Most bloggers stick to paragraphs and an image or two when writing new posts. This is fine for some however you may want to broaden your horizons and learn more about the potential WordPress and its HTML counterparts have to offer.

The purpose of this post is to educate my clients and readers on some of the best practices concerning HTML in their WordPress posts and pages. Sure you can just write blocks of text and hope the content is compelling enough to stick but knowing a little HTML can go a long way in making your posts easier to read.

Learn Basic HTML

Paragraphs and Line Breaks:

The WordPress editor automatically removes <br> and <p> tags that don’t have any attributes and  replaces them when your WordPress theme displays your content. This causes a lot of confusion when people who already know some HTML start trying to use the WordPress HTML editor and their paragraph tags keep disappearing. WordPress interprets a single line break as <br> and a double line break as <p>.

Headers:

Headers are a great way to tell your readers (and search engines) what the next block of text is about. Us humans have become accustomed to scanning posts rather than reading every little word. For this reason headers are a great way to help a reader find exactly what they’re looking for within your post.

<h1>Most Important Header</h1>
<h2>Second Most Important Header</h2>
<h3>Third Most Important Header</h3>
...
<h6>Least Important Header</h6>

I usually try to pick up where my theme left off. So if my post title is using <h2> tags I will use <h3> tags to punctuate my main points in my post.

Images:

I personally think images are the most important part of a post next to its content. You are best off using the Upload/Insert functionality in your post editor. If your theme supports featured images you should most definitely be using them.

One of my WordPress image pet peeves is when people don’t use the built in CSS classes to align their images to the content.  These are classes that the WordPress post editor uses by default and most quality themes will support.

A basic left aligned image in WordPress would look like:

<img src="example.jpg" class="alignleft" />

And there you have it. I’ll talk about the importance of additional tags like Alt and Title in a bit. For now let’s move on.

Lists:

Lists are a very important part of making your post scannable. I try and use them whenever I want to highlight key points because I know the reader is more likely to read them. There are two types of lists; ordered and unordered.

Ordered lists are exactly what they sound like:

1. First
2. Second
3. Third

And alternatively, an unordered list looks as follows:

• Something
• Something Else
• And More

Your sidebar and navigation menus are most likely already making use of lists because of their ability to efficiently organize information. The basic syntax of a list is pretty straightforward.

First you need to declare what type of list you are using

• <ol> – Ordered List
• <ul> – Unordered List

And then you need to wrap your list items with the <li> tag.

A completed unordered list could look like this:

<ul>
<li>Something</li>
<li>Something Else</li>
<li>And More</li>
</ul>

Formatting:

You’ve got your main points highlighted with headers, lists and images to draw your readers eye. Now you can run though your post and do any additional needed styling to accentuate any remaining key ideas.

<strong> – Makes your content bold. Use instead of <b> to help search engines give extra weight.
<em> – Makes your content italic. Use instead of <i> to help search engines give extra weight.
<a href=""> – The anchor tag can be used to link to other websites or within your site. The href attribute specifies the destination of a link.
<blockquote> – Most themes will indent and emphasize blockquote text so this is a great way to emphasize chunks of text and quotes.
<pre> – By default, this tag maintains a text format. Good for bits of text where you want to preserve line breaks and spaces.
<code> – This tag distinguishes text that is computer code from normal language
<del> –  This tag is useful for chunks of text you want to delete after a post has been published. Most browsers will render it as the original text with a line through it.
<ins> –  This tag is useful for chunks of text you may want to add to your post after it has been published. Most browsers will render it as the original text with a line under it.

Accessibility

Web accessibility refers to the practice of making websites usable by people of all abilities and disabilities via Wikipedia. WordPress recommends that you use Alt and Title tags on images as well as Title tags on links.

Example:

<a href="example.html" title="Example"><img src="example.jpg" alt="Example" title="Example" /></a>

Using The HTML Editor (Video)

Conclusion

This is only a small sampling of the HTML tags you can use based on the ones I thought were most important. All of these HTML tags are either built into the WordPress editor or supported by popular WordPress themes. Of course focus more on the quality of your posts than using as many HTML tags as possible. Look at some of your favorite blogs to get an idea of how you might want to structure your posts. With a better understanding of whats possible you can create a more personal style.

Further Reading

Here are some sites and posts worth checking out to learn more about HTML and blogging on WordPress.

