Many U.S. Senators and Representatives are tweeting opinions, updates, images, documents, etc. these days, and Twitter can be a very useful, if not an essential tool, to learn about what’s going on directly from each member, especially regarding controversial legislation such as SOPA. An easy to use but powerful web tool (it's also free) named PolitickerUSA can save you a lot of time and effort informing you as to what members of congress are tweeting about right now. In one location you can quickly access the non-stop real-time stream of tweets from Senators, Reps, President Obama, go [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | How To: Twitter | Search Engines: People Search | Search Engines: Real Time Search | Twitter: Search

The role of the online community manager (CM) was born out of the need for brands to connect with relevant people in a meaningful way. To establish authority and offer value to a relevant community by way of sharing awesome, complimentary content, to solve problems as they arise, to monitor and moderate topical conversations—that was the Social Media Community Manager Job Description, and in many ways, still is. These forms of engagement, if meant to be worthwhile, should always be tethered to actionable marketing key performance indicators (KPIs). In that respect, CMs aren’t just ma [...]

Related Topics: B2B Search Marketing | Channel: Social | How To | How To: Twitter | Intermediate

This week, Twitter launched the instant follow button for websites to make it even easier to connect visitors to Twitter accounts.  This button joins the dynamic Facebook Like button that allows for logged in users to instantly connect to the social site without leaving the website. The main benefit of this new button is that now instead of two clicks, users only require one click and aren’t taken off of your website. But Where Should I Use The New Follow Button? The addition of yet another new button has many webmasters scratching their heads trying to figure out where to put the [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Features: General | How To: Twitter | Twitter

Where the standard Tweet button gives you little control over the button’s appearance, functionality or call-to-action (you can Tweet, Tweet or Tweet) you have virtually unlimited options when encouraging users to follow you on Twitter. This is because the following action takes place on Twitter itself, rather than on your website:  you’re essentially encouraging a user to click on a link. As such, there’s more optimization and testing opportunities. Call-to-Action Your call-to-action can take the form of a text link, a linked graphic or both. This gives you the opportunity to crea [...]

Related Topics: Beginner | Channel: Social | How To: Social Media Marketing | How To: Twitter

The official tweet button from Twitter is easy to implement, aggregates direct tweets and retweets in its counter, and includes a mechanism to encourage following (discussed below). These features almost certainly outweigh the slender benefits of employing third-party tweeting tools (the main benefit being more flexibility in styling the tweet button's appearance). There are a number of things that can be tested in order to improve the number of Tweets a page receives. Display Type The Tweet button is available in three versions, all versions sharing the same color, size and label ("Twee [...]

Related Topics: Beginner | Channel: Social | How To: Social Media Marketing | How To: Twitter

When you successfully encourage a visitor to share content they discover on your website, that action strongly recommends your website to that visitor’s friends, extends its reach, and increases its visibility in the search engines. That same visitor may also be persuaded to make a long-term connection with you or your business, forging an incredibly valuable bond with you or your brand. For these reasons, the structure of almost any contemporary website should advance the goal of converting casual visitors into engaged participants. For Twitter sharing a resource directly from its [...]

Related Topics: Beginner | Channel: Analytics | How To | How To: Facebook | How To: Social Media Marketing | How To: Twitter | Search & Conversion

Even though the importance of choosing the best words for every tweet and bio has probably been discussed at length on Search Engine Land and others, paying attention to exactly how these carefully chosen keywords can be used is the second half of the equation. There are many places on Twitter that may be the last thing to think about when it comes to starting a Twitter account. However, because Bing and Google now count tweets, Facebook posts, and other social media activity in their search results, search engine optimization is more important than ever. The SEO'd Twitter Profile The pro [...]

Related Topics: Beginner | Channel: Social | How To: Twitter | Search & Social

Looking for images that are being shared and posted in realtime? That image search space has gotten more competitive, as Nachofoto reenters the field. Below, what it offers, along with general realtime image searching tips using other services like Topsy, Google Realtime Search and Twitter itself. I've used realtime search tools often, in order to see if people are tweeting and sharing images from news events, such as when the tsunami hit Crescent City. At times, they can provide a faster way to see images before news outlets themselves. Nachofoto Nachofoto launched in April 2010 but clos [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Google: Real Time Search | How To: Twitter | Search Engines: Photo & Image Search | Search Engines: Real Time Search | Top News | Topsy | Twitter

Get An Active Twitter Account This is clearly the first step and sounds very obvious - but many people will be disappointed to discover that simply opening an account and tweeting their own content doesn’t miraculously fire their pages up the rankings! Your Twitter account cannot exist in isolation if it’s going to achieve anything - so you need to connect with relevant friends and industry peers. That means doing more than posting links to your own website. You need to enter conversations, respond to questions and queries, talk to customers who mention your brand, and interact. It [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | How To: Social Media Marketing | How To: Twitter | Search & Social

