Looking to kick-start your marketing efforts for 2012? Here are 50 of the brightest minds in the world sharing their thoughts on what it takes to succeed in marketing your products and services. Use some of your holiday downtime to check these blogs out and put your 2012 marketing plan together. If you want to sell more next year than you did this year these experts can help. Enjoy!

Danny Sullivan, Search Engine Land

1) Search Engine Land

http://searchengineland.com - Search Engine Land is a news and information site covering search engine marketing, searching issues and the search engine industry. The site is led by journalist Danny Sullivan, who has been covering search for the past 11 years.

Seth's Blog, Seth Godin

2) Seth’s Blog

http://sethgodin.typepad.com- Seth Godin’s riffs on marketing, respect, and the ways ideas spread. If you don’t know Seth, the writer of numerousbestselling books about marketing, you need to check out his ever popular blog.

3) PSFK

http://www.psfk.com - PSFK is the go-to source for new ideas for creative business. PSFK.com actively reports on the latest changes and creative ideas in popular, consumer and business culture.

4) TrendHunter.com

http://www.trendhunter.com - With 31,000,000 monthly views, TrendHunter.com is the world’s largest, most popular trend community. Each day, Trend Hunter features a daily dose of micro-trends, viral news and pop culture.

5) Entrepreneur.com

http://entrepreneur.com - Entrepreneur delivers distinctive content on every road taken by the independent thinkers, builders and leaders driving economies across the world.

Daniel Roth, The LinkedIn Blog

6) The LinkedIn Blog

http://blog.linkedin.com - Editor Daniel Roth manages this blog that offers industry insights from one of the biggest social media players around, LinkedIn.

7) ProBlogger

http://www.problogger.net - ProBlogger helps bloggers to add income streams to their blogs. This site is dedicated to helping other bloggers learn the skills of blogging, share their own experiences and promote the blogging medium.

Robert Scoble, Scobleizer

8) Scobleizer

http://scobleizer.com - Robert Scoble is an employee of Rackspace, which can help you with all your hosting needs. He is chief troublemaker in the building43 community of Internet fanatics.

9) Get Rich Slowly

http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/ - Get Rich Slowly — recently named a best blog of 2011 by Time magazine and most inspiring money blog by Money magazine — is devoted to sensible personal finance.

10) Blippitt.com

http://www.blippitt.com - Blippitt is your top destination on the web for the latest breaking & outrageous news and viral videos. Headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland, and one of the top 30,000 websites in the world, Blippitt offers a unique mix of pop culture news, viral videos, a touch of the odd and bizarre, and even daily deals!

11) Emailwire.com

http://www.emailwire.com – EmailWire.Com is a global newswire and press release distribution service. Uses viral marketing, XML, RSS, FTP feeds and E-mail Alerts to distribute news releases to major newswires, vertical news portals social networks and to journalists.

12) Search Engine Journal

http://www.searchenginejournal.com - Search Engine Journal, established in 2003, is a 7 year old publication of Alpha Brand Media, which specializes in a community approach to the reporting of search engine news and the sharing of Search Engine Marketing knowledge and tactics.

13) Copyblogger

http://www.copyblogger.com - Want more traffic, links, subscribers, and a profit-generating website? Copyblogger gives you the solutions you need to succeed.

14) FRESHNESS

http://www.freshnessmag.com - reshness explores the landscape of a boundless culture with no definite origins or home. The site is the face of a global community concerned with the acquisition of goods, for reasons both known and covert, in a studied and tactful manner. Our world has taken to product design and brand marketing as the new frontier in compelling others to think differently, create distinctively and communicate effectively.

15) Famous Bloggers

http://www.famousbloggers.net - Famous Bloggers is a multi-authors blog and Social Network platform for Making Money Online Tips built on the contributions of its authors.

16) mUmBRELLA

http://mumbrella.com.au - Mumbrella is a discussion of everything under Australia’s media and marketing umbrella.

17) WebUrbanist

http://weburbanist.com - WebUrbanist covers the collective life of our times through the lens of creative visual culture in the beating hearts of our cities. From urban design to individual homes, and subversive street graffiti to compelling works of gallery art, our authors scour the net to find the most innovative, compelling and cutting-edge artworks and designs in the world. Our focus is on quality over quantity – publishing only once daily, WebUrbanist packs each article with asmany relevant images and links as possible, part of an attempt to be exhaustive informative as possible within any given subject area.

