via: Chantal Coolsma

Chris Brogan’s 50 Power Twitter tips, read the blog post on his blog and of course it is a fantastic resource for more social media tips.

Use Google Places to create your free listing. When potential customers search Maps for local information, they’ll find your business: your address, hours of operation, even photos of your storefront or products. It’s easy, free, and you don’t need a website of your own. via: Google Places

More and more people are using Google Maps every day. You can add your business to Google Maps by signing into Google Places with your Google Account. If you don’t have a Google Account then you can make on in a couple of minutes. By adding your business you will increase your visibility to be found. While mobile internet will only continue to increase it makes sense to already be easy to find.

Besides endlessly surfing the web, making websites and posting on all of my blogs I also really enjoy helping people understand and get more out of social networking. Over the past weeks I have been assisting Azra Secerbegovic of ASpa Health and Beauty setting up her Social Media accounts. It was great to see that even though she just recently started using Twitter she had already grasped the most important element: just do it!

So often people over think a tweet and then you can guess what happens next, the moment has passed, you missed your chance and now you have to think of something else. I am not saying that you shouldn’t think about what you tweet, but a golden rule nr.2 is ‘if you don’t want people linking to it  - don’t post it’.

While you might already be actively thinking and planning your social media  Twitter strategy don’t forget to customize your Twitter page! There are websites where you can create a Twitter background but if you are looking for something special or different contact me for a quote.

P.S. If you live near The Hague in The Netherlands start following Azra on Twitter, besides being a very nice person I have heard that she gives the best facials ever, certainly worth a try.

At the Women’s Business Initiative International we recently started a blogging group. The aim is to collaborate, share best practices and most important of all to BLOG. We often, me included, neglect our blogs so this is a great opportunity to post at least one blog before leaving the room.

Sparks are flying in the room and idea’s are being shared, one blog post down, 3 to go for me as I have more blogs. Here’s a list of the bloggers who attended, well worth a visit! So far I think all attendees are WordPress bloggers too!

Bloggers:
Melinda Roos – melindaroos.com
Navah Hocstein – tag-on.com
Nina du Pre – ninadupre.com
Natalie Carstens – tigscreations.com
Suzy Oge – suzyoge.com

“Is social media a fad? Or the biggest shift since the industrial revolution?”

Watch the video, what are you thoughts?

The other option is to add icons with html and link them to your social media profiles. A great site is Icon Dock, which recently updated their icon pack with Hyves (Dutch networking site) and FourSquare icons. Komodo Media also has a rich and refined social media icon pack for all major websites.

Maybe you are not yet familiar with html, why not give it a go? There are heaps of websites (like divageeks.com) where you can find links to free icon resources. Why not make your icons look different than everybody else’s! If you are ready to take the plunge into your first html experiment follow the steps after the jump.

How to add a hyper-link to an image in your WordPress sidebar

1. Upload the image (icon) to the WordPress media library
2. Copy the ‘file link’ at the bottom of the upload page
3. Copy this html code
4. Add a ‘text widget’ to your WordPress sidebar
5. Paste the html code into the ‘text widget’
6. Replace the image link with the ‘file link’
7. Replace the ‘hyperlinkcode.com’ link with your social media profile link
8. Save the new text widget
9. Refresh your website page to see the changes

Let me know how you got on and if you know of any other must see icon resources in the comments.

The change from ‘become a fan’ to the ‘like button’  is huge. It has removed a barrier for users to share online content with their friends in one easy click (if already logged into Facebook). Think about it becoming a fan is a serious matter but liking a site, article or photo is easier and less intimidating.

If you want to read up on what the actual consequences for bloggers and site owners are Jeffrey Zeldman wrote an great blog post ‘Like buttons falling from the sky‘. Interesting to see if the ‘like button’ is here to stay and how this will impact the web.