• http://codex.wordpress.org/Writing_Posts
• http://www.w3schools.com/html/default.asp
• http://www.problogger.net/archives/2006/02/20/basic-in-post-html/
• http://www.tamba2.org.uk/wordpress/quicktags/

- Image by cdsessums

Download Now

So you have an XHTML valid website template and you would like to put it on top of WordPress. Whether you are starting from scratch or moving your existing website to WordPress as a CMS, this guide will help you get the conversion done.

Keep in mind that these are the basics and this is not a guide on how to develop themes for public release.

What You Will Need

• An XHTML web template
• A WordPress install
• A text editor (Like Dreamweaver or Notepad++)
• An FTP client (Like Filezilla)

Getting Started

First, let’s set up our theme files.

Prepare your files

For this tutorial we are going to use the minimum number of theme files needed to create a functional WordPress theme. Your existing template files should include the following:

• An HTML Template File
• A CSS Stylesheet
• An images folder

You should rename your HTML Template File to ‘index.php’ and your CSS Stylesheet to ‘style.css’. This is important and is how WordPress knows which files are which.

This is an example of what your theme folder should look like

Add WordPress Theme Info (video)

This is where your WordPress Theme gets your theme name, description, author link, etc. All you need to do is create a commented out area at the top of your stylesheet as follows:

/*
Theme Name: Rose
Theme URI: the-theme’s-homepage
Description: a-brief-description
Author: your-name
Author URI: your-URI
Template: use-this-to-define-a-parent-theme–optional
Version: a-number–optional
.
General comments/License Statement if any.
.
*/
CSS Goes here…

Adding Template Tags To Your Theme

Template Tags are bits of code that WordPress uses to populate your website with content. Different tags display different bits of information from the WordPress database. These are the main tags needed to make your WordPress theme work.

Page Title – (video)

Change whatever is within your <title></title> tags to:

<?PHP wp_title(”); ?>

Stylesheet – (video)

We are going to need to swap out the call to our stylesheet with:

<link rel=”stylesheet” href=”<?PHP bloginfo(‘stylesheet_url’); ?>” type=”text/css” media=”screen” />

Plugin Hooks – (video)

Next you will need to add Action Hook Template Tags so WordPress plugins can access your theme. All you need to do is add:

<?PHP wp_head(); ?>

to your header (Usually write above the closing </head> tag).

Then you should add:

<?PHP wp_footer(); ?>

to your footer (Usually write above your </body> tag).

Media and Script Paths – (video)

By default, your paths will most likely reference your site root. You will need to point all of your multimedia, scripts and stylesheets to your new theme folder within the WordPress file structure using:

<?PHP bloginfo(‘template_directory’); ?>

The easiest way to do this is to do a search and replace for ‘src=’ and add the appropriate template tags. This is not fool proof as not all template structures are created equal but it will work a majority of the time.

Search and Replace to change paths to WordPress theme paths

Adding The WordPress Loop

The WordPress loop is what handles all of your websites content. Its main components are:

• A header
• A permalink
• Some Content

First you will need to identify where your content starts/repeats (if it repeats). The easiest way to do this is to look for your content’s header and begin The Loop there. The Loop will usually end immediately after your content unless you are displaying extra information below your entries. You will also need to identify where your content begins and ends. Scroll to the end of this section to view some example code.

The Loop Code – (video)

Beginning:

<?php if (have_posts()) : while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>

End:

<?php endwhile; endif; ?>

Template Tags Within The Loop – (video)

The Title:

<?php the_title(); ?>

The Permalink

<?php the_permalink() ?>

The Content

<?php the_content(‘<p>Read more</p>’); ?>

Example Code

So this becomes this.

Navigation – (video)

Most themes will have the navigation within an unordered list. This makes things easy for you. All you need to do is replace the list elements (everything between the <ul></ul> tags) with the following:

<?PHP wp_list_pages(‘title_li=&depth=1&sort_column=menu_order&exclude=’); ?>

This is the most basic of menus and wont display child pages. You can exclude pages by simply adding the page ids separated by comas after “exclude=”. Learn more about wp_list_pages().

Upload and Activate Your Theme

Now all you have to do is upload your theme folder which should now consist of:

• An index.php file with custom code
• A CSS file with header information about the theme
• An images folder with all of your images

If all goes accordingly you should have a functional WordPress theme that allows you to add new pages and posts as well as use most popular WordPress plugins. It is important to note that you will not be able to add widgets to your sidebar and people will not be able to comment on posts. There may also be some other limitations due to the themes simplicity.

