Thank you so much to Todd Wickersty at Business Bullpen for inviting me to guest post on their blog today.  See the full post on their blog by clicking “read more” below!

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Those who are not active on Twitter (or have never signed up) frequently ask: “What’s the point?” or “Is this really going to help my business?”

The short answer is: yes.  I know that it works because it has worked for our business in 6 very distinct ways.  The holy grail of social media still leaves the question of how to effectively analyze social media efforts.  It seems that John Lovett and Jeremiah Owyang, from Web Analytics Demystified and the Altimeter Group, are on the right track for creating a framework.  Until then, the list of 6 will have to be statistics free.

Creating leads. Twitter helps foster relationships if used properly.  It’s a way to engage in conversation and offer answers when asked—without expecting anything in return.

Click here to read more…

The WordPress name is becoming more well-known outside industries who work with technology. It’s not as popular as the Facebook name, but more and more I run into people who have heard of WordPress. However, many of those people don’t know the difference between creating a website with WordPress.com vs. WordPress.org. It’s not too apparent either when you visit the home page of either site. You have to dig a little deeper to find an explanation.

Before I guide you on which WordPress road to travel, it’s important to know that both the WordPress.com and WordPress.org solutions contain the same core features for blogging and content management. You can create a blog in both. You can create a full-blown website using both.

They are also both free.

The choice boils down to this:

• If you are managing your website and you have no programming experience or desire to learn, WordPress.com is for you.
• If you do not want to pay for and/or deal with hosting, upgrades, and backups, WordPress.com is for you.

Simple enough, right? Aside from techies, who wouldn’t go with WordPress.com? If you dig a little deeper, the decision can get complicated.

While WordPress.com is a robust and fantastic solution, the WordPress.org solution is much more flexible. For example:

1. You are limited to about 70 themes (designs/layouts) on WordPress.com. There are over a thousand themes that can be used with the WordPress.org solution.
2. You cannot install plugins on a WordPress.com site. A plugin is an additional piece of functionality that enhances your WordPress website, which has already been programmed. For example, lets say you want to add a form that people must fill out to contact you. Contact forms are pretty standard on websites. The WordPress.org solution offers plugins that allow you to add a contact form to your WordPress site.

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