Andy Beal, Marketing Pilgrim

18) Marketing Pilgrim

http://www.marketingpilgrim.com - MarketingPilgrim.com was launched by internet marketing consultant Andy Beal in September 2005. As a follow-up to Beal’s award-winning search marketing blog, Marketing Pilgrim expands its coverage to bring the latest news, rumors and reviews of all things related to internet marketing and online advertising.

19) Jay Mug

http://www.jaymug.com - Jay Mug – Trendspotting |Advertising | Marketing | Design | Media | Tech | Sharing inspiration, creative thoughts and awesomeness for the ever curious.

20) Spinsucks

http://www.spinsucks.com - The Fight Against Destructive Spin focuses on today’s issues in the media, and the intricate role public relations plays in our daily lives. FADS is a forum for discussion among public relations professionals and the online community.

21) Hitwise

http://weblogs.hitwise.com - Hitwise is the leader in online competitive intelligence. Contact Hitwise to maximize your online marketing programs.

22) Business 2 Community

http://www.business2community.com - Business 2 Community aims to provide a balanced view of the current business landscape based on industry news and trends, as well as real-life experiences. We feature daily news, information and blogs on Marketing, Strategy, Branding, Public Relations, Social Media, Tech & Gadgets and Entertainment. Our mission is to expand readers’ awareness of business best practices and to encourage participation.

23) Marketing Profs

http://mpdailyfix.com - MarketingProfs Daily is a rich and trusted resource that offers actionable know-how to help you market your products and services both smarter and better. Entrepreneurs, small-business owners and marketers in the world’s largest corporations make up its 379,000 subscribers, making it the largest in its category.

24) Adrants

http://adrants.com - Adrants, published by Adrants Publishing LLC, provides marketing and advertising news, especially insightful, informed, experiential, no holds barred commentary on the state of the advertising and media industries.

25) Traffic Generation Café

http://www.trafficgenerationcafe.com - Traffic Generation Cafe brings you the most profit-pulling free traffic generation tips, tricks, and resources, so that your website and business will go where no website has gone before.

John Jantsch, Small Business Marketing Blog

26) Small Business Marketing Blog

http://www.ducttapemarketing.com/blog - John Jantsch has been called the World’s Most Practical Small Business Expert for consistently delivering real-world, proven small business marketing ideas and strategies. Check out his blog at Duct Tape Marketing.

27) Food Politics

Marion Nestle, Food Politics

http://www.foodpolitics.com/- Marion Nestle posts almost daily about current events in food and nutrition politics and policy, mainly those related to agriculture, food, nutrition, and health, particularly dietary practices, obesity, food safety, and pet food.

28) MarketingCharts

http://www.marketingcharts.com - MarketingCharts is a Watershed Publishing publication. It is published daily in the US by its own staff, and also features editorial contributions from other writers and analysts in the Watershed Publishing network. MarketingCharts is a sister publication to MarketingVox.

29) MarketingProfs Daily

http://www.marketingprofs.com - MarketingProfs Daily is a rich and trusted resource that offers actionable know-how to help you market your products and services both smarter and better. Entrepreneurs, small-business owners and marketers in the world’s largest corporations make up its 379,000 subscribers, making it the largest in its category.

30) Chitika Insights

http://insights.chitika.com - Chitika is a data analytics company in the business of on-line advertising. Through the application of data and innovative technology in the fields of mobile, local and search Chitika has developed a vast global network that maximizes yield for both publishers and advertisers.

31) Reel SEO Video Marketing

http://www.reelseo.com – ReelSEO.com is The Online Video Marketer’s Guide – The world’s leading resource for news, analysis, tips and trends for the online video and internet marketing industries. Our videologists & columnists offer expert advice, guidance, and commentary about the world of online video in an effort to guide internet marketers and video content producers towards best practices and online video services that suit their needs.

32) comScore Voices

http://blog.comscore.com/ - comScore Voices shares perspective on the latest events and trends in global Internet behavior. comScore Voices shares commentary and analysis of the state of Internet audience measurement, as well as how trends in Internet usage are affecting businesses and creating new opportunities for growth.

Neil Patel, Quick Sprout

33) Quick Sprout

http://www.quicksprout.com - Neil Patel is the co-founder of 2 Internet companies: Crazy Egg and KISSmetrics. Through his entrepreneurial career Neil has helped large corporations such as Amazon, AOL, GM, HP and Viacom make more money from the web. By the age of 21 not only was Neil named a top 100 blogger by Technorati, but he was also one of the top influencers on the web according to the Wall Street Journal.