Feel free to contact me if you would like to learn how to bring your theme to the next level with a sidebar, comments and other interactive elements.

More Resources

• Theme Development
• Stepping Into Templates
• WordPress Theme generator

A couple years ago I would have said it depends. Now it is a necessity.

It doesn’t matter how big your business is or how much money you bring in. If you exist, I want proof of it on Google. I can bring up a business listing and even get reviews within minutes right from my cell phone anytime, anywhere.

We live in an on demand world where everything is a click, flick or a button press away.

But I Can’t Afford a Thousand Dollar Website!

Well me neither.

Luckily I make them for a living. For those not as fortunate feel free to learn more about how I can get you up and running with a customizable website for very short cash. The truth of the matter is, you really don’t need a thousand dollar website. There are tons of free content management systems and thousands of open source plugins on top of that creating endless possibilities for a completely unique, dynamic, out of the box website for your business. It’s not always about the glitz and the glam but about easily providing the information your audience needs.

Your Online Identity Freebies

User moderated reviews and online discussions have become the corner stone of a business’s online identity. These sites dominate the search engines and our mobile phones when searching for information about businesses and therefor should not be overlooked. You should check these sites to see if your business is already listed and add/modify as needed.

• Yelp
• Google Maps
• ZoomInfo

These sites require more attention on your part if you decide to participate. They take time to develop interested audiences but can be well worth it in the long run.

• Twitter
• LinkedIn

Don’t Be A Sucker

That basically just means don’t spend thousands of dollars on a crazy flashy website for your corner store boutique. Web developers are a dime a dozen – you can find them at your local college campus, all over Twitter and dominating craigslist. Be careful any way you go about it though. If you think you are getting ripped off, you probably are. Get a couple quotes for the same project and learn the lingo. Don’t go overboard with Internet marketing techniques like social media marketing and SEO. Get yourself a functional up to date website that provides your audience with what they want.

- Photo by Curious Expeditions

Awhile back I decided to start posting videos on my blog. Once I had a few videos up I began to rethink my approach. Ultimately I wanted to prevent videos from showing up where normal posts are displayed and instead display my most recent video in the sidebar.

To do this, I would need to:

• Suppress all video posts from being displayed with other posts
• Create an archive of all video posts
• Resize and place my most recent video in the sidebar

The first step was pretty easy. I just created a new category called “Video Post” and assigned it to all of my video posts. This would become a fairly intuitive list of videos people could access at their will.

Next I wanted to remove all video posts from being displayed among other posts on the home page. However, I still wanted my videos to be displayed in RSS feeds as well as archives and search pages. To do this, I just modified the default WordPress query used to pull the most recent posts by placing the following code before “The Loop”.

Be sure to change ‘-66′ to the id of whatever category you are trying to hide. How do I find the category IDs?

Also, if you are not sure where the WordPress Loop begins, it is usually located inside of index.php in your theme folder and starts with:

The last step is to display my most recent video in the sidebar. To do this I decided my best course of action was to save the embed code of my videos into a custom field as well as within the content of the post. This would allow me to easily pull the embed code and I would still be able to add text along with my video within the content.

In the example below I used the custom field ‘embed’ in my posts. Just paste this code in your sidebar where you would like your video to be displayed.

You will notice I also included a link to my last video however you can remove this or replace it with a link to your video archive. This code should work with most video embed codes. Be sure to change the width and height so everything fits nicely into your sidebar.

And that’s it. Now all you need to do when adding a new video post is:

1. Assign the post to your video category
2. Paste your embed code into the content and your ‘embed’ custom field
3. And Publish Your Post!

A WordPress blog is an easy way to establish a dynamic online presence however it’s also very easy to get trigger happy with plugins and themes that ultimately slow down your websites loading time. Here’s a quick little checklist to help improve your blogs performance.

1) Test your blogs speed first and get it primed

Use tools like iWebTool’s Speed Test and Pingdom’s Full Page test to visually see your blogs weaknesses and identify any key areas to focus on.

You should also be sure that your HTML adheres to W3C guidelines by validating your website and fixing any problems.

2) Make sure you have reliable hosting

Choose a reliable host that has the most recent versions of PHP and MYsql installed as well as enough space/bandwidth to handle large loads. WordPress has it’s own list of recommended hosts.

