design.

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When one considers the incredible growth of the network – Nielsen has reported around fourteen million users in 2008 – and how quickly Twitter has been integrated into mainstream media, one may argue we should ask, “Why are you not Tweeting?”

These days breaking news may be discovered in a brief line of text and an accompanying link before any of the major news channels are able to broadcast. Twitter puts a personal spin on world events (California users texted a recent earthquake as it happened), unites people to a common cause (awareness of Iran’s elections made for a popular trending topic), and serves as a forum for multiple discussions. Literary agents field questions on the craft and submissions, businesses post sales information and online cart codes, and news outlets use Twitter as a wire, teasing stories and updates in hopes of increasing click-throughs. As the network matures and is made more accessible through Internet and phone widgets, Twitter just may move from the latest fad to an important media and commerce tool.

So how can a small business use Twitter effectively? Once you set up an account, there’s no guarantee thousands of followers will immediately flock to read your posts, and one must consider the legitimacy of so-called programs that “guarantee” masses of subscribers through viral promotion of their software. One social media expert I read puts it best when she stresses the social nature of Twitter – don’t worry about who you follow or who follows you. Treat Twitter as you would your Web site or blog, offer concise relevant content and eventually you will build readership.

Initial promotion of your account is key in lighting the fire. A link from your main site, blog, and other social profiles allows visitors to know of the addition exposure you provide. Approaching Twitter with a relaxed yet professional attitude, coupled with the occasional use of hashtags relevant to your content, can be helpful in increasing awareness of your business. Regardless of your products or services, if somebody is interested in what you have to offer, they will follow. The constant hard-sell, where every Tweet is an ad, could turn off followers and risk the labeling of your account as spam.

Interest followers not only by posting your own expertise via Twitter, but using the network to research your topic through other sources. Link to articles or blogs, “retweet” posts from like-minded accounts you follow, and engage followers in conversation. The more you use Twitter, as one would with any other network, the more you’ll find an audience for your business.

Kathryn Lively is a freelance writer specializing in articles on professional SEO writing and local PPC management.

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Choosing the Right CMS for Your Website

Before diving right into the creation or renovation of a site, one must understand what a content management system is and does. The CMS of your website is where you, or your webmaster, handle the maintenance of the site. From adding new pages to editing current ones, setting up contact forms or widgets for social media, everything you do in the back affects what the actual site looks like. Think of the CMS as the fuse box in your home. You tinker with a few wires to make sure the lights are working correctly – so it is with content management.

Examples of Content Management Systems

Do you use Blogger or Wordpress to maintain a weblog? If so, you are using a CMS. Every time you log in to write a new post you manage your content through a specialized CMS program. Other programs, like Joomla and Drupal, allow site owners to create and customize sites for a variety of uses. You may find some designers use these systems when working with clients, or they may create a proprietary program for your use. If you go with the latter, it’s recommended to find a system with these features:

Easy Web Access – You want to be certain you can get to your site from anywhere. The backend should have an administrator log in page and dashboard for maintenance 24/7.

Drag and Drop Features – For sites with lengthy menu sidebars and widget capability, it’s nice to have a CMS that let’s you easily position links where you want them to go. A drag and drop feature for positioning modules on a web template is ideal for the novice user.

Ease of Graphic Placement – Photos can be a bear to manage online, so having a good photo editing systems in your CMS can help you upload, resize, and position graphics simply.

HTML and WYSIWYG Editor Options – For those who aren’t very proficient in HTML, an editor designed to work like a regular word processing program can assist site owners in page creation. Having the HTML option as well is a plus, for one can use it to tweak font sizes and colors. When shopping CMS systems, make sure yours works both ways.

Instant Publishing Ability – If you need to get a page launched immediately, you want a CMS system that publishes with the click of a mouse. Consequently, if you need to remove pages, you should be able to quickly.

RSS Publishing – These days RSS feeds can be imported into Twitter and Facebook. If you constantly publish new material, you should be able to syndicate as much as possible, and have a CMS that does it for you.