Chris Brogan, chrisbrogan.com

34) chrisbrogan.com

http://chrisbrogan.com - Chris Brogan consults and speaks professionally with Fortune 100 and 500 companies like PepsiCo, General Motors, Microsoft, and more, on the future of business communications, and social software technologies. His blog is in the Top 5 of the Advertising Age Power150. He has over 11 years experience in online community, social media, and related technologies.

Eric Goldman, Technology & Marketing Law Blog

35) Technology & Marketing Law Blog

http://blog.ericgoldman.org - Eric Goldman is an Associate Professor of Law at Santa Clara University School of Law. He also directs the school’s High Tech Law Institute. Before joining the SCU faculty in 2006, he was an Assistant Professor at Marquette University Law School, General Counsel of Epinions.com, and an Internet transactional attorney at Cooley Godward LLP.

36) Online Marketing Blog

http://www.toprankblog.com - Since December 2003, TopRank’s Online Marketing Blog has provided insights, resources and commentary on a range of digital marketing and public relations topics including: Search engine marketing and optimization, Social media marketing, Business blogging and marketing, and Online public relations.

Brian Solis, Brian Solis

37) Brian Solis

http://www.briansolis.com - BrianSolis.com is among the world’s leading business and marketing online resources, ranking among the top 1% of all blogs tracked by Technorati. Solis is also ranked as one of the leading voices in the AdAge Power 150 index of worldwide marketing bloggers.

Mark Sisson, Mark's Daily Apple

38) Mark’s Daily Apple

http://www.marksdailyapple.com - Mark’s Daily Apple is a blog by Mark Sisson, a forum for discussion and debate, a place where people go to explore how to live the healthiest life possible. And it’s a place where I rant, teach and attempt to entertain with daily articles. I started this experiment at the end of 2006 and haven’t missed a day yet. Visit the site daily to learn something new, to take home some practical information and tips you can actually use in your life, and for continuous motivation and reinforcement.

Bas Van Den Beld, Founder-State of Search

39) State of Search

http://www.stateofsearch.com - State of Search is one of the leading websites when it comes to search and social media. This website, founded by Bas van den Beld and co-founded by Lisa Myers, focusses on the next step in search marketing and social media. The web is changing and so is search. What consequenses do these changes have and how do we handle these? Those are questions answered on StateofSearch.com.

40) Social Media Explorer

http://www.socialmediaexplorer.com - Social Media Explorer is a leading platform for insights, opinion and learning around the world of social emdia marketing, online communications, conversational marketing, digital marketing, public relations, community building and branding.

41) Direct Marketing News

http://www.dmnews.com - Direct Marketing News is owned and operated by Haymarket Media Inc., a privately held media corporation, located at 114 W. 26th St., New York, NY, 10001. The Direct Marketing News franchise today includes the print edition of Direct Marketing News, serving a BPA-audited circulation of 45,000 qualified recipients, along with this website, www.DMNews.com, and four e-mail newsletters and four lead generation opportunities.

42) For Bloggers by Bloggers

http://bestbloggingtipsonline.com/ – according to leading blogging resource Technorati, there are more than 133 million blogs online today, and that number continues to grow. With these numbers, it can be hard to stand out – and that’s why For Bloggers, By Bloggers and our own resource of blogging tips was born.

43) Shawn Blog

http://www.shawnblog.com - Spawning initial public awareness of the shocking and awful anti-Radiohead movement, shawnblog.com was featured on the tumblr.com home page and subsequently became popular enjoying higher technorati and Google rankings than far more influential web sites. The blog is, of course, mostly nonsense and should not be taken seriously, only very loosely representing the moments in the stream of consciousness of it’s author.

44) Intuit Small Business Blog

http://blog.intuit.com - This blog is dedicated to a discussion of small business, including advice, resources, and insights we think will help you be more successful . We’ll talk about broad topics of lasting interest to small business owners, such as Money, Customers, and Employees. We’ll also share information on current Trends as well as stories about Local businesses. Authors include professional journalists, people who work at Intuit, our customers and research partners, and guest experts we invite to share their perspectives.

Noah Rubin Brier, noahbrier.com

45) NoahBrier.com

http://noahbrier.com - He uses the web to understand the world. In his eyes, everything is linked, and Noah treats every encounter with information as a potential web waiting to be untangled.