Here are a few others worth checking out:

• HostGator
• Fat Cow
• GoDaddy
• Lunar Pages
• Host Monster

3) Handle your images properly

Images can put a huge strain on your server’s load time if not managed properly. Your images don’t need to be any higher than 72 DPI and should be resized before being inserted into your post. Resizing images with HTML can distort the image and increase it’s loading time.

It also might be a good idea to disable hotlinking so no one outside of your website is using up your resources. All you have to do is navigate to your .htaccess file and insert the following code. (Note: If you are unfamiliar with how htaccess works, you may want to skip this step or contact a web developer for help)

It also wouldn’t hurt to cache your commenter’s gravatar images if you are currently displaying them on your site.

4) Easy with the javscript calls

Calls to 3rd party javascripts seem to be the main culprit in slowing down WordPress blogs. Between all the analytics packages available and social media enhancements you can make, their are tons of ways to slow down your blog. It really comes down to just choosing wisely. Do you really need that nifty little MyBlogLog widget? Is Google friend connect that important to your blogs strategy?

Two easy ways to cut down on the amount of time is takes to load whatever scripts you deem are necessary is to:

• Move javascript to an external file so browsers can cache the scripts.
• Move any remaining scripts to your WordPress’s footer.php

5) Don’t load too many videos at once

Too many flash videos on one page is a sure way to use up all of someones memory trying to load your page. I worked around this problem by assigning all video posts to the same category and not displaying any posts from that category on the home page. I just placed the following code above my “WordPress loop”:

Another easy fix would be to use the <!–more–> tag above your code that embeds the video in your post. This would only prevent the video itself from displaying on your home page.

6) Control your plugins

Only make calls to plugins when you need them by only calling them on the pages they will be used on.

This code only displays “function code here” when you are viewing the “archives” page. A full list of all the conditional tags can be found here.

Also be careful not to install too many plugins in general and disable and remove any plugins that are not being used.

7) Cache Your Pages

The WP Super Cache plugin is probably the easiest way to seemingly increase your blogs loading time. It saves a copy of your website to a file on your server so WordPress only need to call that file rather than all the SQL and PHP it normally has to run. It comes in very useful when you have traffic spikes from certain social media sites.

8) Reduce SQL queries and PHP calls

Yoast has a great post that can help significantly reduce the number of calls your blog makes to your database. It also wouldn’t hurt to clean up your database either manually or with a plugin like WP DB Manager.

Another thing you can do that might speed up your database is to disable post revisions.

-

I hope someone finds this useful. Are there anymore tips you would recommend for speeding up a WordPress blog’s loading time?

- Photo by kevindean

(Note: This code is meant to be put in your WordPress Template. However, it should be easy to modify it for other uses.)

Awhile back, I tweeted about how I wasn’t a huge fan of the AddThis button and I felt the need for more actionable social sharing buttons. That led to a few conversations with an AddThis representative about how I could still use their JavaScript to help track my custom buttons usage.

So now, with this code, you can use any custom social bookmarklet you like, and still track the button usage.

So first and foremost you will need an AddThis account.

Then you need to add the AddThis javascript to your HTML. I like to put it in the footer so all of my content can load first.

Next, you will need to add the following javascript, substituting the “YOUR-ACCOUNT-ID” with your AddThis username. I usually put this right above the first link that will be using the AddThis code.

Finally you will need to add the ‘onclick’ javascript to the anchor tag like I do in the example below. The key here is to put the name of the service you wish the button to link to where I have inserted ‘stumbleupon’ below. A full list of services can be found on the AddThis custom services page.

So that is how I am able to track my sharing button usage on my site through AddThis without using the AddThis button.

I talked a little about my Twitter following strategy back in a previous post but I wanted to expand a bit.

First you should know I am a very active follower. I take recommendations very seriously as well as any incoming replies.

Then there is my ‘social media’ inbox. I’ve basically just set my GMail to move all Twitter follow requests to a separate folder for easy sorting and general management. Then I begin the daunting task of opening each new followers Twitter page to scrutinize their stream.

One time I went a week without checking my ‘social media’ box and then spent the next 2 hours checking 350 Twitter profiles. It’s not so bad once you get in the groove. I try to keep each profile view down to a couple seconds looking for a couple key points:

The user’s bio/website/profile pic

I like to know I am following a real person and this could be the first giveaway. I also personally stay away from people pushing MLMs, porn and press release feeds.

The user’s conversation quotient

Your conversation quotient is simply the ratio of total tweets to total replies. The average is said to be around 25% so that’s more or less my bearing for success. The higher your conversation quotient, the more likely I am going to follow you back.