While there are other bells and whistles one may desire on a Web site, ask about these features when you talk with your site developer. Your Web should be simple to weave.

Kathryn Lively is a freelance writer specializing in articles on SEO writing services and local ppc management.

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Depending on your skill level and knowledge of the site’s purpose, writing the content may be the simplest or most challenging task in achieving your promotion goals. Once you have the information written and made live on your site, exposing it through social media is perhaps the easiest thing to do, and it doesn’t take long to generate a buzz. Here are four ways you can help light the fire.

Add links to social media sites on your Web pages – If you make use of a blog program through Blogger or Wordpress to supplement your site content, you’ll know there are widgets available to help you advertise content for social media. Icons and links implore readers to add the content to Facebook or Twitter, all you have to do is click a link to make it happen. If you know a bit of HTML code, though, you can set up links on static Web pages for people to use to add your content to social networks. Decide which social sites you want to focus on the most, then get the code to create the links.

Import your RSS feed into Facebook – Whether you have a personal Facebook account or a fan page related to your Web site, you can use your profile to promote your work. Facebook’s Notes application allows users to import the RSS or XML feed of a blog or site, and will upload the content of the feed into your profile. Then, every time you add to the feed, it’s updated on Facebook and your friends are alerted. If you don’t use a blog for your site, you can create one just for use of the RSS capability for social media, then track referrals from Facebook and Twitter to see how effective it is.

Bookmark your content – Every time you write an article for your blog or site, add it to your social bookmark collection. Whether you prefer Delicious or Digg or any of the myriad of competitors, generating that buzz can help bring more attention to the rest of your site. Get friends and employees to set up similar accounts and help promote the links.

Write more content – For an author, the best way to promote a book is to write the next one. This tip applies to just about anyone using article or blog marketing to optimize Web sites…keep on writing! The more content you offer, the better the opportunity for showing up in search. A visitor may catch one article and come back to read more, and buy more.

Maximize your content through social media – writing, linking, and bookmarking. It’s a great way to maximize your business and your profits.

Kathryn Lively is a freelance writer specializing in articles on SEO writing services and local PPC advertising.

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Users of Twitterfox, a handy Firefox extension that lets you track folks from a pop-up screen on your browser, will note that URLs too long to appear in posts are cut using TinyURL, perhaps the best known of the shortening services. What TinyURL does is take a long URL like this:

http://hg.highsearchranking.com/2009/05/01/are-url-shorte…s-good-for-seoare-url-shorteners-good-for-seo/

and make it shorter through its own root and a random extension, like this:

http://tinyurl.com/djvfvq

Some services, like TinyURL, have recently allowed users to customize the URLs, so the first string above could be also marketed like this:

http://tinyurl.com/urlshortshsr

The downside to this, for one, is that more popular names may be taken. “url-shorteners”, for example, was.

Good to use on the go if you Twitter constantly, but are shortened URLs good for your site’s SEO? In observing recent trends in Twitter, it isn’t difficult to see spam accounts are on the rise, and the inclusion of such a URL, however innocuous the preceding text may appear, could lead to a phishing link. It stands to reason one should look on shortened links carefully, clicking through only if you are certain the source can be trusted. The use of another company’s URL root in your posts, aside from your own domain, might also set back marketing efforts. The more people see your name, the more apt they are to remember your URL. Long strings cut short risk the dilution of your brand as you micro-blog.

This is not to say you should never use a shortening service. One suggestion, if you must promote long URLs for specific pages on your site, would be to use a service that lets you customize their link name. Make a spreadsheet and record all the customizations – using your brand in every way possible – and drawing from that list as you Twitter. With many services the shortened URL is permanent, so you can reuse them as needed.

Another suggestion for marketing via Twitter is to create alternative pages on your site with short file names that best describe the content. This way, you can provide good text before your link and get everything in under the character limit.

URL shortening services are handy in a pinch, but ultimately it is important to promote your own domain in Twitter, Facebook, or other social networks.