Do a search for politics on Bing Social Search, and its new "who to follow on Twitter" feature offer exactly one person: Sarah Palin. Gary Price of ResourceShelf tipped me to this gem. Hey, perhaps it's designed to help balance out the seemingly left-leaning recommendations that Twitter makes: No Fox News or Tea Baggers there among the Huffington Post, CNN, NPR and Congressional Quarterly! Actually, the latter three are arguably more middle in the road, though you might not see it that way, if you're on the right. How About Some Tea? For fun, let's do some side-by-side. How abo [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | How To: Twitter | Microsoft: Bing Social Search | Top News | Twitter

On the Daily Show earlier this week, Jon Stewart did a funny takedown of the White House and the Republicans having a back-and-forth on Twitter. But while the conversation was real, hunting it down to see it yourself an ordinary Twitter user is pretty tough. Replies Vs. Mentions The problem is due what I call "manual replies," something I wrote about yesterday in our The New Twitter & Search, An Illustrated Guide story. These are replies when someone is called out by name in a tweet, rather than being answered by using the actual reply button in Twitter or a Twitter application. Do th [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Features: General | How To: Twitter | Top News | Twitter

Within the past month, Twitter Search has radically matured. It has gained "relevant" tweets in addition to search ads. The changes are as much a revolution as when web search engines increased their relevancy and integrated search ads a decade ago. Searchers, search marketers -- take notice! Below, a guide to what's happened and what may come. Relevancy Ranking Vs. "Recency" Ranking To fully understand how radically Twitter Search has changed, let's compare to Google. When you search on Google, the results are generally listed in order of relevancy. That relevancy isn't always perfec [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Features: General | How To: Twitter | Search Engines: Real Time Search | Top News | Twitter

If you think social media provides value now, just wait. From a developer's standpoint, Twitter is an exciting application because of the freedom provided through their API. A rogue hacker can download one of the many Twitter libraries, connect to the API, query for the top trending topics at that time, take and put the trending topics in irrelevant tweets that are meant to spam Twitter, in the end 4chan'ing the trending topics that show on a user's home page for monetary gain. Let me explain. Or rather, let me quote Superman: "With great power comes great responsibility." Twitter has es [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | How To: Twitter

It's hard to justify the time spent on social media account management. But there are ways to measure the real value (monetary or otherwise) of fans on Facebook and followers on Twitter. These top two social media websites offer free advertising, an open customer service and communication platform and a demographics database all wrapped up in one, so knowing the value of fans and followers can be a big help when deciding how much time should be allotted to social media efforts. Here are some of the ways to measure how much Facebook and Twitter users are really worth. Number of quality fans [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Analytics | How To: Analytics | How To: Twitter | Social Media Marketing

Looking to find out how popular your blog post was on Twitter? Want to know what tweets people really enjoy? Well, these Twitter-based applications can help you see the most popular trends on Twitter by aggregating tweets. 1. Tweetmeme By far the most popular tweet aggregator, Tweetmeme lists the most popular links on Twitter. Much like Digg, the stories can then be viewed across 40+ different categories and also segmented by Images, News or Video. The top URLs for the day can be easily located in the popular sections. A user history can be found if you select a username, so you can se [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | How To: Twitter | Search & Social | Twitter

URL shortening services are experiencing a renaissance in the age of Twitter. When every character counts, these services reduce long URLs to tiny forms. But which is the best to use, when so many are offered and new ones seem to appear each day? Below, issues to consider and a breakdown of popular services, including recommendations and services to avoid (the new DiggBar being one of these). The URL Shortener Mega Chart NOTE (March 2011): I'm hoping to update this article in the near future. Much of the basics are still valid. But you should also see Google URL Shortener Opened To T [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | Features: General | How To: SEO | How To: Twitter | SEO: Domain Names & URLs | SEO: Redirects & Moving Sites | Social Media Marketing | Top News | Twitter

One of the problems with Twitter is knowing who to follow in particular areas. Now Kevin Rose has launched WeFollow, a nice directory of people organized into categories. It's not perfect, but it's a great start and well worth visiting. At the site, you'll see the top five people in popular categories such as celebrity, music and news. You can also drill-down into any category to see all the people listed in them. On the right-hand side of the home page, there's also a list of more popular categories: That list of popular categories (or tags) is dynamic and has already changed si [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEO | Features: General | How To: Links | How To: Twitter | Top News | Twitter

The Twitter social networking and micro-blogging service was launched only two years ago, but it's rocketing up in usage numbers quickly, and it seems likely to turn red-hot. Many companies are rapidly cluing into the promotional value, but smaller businesses appear slow to hop on the bandwagon. Here are a few tips on leveraging Twitter to help your locally-oriented business. As oft pointed-out among search marketers, Twitter links do not pass "link juice"—that is, they don't transfer PageRank value from Twitter to linked-to sites. Even though links in Twitter are nofollowed, there s [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | How To: Twitter | Local Search