You can learn more about the conversation quotient as well as view in depth statistics at twitter-friends.com.

Any signs of robots

I don’t get along with robots for some reason so I just avoid them. This includes follow schemes and auto replies.

And that’s about it. It all boils down to following real people talking to other real people. It’s becoming easier and easier to see through the bullshit, so don’t kid yourself.

I love talking to people about the tools they are using to efficiently track conversations in social media. Everybody has there own methods they’ve developed over time and their own goals they wish to achieve.

Most of my Tweeting revolves around TweetGrid and Twhirl. TweetGrid always seems to catch my new replies a split second before Twhirl will so I keep TweetGrid running in the background at all times.

There are a couple very cool features built into TweetGrid that allow me to track local, relevant and high profile conversations.

First there’s the local search. I’ve been using this feature via Twitter’s advanced search tips before it was officially revamped and released in TweetGrid. It’s a fun way to keep up with the local scene as well as find some local tweeps.

Next we have Groups. Keeping up with 2000+ followers can become quite a hassle. To be sure I don’t miss anything too important, I’ve put together a list of friends and tweeps I’ve conversed with in the past that provide value. The list changes on a weekly basis and is usually dominated by the same people (as you can see in the attached photo). But it keeps me in the loop.

I also track terms associated with me and my blog. I recently released my first wordpress plugin and like to keep track of it’s mentions in Twitter. It’s also a great way for me to keep tabs on any problems people might be having with my plugin.

I usually leave a spot for my interests. This grid does not have it, but I usually have a spot for tracking bands I like, games I play and anything else I’m interested in.

And last but not least I can keep track of my friends timeline and DMs thanks to some recent TweetGrid updates.

The one thing I cannot stress enough is the speed at which TweetGrid produces results. I’ve yet to use it as a replacement to tweetchat for jourchat and other hashtag related discussions but I could easily see it being a suitable substitution.

The ReTweet plays a pivotal role in the viral capabilities of Twitter. I’m not going to get into all the viral sciences of Twitter because Dan Zarrella is already doing that. Instead I want to discuss some basic simple rules that can encourage the ReTweeting of your Tweets.

1) Keep It Short

I usually keep it less than 120 characters to be sure there is enough room for people to add RT @username before my Tweet. When people have to trim your Tweet down to ReTweet it properly you run the risk of them not following through.

2) Make Sure Your Link Works

You would be surprised how many people post bad links without even knowing it. Some reasons this could happen are:

• You posted the wrong URL
• You posted an incomplete URL
• You added an extra character to your URL (example.com/abcd and example.com/abcd? are two different links)
• The URL shortening service you are using is down (I’ve been having problems with Twurl)

3) Don’t ReTweet Too Often

There are bots made for this. Your main goal on Twitter should be to provide valuable content and form relationships with like minded Tweeps. How am I supposed to get to know you if all you do is ReTweet other people.

4) Learn What Works

Check out what is trending on sites like Retweetist to learn what is working for other people. This is a great way to learn how to structure your Titles as well as what other people are finding interesting. You should also review some of Dan Zarrella’s research about “The 20 Words and Phrases That Will Get You the Most ReTweets“.

5) Become A Trusted Source

Remember to share other people’s work as well as your own. If you are successfully forming relationships on Twitter then there will be a group of people willing to share your Tweet.

You’ll notice that most of my tips revolve around convenience and honesty, because that is what social media is about. ReTweets are a great way to get your good name out there and develop a solid loyal following. Just take an extra two seconds next time to make sure your Tweet is fully ReTweetable.

Side Note: I’m still torn on whether or not it is okay to ask for a ReTweet. It seems as if Twitter is torn as well (Twitter Poll via ProBlogger).

- Photo by swanksalot

Third party services that sent out automatic direct messages to new followers were all the rage a few months back. Even still it’s a popular solution for the “lazy twitterer” hoping to snag some extra traffic for their company’s blog or website.

There are two main websites responsible for the auto DM epidemic, SocialToo and TweetLater. Both are great sites that have just been abused by their users.

Thankfully, both sites recognize the auto DM problem and have provided ways to opt out from receiving further communications via automated direct messages from their sites.

To put a complete stop from receiving these messages you should opt out from both sites.

Opting Out From SocialToo

SocialToo is currently the harder of the two to opt out from.