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When you choose a bulk e-mail program for your newsletters and other mail alerts, you want to be sure you have access to as much data as possible where your campaigns are concerned. Charting a campaign’s progress goes beyond checking your website’s results – you need to know if the mail you send not only arrives to its intended destination, but is opened and heeded. Here are just a few features of a solid e-mail statistics report:

Bounce Rate: Are all of your e-mails getting to your readers? If you want your sale or news to succeed, you have to know if people are seeing what you have to show them. Your e-mail software should be able to tell you how many recipients are “bouncing”, or coming back to you as undeliverable. You may find your mail experiences hard bounces where the address provided is no good, or soft bounces where a mailbox may be filled to capacity. Knowing this can help you pare your recipient list if needed or check for addresses that are incorrect.

Open Rate: Of the e-mails being delivered, how many are actually opened? A good program will inform you the open rate of each campaign you prepare. As your archive of newsletters grows, you can use the open rate as guideline to determine which campaigns are more successful – by virtue of the sales pitch or perhaps the attention-grabbing subject header – and build future mails from there.

Click-Through Rate: Getting a reader to open your mail is good. Seeing that reader click a link from that mail to your website is better. Your e-mail software should allow you to see not only your click-through rates, but information on which links are clicked. Having this information at your disposal will permit for more focused campaigns that offers your readers what they truly want.

Opt-Out Rate: It’s the nature of the business that as you gain subscribers to your e-mail, you stand to lose some as well. If your e-mail software can provide you the information on how many readers are unsubscribing from your lists, it may be useful in helping you evaluate your e-mail marketing strategies. If you experienced a spike in opt-outs following one particular campaign, it would be handy to have a program that collects the data of the readers so you can follow-up with a feedback survey or free offer.

Once you can keep up with your e-mail campaigns through statistical reporting, you can use the information to improve upon future marketing plans. Take the time to explore the statistics options available to you when you choose your next e-mail software program or provider.

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As a newer company or an established organization just coming to the Internet, you have a shorter window of opportunity to attract attention. Once your initial site is built, it is important to establish your immediately as an expert in your field in order to gain the trust of your visitors. In doing this, you also help your SEO through steady building of content and proper saturation of keywords under which you wish to be found.

Show What You Know

Being an expert doesn’t mean you have to give away any secret recipes or your entire plan of attack. However, if you want to show visitors exactly why they should choose your products or services over others you must provide some information to prove your validity and authority:

• Write Articles: Whether your sites promotes pest control or sells auto parts, a series of well-written, keyword rich articles can build a online library for visitors wanting to know more about what you do
• Podcast: If you work in consulting or another field which lends itself to promotion in other media, consider creating a weekly or monthly podcast about your services and the condition of your industry. Include tips and maybe success stories about current and previous clients to create a compelling broadcast.
• Video: If the products you sell would better be served with video demonstrations, consider not only embedding short video on your site but create accounts at social sites like YouTube for maximum exposure. Link back to your main site to improve link popularity and lend an interactive look to your site that can also help improve your results in blended search.

The more you know and share, the better your chances of being found online. Don’t just be a salesman, be an expert at what you know.

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When shopping for a potential e-mail program, there are a number of features you should check for before making a purchase. Bulk mailing programs may vary according to price and functionality, but ultimately you will find many contain similar basic commands. All the same, it is important to make certain the program you use employs the following abilities:

Multi-address import: If you have a rather long list of e-mails, you know adding them one at a time to a database is tedious. A good e-mail marketing program will allow you to import directly from a file like Word or Excel and let you use fields for names or nicknames if you personalize your letters.

Filtering: As you progress with building your database, you may come upon a number of bad or duplicate mails. A good software should filter out unusable addresses so you can achieve maximum send percentages and minimal bouncing.

HTML and Text capabilities: Not everybody will want to receive graphics-laden HTML news alerts, so you want to be sure to offer a text only alternative. When you upload your newsletters to your program, you will want one that offers a multi-part option, sending HTML and text mails to those who request them.

