Building a website that focuses on the user, is targeted to a specific audience with a well defined offer and has an abundance of useful information is an engaging challenge.  Work continues after the site is launched -and for the life of the site, when the main effort shifts from building and launching to growing traffic. From the start, any web project needs to formulate a strategy for attracting visitors. Here are three key elements to think about when engaging this high-priority activity.

1. MAILING LIST: The mailing list of opt-in contacts is gold. These are the people who have given you permission to contact them with relevant high-value information. This list provides a firm foundation for any marketing initiative and growing that list should be a high priority. All that’s needed is a name and an email address. Do you have a list? Even if it’s only ten names, put that list together. Don’t delay, start now. To build a list there are some great services available including: Feedblitz, Feedburner, and Aweber, to name a few.

2. CONTENT: You have your brand new site up. Great! Feeding the site regularly –as in at least a few times a week, with text content is critical for feeding the spiders and key to being found in search. Producing content takes time and for the lone individual with a mission it can be a challenge. But it can become addictive in a good way. We might not always hit our posting target, but that’s ok, life happens. Just keep trying.

3. COMMUNITY: The whole point of having a site is -among other things, to let others know what you can do for them. Engaging with social media and building a community is that powerful tool we all need to build meaningful connections and get our message out. If nobody knows who we are, what we do, or what we can help with, what is the point?

While social media is valuable for connecting, finding new acquaintances and building credibility, it almost goes without saying that these are public spaces and should be treated as such. As in the realtime world, if we don’t want something known, we shouldn’t reveal it. But being a hermit is counterproductive.

Among the many tools available I use the following…

• Diigo
• Facebook
• Flikr
• LinkedIn
• StumbleUpon
• Twitter
• Youtube

Embrace and enjoy the adventure.  Happy building!

So, you’ve decided to give Twitter a whirl and see what it can do for you. You may or may not have a specific objective in mind and just want to see if Twitter is a fit for you.  That’s perfectly fine, and the way I approached it. But however you start, and for whatever reason, there are few simple things you must do if you want to give yourself the best chance of developing  relationships with real people.

Of the many options that should be configured in your Twitter account settings  panel, there are four essentials that should be tended to right away. For arguments sake, I’m going to assume you want to use Twitter for business.

• Name: Use your real name when registering a personal account. Using a false persona makes it difficult to develop a long-term  relationship especially if one of your goals is to using Twitter as a marketing tool for business. A real name builds confidence and trust which is critical for a  meaningful relationship whether online, or offline.

• Picture: Like your name a picture of yourself will strengthen trust, and represent you in the best possible light. The most common Twitter photo is a cropped photograph of your face. Sometimes people use their Twitter Photo to make a statement, overlaying their image with symbolic graphic additions such as ribbons or borders. The free site Twibbon (http://tibbon.com) has many design choice suggestions. Visuals are powerful so use this feature wisely.

• Weblink: Insert a link to a website home page, blog, Facebook personal or business page, LinkedIn profile, or any other link that you think would provide useful information about you, your company, and your offering. Eighty percent of your tweets should be useful information rather than self -promotion. The URL you have listed on your Twitter homepage will serve as your proxy giving people the option to chose for themselves whether or not to find out more about your. Remember, Twitter is about meeting people, not forcing yourself on them

• Bio: In keeping with Twitter’s character, the bio line gives you a chance to further define yourself, in 160 characters or less. This could be strictly business, or personal, or a combination of both. Or empty. I’d recommend filling it out though.

Happy tweeting and remember: it’s not the number of followers you have or the number of people you’re following but the quality of the tweets and the relationships you build. Give Twitter a chance to produce results, and for that, I would suggest working it for a year, at least. The results will come, but you must be active with your engagement.

Follow me on Twitter:  @johnsutton4

Recommended reading: ‘Twitter Marketing An Hour a Day’ Hollis Thomases

Illustration: Leyla Torres