1. You will need to go to socialtoo.com and create an account.
2. Log In and click on “Change your Twitter and Facebook Preferences”
3. Navigate toward the bottom of the page and check next to “Turn off automatic Direct Messages from other SocialToo.com users?”

You should be all set. Now on to TweetLater.

Opting Out From TweetLater

1. Log in to Twitter.
2. Follow @OptMeOut. (@OptMeOut will follow you back shortly)
3. Once you receive an email stating you’ve been followed back, send a DM to @OptMeOut. (You can write whatever you want in the DM, it does not matter.)

That is all. You will receive a confirmation DM from @OptMeOut at which point you can unfollow them or just be on your way. The best part is that you do not need a TweetLater account to opt out.

* Update (8/3/2009) *

Here are a couple new services you can opt out from.

• SpyMaster
• Fun 140
• Twables

Waiting on @lolplaying to add a way to opt out from receiving auto-dms from their games. (see update below)

I can’t find who made Mobster World so I can’t ask them how to opt out.

Please let me know of any other services that send auto-dms on Twitter that also provide a way to opt out so I can add it to the list.

* Update (9/8/2009) *

Still no response from @lolplaying however they have provided an opt out for lolquiz.com

I used to be a big fan of TwitterLocal until the landing page started displaying this message:

Since Twitter cut off their Jabber feed from TwitterLocal, we had to rely purely on the XML API, which meant that only about 20% of Tweets from the public timeline got into TwitterLocal.

Which in turn forced them to shut down the web service and create a desktop app.

I personally have enough applications running on my desktop and preferred to keep my conversations organized in my browser. So it’s a good thing Twitter has it’s own TwitterLocal type service built into it that is actually very easy to use. It’s called geocode and can be used right inside Twitter Search.

The geocode docu reads as follows:

geocode: returns tweets by users located within a given radius of the given latitude/longitude, where the user’s location is taken from their Twitter profile. The parameter value is specified by “latitide,longitude,radius”, where radius units must be specified as either “mi” (miles) or “km” (kilometers). 

Well this is all fine and dandy if you know the latitude and longitude of your location off the top of your head. To make my life easier (and hopefully now yours), I created a Yahoo Pipe that creates a geocode for you as well as links you to a page that can display the results.

You can click the link that was generated to view your local results instantly or you can copy your geocode into your favorite Twitter Search engine. Geocode can be used in most Twitter Search engines like Tweet Explorer, TweetGrid and plain old Twitter Search.

I personally use geocode in one of my grid blocks in TweetGrid so I am always up to date on local happenings.

Wondering why you’re not seeing any results from your marketing efforts in social media? Probably because you are doing it wrong. Here are a few things you can try doing differently.

Twitter

I feel like Twitter is the easiest one to do right and somehow so many people do it wrong.

First you have your spray and prayers. They follow everyone on TwitterPacks and post one link in their feed that sends them to their website. If very little untargetted traffic is your thing then by all means go for it. You won’t last very long as Twitter is slowly getting better at filtering out the trash in its intertubes.

So the easiest way to use Twitter for business is to develop a following through honest communication.

Wondering why no one’s following you back?

• You’re following too many people
• You never filled out your profile
• You never post anything
• You only post things from your blog
• You’re too hot to be real (or too ugly to be followed)
• You sound like a robot

Key to Success: Reach out to others

I find that those that become resources in their communities often thrive at building trust as well as followers.

Facebook and LinkedIn

Facebook and LinkedIn are great places to network by using their groups and micro communities to find like minded individuals. However, people often overlook the potential in niche community sites outside of the main stream social media. These smaller communities are filled with people that might actually like your service and even welcome it.

Another reason why your marketing efforts won’t work on Facebook is simply because they are not welcome. Facebook is a platform to connect with friends, not your brand. If you once again focus your efforts on becoming a resource rather than just throwing yourself out there, you may see better results.

Key to Success: Be yourself

Like I said, “Facebook is a platform to connect with friends, not your brand”. Use these tools to network the same way you would at a party or any other networking event.

Blog

Blogging can be the foundation of your companies online reputation or it can get overlooked completely. There’s no shortcut to developing quality content for your posts. Blog about things you actually know about.

Wondering why no one is subscribing to your feed?

• Your posts are too long
• Your topics don’t provide value
• Your layout compromises your post
• Your title isn’t appealing
• No one knows your blog exists

Key to Success: Focus on writing unique content for a specific audience. Also be sure to seek out your target audience and connect with them honestly and openly.