Test Function: Before you send out that mail to thousands of your subscribers, you want to be certain it looks right first. Viewing your mail as a webpage may not always be a good indicator, so your e-mail program should allow you to send test messages prior to the big send.

Scheduling capabilities: You may not always be at the office when it comes time to send your regular mails. With a scheduling option, you can set emails to launch any time of the day, even if you’re not around. This is a handy tool to have if you plan multiple e-mails to send far in advance.

Tracking: Once the mails are sent, you want to know how effective they are. How many were opened, and how many recipients clicked through to your sites? Choose an e-mail marketing software that gives you this data.

With the proper software, timing, and content, you can create successful e-mail campaigns for your business. Choose the software wisely for smooth delivery of your message every time.

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Twitterfox installs in the lower right hand corner of your Firefox browser, and pops up a small box of recent “Tweets” to your account. What is good about this plugin is that you don’t have to view your Twitter account page to catch up on recent postings. Everytime you consult the pop-up box then leave, the number of new Tweets will refresh. A small text box at the bottom allows you to post while you are elsewhere on the Internet, allowing for great multi-tasking.

If you operate multiple Twitter accounts, you can adjust the settings to add all of them to your Twitterfox plug-in. Then, when you wish to jump accounts to post, simple click on the profile name at the top right corner of the box and a drop-down menu with your account names will appear. Marketing your products and services via Twitter doesn’t come any easier.

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If you are trying to make money online, your website should do more than present a nice picture for people to look at before moving on to the next website. If your aim is to foster a community of regular subscribers and increase sales and visibility, your website needs to stand tall and tower over your competitors. Interactive functionality and user-friendly Web applications designed to hold existing visitors and attract new ones provide an affordable solution to online marketing and longevity. Why have just a website when you can offer users a place to go and a place to stay?

When you search for a website company to handle design and development, here are a few tools to consider to add this functionality to your online presence, to maintain a strong customer base and win new patrons to your products, subscriptions, and news.

Online transactions and payments – Sell products online, accept credit cards and Paypal, and allow for customer interaction.

Events Calendars – Let the world know what you’re doing, where it’s happening, and when to be there. Community and travel sites in particular can take advantage of custom event calendar functionality from CINIVA to enhance the interactive usability of their sites. Post information on concerts, sporting events, charity events, and parties.

Events Registration Manager – Once you’ve posted your schedule of events, now you can let people register for them online! Collect the data and transactions, and keep the customer information for future opt-in mailings.

Weblogs and Forums – Weblogs are a popular and easy to implement way to produce fresh content for your site on a regular basis, with no special skills, equipment, or external software required. Blogs allow you to share your expertise, opinions, stories, company news, etc. and optionally allow readers to respond or even syndicate your information. Blogs allow you to dramatically improve the timeliness and relevancy of your website by helping to keep the content fresh- this not only attracts site visitors who know your organization, but the search engines like Google, which are always on the lookout for ‘what’s new’ as they scan through millions of website pages every day.

Online forums, also called ‘bulletin boards’, are great community builders, which translate into making your website more useful, visited, and visible to search engines. It’s great especially for non-profit organizations looking to enhance member communications and disseminate information. Another good use of a commercial online bulletin board is to improve communications among sales and technical teams (cuts down on email traffic) , as well as customer help forums.

Customer Response Forms – A relative straightforward way for website visitors to communicate with your staff – better than simply posting e-mail addresses, forms allow you route inquiries, require specific information, and collect data, including marketing information that users may wish to provide in exchange for some type of information or newsletter subscription. Dynamic forms can range from short and simple to complex multi-part applications which include photo submissions complex scripting.

Image Libraries and Photo Galleries – A great way to provide visual content to visitors in a directed way.

Create the site with the proper tools to allow customers to not only purchase, but interact and continue to do so in the future.

Kathryn Lively works for CINIVA Systems, a Virginia Beach web design company.

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