Question: What is Google PageRank?
Google PageRank (PR) is a number that represents the importance of an individual web page in the eyes of Google. Generally it is believed that when one web page links to another, it is actually casting a vote of confidence. That means good stuff to Google because their ultimate goal is to always deliver the most relevant, quality content to all of their users. So, when lots of sites (people, really) link to a specific web page, it shows Google that the page is popular.
In other words, if a page has a PR of 9 or 10 (10 being the highest), the page has won a popularity contest!
Is Google PageRank Important?
Well, that’s a great question. There is a lot of speculation as to whether a high PageRank benefits a website’s ranking in organic listings (SEO). However, it is ALWAYS good to have as many quality inbound links as possible directing people to your web pages.
If you have the Google toolbar installed in your browser, you can see the PageRank of each page as you browse the web. Don’t know if you have the Google toolbar, or want to install it? Let me know and I’ll be happy to help!
Question: I am an interior designer and I have a friend and colleague who is a real estate agent. We each would like to start a blog. Would it be effective for us to do a blog together since our two areas are related?
One of the first things to ask yourself when conceiving your blog is: “Who is my audience?” “Who is going to get benefit from the information I can share?” In this case, a combined interior design and real estate bIog may not be a very good idea. Are the people who are interested in interior design the same people as those who are interested in real estate? Not necessarily.
For instance, if your friend the real estate agent posts a blog about, say, the perils of buying a home in foreclosure, the person who is interested in buying vintage furniture for their living room will probably think “this blog doesn’t give me the info I’m looking for” and not come back.
However, that doesn’t mean that you should never co-write a blog. Many bloggers invite guest authors to post on their blogs if the content is valuable to the audience. For instance, I recently co-wrote a blog with Elizabeth Beskin of Fifth Avenue Digital. We attended the O’Reilly Twitter Boot Camp together and wrote “10 Things I Learned at Twitter Boot Camp” and posted it on our blogs.
I recommend “31 Days to Build a Better Blog” which is a terrific e-Book published by ProBlogger.net. It will really help you identify what you bring to the table in Social Media and get you on track.
I spend a lot of time these days talking to local businesses about Social Media and brainstorming about how they can use Blogs, Facebook, Twitter and other channels to increase their customer base. And it can be challenging, because in many cases (in spite of the fact that they may be using one or two social channels for their personal use people have a hard time seeing the connection between online social activities and their own businesses.
I came across this article in the New York Times that I think successfully illustrates the opportunities for local business using Twitter. Take a look and let me know your thoughts!
Mom-and-Pop Operators Turn to Social Media
http://preview.tinyurl.com/lcjpow
I’ve been spending a lot of time on Twitter lately. The more I use it, the more I discover about it. The more I use it, the more I learn how to use it more effectively. I have recently figured out a few little tricks that make Twitter a more productive tool for me, so I’d like to share them with you!
My particular goal on Twitter is to learn everything I can about Internet Marketing and Social Media and then share what I learn with my followers. I am always really concerned that my followers (and my potential followers) can easily understand what I am tweeting about.
So, if you have the same or similar goals, here are 4 tips that just may make your Twitter activity more productive.
- Leave Enough Space for the Link: When you RT (the ultimate form of flattery) a post that has a URL in it, leave enough space so you don’t run out of characters and wind up losing part of your tweet. Add-up the character count, i.e. RT @bevisible (that’s 12 chars right there) and even a shortened URL is at least 8 chars. If you run out of space, go back and find places for abbreviations or symbols in the original tweet to open up space.
- Same Goes for your “Native” Tweet: If you want people to re-tweet your tweets, try to follow the same rule (I break this one all the time :0( ). Try to keep your tweet as short as possible so when someone RT’s your tweet, they don’t have to worry about character counts.
- Don’t Get Too Personal: I am particular about who I follow. I use Twitter as a tool to be a better consultant, so I follow a lot of people who are in the Internet Marketing and Social Media arena. So, when someone follows me, I take a look at his or her profile before I follow back. If all I see in their tweets are snippets of conversations that mean nothing to me, I will most likely not follow them. So, take a look at your own profile from the point of view of a prospective follower every now and then. If you are engaging in a lot of one-to-one conversations with no reference points for an outsider, consider sending direct messages to them instead of clogging up your profile with tweets that only you can understand.
- Complete the Thought: When you are messaging back and forth with one of your followers about a link or an idea, repeat the link or idea in your tweets. For example, I will use this: “It was great to meet you at the Gravity Social Media Summit, www.gravitysummit.com” instead of “It was great to meet you.” Make sense? This way your followers know what you are talking about, and potential followers will be able to decide if what you are saying has value to them.
- Explain Why you Tweeted It: If something is interesting enough for you to tweet about, sometimes it’s great for your followers to know why. For example, if you read a blog post that you think is brilliant, when you tweet about it, tell your followers that. For example: “Just Blogging Isn’t Enough – You Have to Blog with Purpose, http://bit.ly/18EAYP, really good stuff here.”
Got some tips of your own? Would love to hear them.
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