Wrap Up

There are a lot of specifics you can get into when identifying your target audience online and how you can best reach them. I look at all of my social media conversations and try to be as completely transparent as possible. I also try to maintain a healthy mix of personal and business interactions as I do in life. Remember that social media is just a tool that helps extend our real life beyond it physical limits and it should be treated as such.

So what do you think? What else might be holding back someone’s social media efforts from seeing any results?

- Photo by coxy

I joined Twitter in October of 07 not really knowing what it had in store for me. Well one thing led to another and as I reached my 1000 follower milestone I began to regret my original naming decision. Then I received a tweet from Ari Herzog concerning my Twitter name and that was it, I had to change.

Here is how I changed my Twitter name without losing any followers.

First, make the name change. You can change your Twitter name at any time on the ‘settings’ page at Twitter.com.

Second, create a new account with your old Twitter name. You don’t have to do much with this account. Maybe add a URL to your new twitter account and post a single tweet notifying people that your name has changed.

You won’t lose any of your followers and they’ll all see the name change as their Twitter clients refresh.

Notes

I seem to have missed a few @replys right after the switch. Most Twitter apps won’t update your existing tweets with your new name until they are restarted. As a result you are at risk of getting some @replys sent to your old account. This could also happen with people you talk to regularly. Be sure to continue to monitor your old account so you can catch missed replies and update your follower of the name change.

I also made it a point to run across all of the social networks that list my Twitter handle and update them. This included sites like MyBlogLog, FriendFeed assorted ning sites, etc. It may be awhile before my new Twitter account shows up on Google for Jon Bishop.

Don’t forget to update your Twitter link on your blog if you have one.

My TwitterGrade went down .9 points … oh well. I also had duplicate listings for awhile but this was solved by retrieving an updated grade for the old account. Other Twitter stats sites are showing decreased numbers but I’m sure this will even out over time.

I’ve talked about variable video and personalized video a little in the past. Now let’s look at some more examples and break down some of their components.

Here are some examples:

• Inspiring Escapes
• Dexter
• Haunted house
• Walts wisdom
• Carmen has a crush on you
• News3Online
• Disney World – New
• I Love You – New

There are 4 main effects that can be achieved in a variable video:

• Variable text – example: holding up a card with the persons name
• Variable image – example: holding up a picture of the person
• Variable audio – example: saying the persons name with actors face covered
• Variable video scenes – example: saying the persons name without actors face covered

If you wanted to create a variable video campaign, there are multiple ways to go about it. All of the above effects can be recreated using Adobe Flash. If you only plan on doing variable text and/or imaging in the video you may not need 3rd party software. If you do wish to integrate your variable video campaign with other software, XMPie recently announced video integration capabilities with their system.

Another important aspect of variable video is the story. To properly recreate any of the videos shown in this post you would need actors, sets, equipment, scripts, etc. But, one great thing about variable video is it’s surprise factor. You could get away with crappy quality video as long as the personalization tied in seamlessly.

The most important part of any variable video campaign is it’s final conversion screen. This is where you encourage personalizing the video for someone else. Someone the user believes will find the video entertaining. People love seeing their name in lights and now everyone can be part of the internet video phenomenon.

Contact Me to learn more about variable video.

Everything you need to know about Twitter in as short of a post as possible.

What is Twitter?

Twitter is a social networking and micro-blogging service that allows users to send “updates” (or “tweets”; text-based posts, up to 140 characters long) to the Twitter website, via short message service (e.g. on a cell phone), instant messaging, or a third-party application such as Twitterrific or Facebook. – From Wikipedia

Commoncraft also has a pretty good explanation of what twitter is on youtube.

Here are some Twinterviews about what people love about twitter.

Who do I follow?

First thing you can do is invite all of your friends through Twitters Find & Follow page. Once that is done you can move on to websites like Who Should I Follow, Twittersearch and Twubble. (More Twitter Search Engines)

There are also lists you can scan through at TwitterPack and Twitterholic as well as some Internet Marketing Gurus on Twitter.

It is probably a good idea to view a users Twitter page before you follow them to be sure they aren’t spam.

How do i update?

There are A LOT of ways to update your twitter status. The most obvious (and sometimes most reliable) is the Twitter site itself.

There is also an array of third-party apps to help feed your twitter hunger:

• TwitterFox
• Twhirl
• Twitterrific
• Snitter
• Twitkit

Or you can automate the process with TwitterFeed.

Where else can i put my twitter feed?

You can view your feed in any feed aggregator (Google Reader, FriendFeed, Outlook, etc). Your feed can be accessed at

• http://twitter.com/statuses/user_timeline/username.rss – Your Feed
• http://twitter.com/statuses/friends_timeline/username.rss – Your Friends Feed

as well as by clicking the RSS button at the bottom of your Twitter page.

Another popular thing to do is add your Twitter feed to facebook. Twitter has its own Facebok App or you can just sync your facebook satus with Twitter. I personally chose to use FriendFeed because it was the least intrusive.

What are some cool apps I can use?

Check out the Twitter Fan Wiki Apps Page.

I hope someone found this informative. Please feel free to follow me: @spazcer

I talked awhile back about personalized video and how it could be (is) the next big marketing medium. The benefits of personalized video are obvious, you’ll get better quality personal information and it is very viral.

The key here is personalization and interactivity. The internet took a turn a few years back with the rise of social and interactive networks. From that point on, the user was given control, and thats the way it going to be from now on. I showed in my previous post how successful personalized video is and now, I want to show you how easy it is to pull off.

Here are two videos i made when first experimenting with how flash could be used to manipulate video:

The best part is that i made each of those videos in under 15 minutes.

All you need to do it upload your video in flash:

1) File -> Import -> Import Video

(Note: I had to rerecord my video as a wmv because i could not get avi to work properly)

2) Then choose:

“Embed video in SWF and play in timeline” is what allows you to manipulate movieclips on top of your video. Now what you could do with this is map certain items to sync with the video and possibly even change those items at run time. You could insert personalized images, text, etc.

There’s a small back story to this entry. Ive been working with an open source content management system for my company Magicomm and it eventually came time when we decided we were going to start our own blog. My goal was to use the preexisting framework of the CMS to smoothly integrate the blogging software into the back end of the system. It turns out this was the easy part….

So now the goal of this entry. When it came time to output the data into your common blog format I found that their were some small things that helped my blog get indexed by popular blog directories as well as other assorted social media aggregations.

So ultimately I’m assuming you understand the general format and benefits of a blog. You’ve got your title, author, timestamp, and a post of some sort. Other optional features include keywords, permalinks, comments, and an RSS feed.
Now I want to go into a little more detail about the code side of this and show you where some simple HTML syntax separates the blog from the..um… not-blog.

Rel-tag

First I’ll talk a little about my favorite blogging feature, the ‘rel-tag‘. Rel-tag is basically a keyword that physically sits on your screen as apposed to META keywords which hide in your page’s header. Now when you’re displaying ‘rel-tag’ that relate to a specific post you use the relationship attribute of the anchor tag to define the hypertext as a ‘tag’.

As you can see it it pretty simple to establish a tag. Basically rel-tag is a MicroFormat and what you are doing is declaring that this link is an author-designated keyword for this post. Also note that in the URL of the link I’ve separated the two words with a + sign instead of a space (You could also use %20). You want to try and be sure that your tags relate and are appropriate for your post. Alot of social media aggregators use this information along with specific information in your RSS feed to categorize your post and you can often see your tags displayed on sites such as technorati.com and mybloglog.com.

Permalinks

The second thing I would like to talk about are permalinks which are also often called bookmarks. Permalinks are basically links back to a specific entry that will never change. This makes them ideal for bookmarking which is why it comes as no surprise that the following helps you establish a permalink/bookmark.

As you can see we once again use the relationship tag to define the Permalink. This is not always necessary however Ive found that certain social media sites use the bookmark relationship to determine if this link is a permalink or not.

RSS

Now last but not least there is the RSS feed. I could go on forever about the different formats and everything you can stuff into a solid feed, but i wont. The only thing i want to mention here is how to make your feed available to social media sites (seems to be the theme here). Basically what you do is use a combination of rel=”alternate” and type=”application/rss+xml” to define a META link to an RSS file.

Thats pretty much it. I hope that between the 3 things I’ve showed you and some of the resources ive presented you should have a social media friendly blog thats ready for the masses.

So i wanted to add the little icon next to my URL in the address bar so i went on a hunt for the easiest solution (kinda counter-productive as i could have just downloaded a program however I so love to find new SAAS apps online). So i finally ran across this site. This was pretty much exactly what i was looking for and it was very easy to use. I went on and created 7 icons:

I ended up using the first one i made for my site, but they still all look kinda cool.