Jeremiah Owyang, Web Strategy

46) Web Strategy

http://www.web-strategist.com/blog - As a Web Strategist, Jeremiah Owyang strives to deliver insight on disruptive technologies and their impact on how companies communicate with their customers. This blog has been around since 2006, and has been recognized as a top analyst blog within the industry and by readers like you.

47) Osocio Weblog

http://osocio.org - Osocio is dedicated to social advertising and non-profit campaigns. It’s the place where marketing and activism collide. Formerly known as the Houtlust Blog, Osocio is the central online hub for advertisers, ad agencies, grassroots, activists, social entrepreneurs, and good Samaritans from around the globe.

48) Inkling Media

http://inklingmedia.net/ – Inkling Media is an inbound marketing shop based in Lancaster, PA with an emphasis on social media. We provide consultation on utilizing social media as part of an overall marketing strategy. In addition to Social Media, we work with you to help implement a strong blogging plan, as well as organic search engine optimization. Our work includes the creation, and implementation of social media plans.

49) SEOptimise

http://www.seoptimise.com/blog – SEOptimise began life in 2006 and has doubled in size every year since. Familiar faces at SEO conferences both as speakers and delegates, the ever-expanding SEOptimise search team develop innovative SEO strategies based on the latest thinking and developments in the online market. We pride ourselves on proven results delivered to clients at a high return on investment, with the flexibility to work to a huge range of Key Performance Indicators.

Larry Ferlazzo, Larry Ferlazzo's Websites of the Day

50) Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day

http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org - This blog highlights new sites added to Larry Ferlazzo’s English website, which has over 6,000 links apprpriate for English Language Learners and younger native-English speakers. Subjects include English, Math, Social Studies and Science. 

Grab the Badge

For those of you who follow search engine news you’ll know that the biggest events that cover the industry are the Search Engine Strategies conferences. Being based in Toronto I was able to attend SES Toronto last year and am pleased to be able to attend again this year. It’s one of those must-attend events where you get to hear from the top experts in the industry, be able to directly ask them questions, and get valuable advice to help you grow your business.

“Although bigger isn’t always better, the biggest social media site is the right place to start.  And at 104.1 million unique visitors, Facebook reaches a lot more segments than just college kids these days.”

I’m also fortunate enough to have been able to connect with two of the experts who will be presenting at SES Toronto this year. I asked them about what factors they see as being important for website owners in the year ahead. The two interviewees were Greg Jarboe and Amanda Watlington. Here is a little more about them:

Greg Jarboe

Greg Jarboe is the president and co-founder of SEO-PR, a search engine optimization firm, public relations agency and video production company. Founded in 2003, SEO-PR has won a Golden Ruler Award from the Institute for Public Relations and PR News, and was a finalist for SES Awards in three categories: Best Social Media Marketing Campaign, Best Business-to-Business Search Marketing Campaign, and Best Integration of Search with Other Media.

“Over the past year, the change in the search engine world that’s had the biggest impact on my business has been the recognition that the #2 search engine isn’t Yahoo!  It’s YouTube.”

Amanda Watlington

Amanda Watlington is owner of Searching for Profit, a search marketing consultancy focusing on the interaction of the consumer with businesses, using search engines, RSS, blogs, podcasting, or other new media to deliver their messages. An industry thought leader and an internationally-recognized speaker, Amanda has led sessions on search marketing, web strategy, and social media at Search Engine Strategies, Webmaster World, Ad:tech, and DMA. She shares her views of where search marketing is headed on her blog, Blogs and Feeds, and as a blogger for Search Engine Watch.

I asked them both the same questions – here are their answers:

1)      What are you 3 favorite tools website owners should know about that you would consider “hidden gems”?

The first hidden gem is Wordstream. It’s a new keyword tool for taking long keyword lists for search engine optimization (SEO) or pay-per-click (PPC) advertising campaigns and putting them in buckets that are segmented intelligently.  Another hidden gem is Radian6.  It’s an automated solution to monitor and analyze a variety of social media, including blogs, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter.  The third tool has been around for a while, but it’s unfortunately a hidden gem: Yahoo! Site Explorer.  It allows you to explore all the pages indexed by Yahoo! Search and find pages that link to that site or any page.

2)      In your opinion, how important is it for website owners to reduce their page load time and do you recommend they enable gzip compression?

I do think reducing page load time is important.  Gzip is a popular data compression program.  It’s main advantage is much better compression.  However, gzip 1.2.4 may crash when an input file is over 1200 characters. (info on gzip compression here: http://www.gzip.org/)

3)      LinkedIn, Twitter,YouTube, Digg, or Facebook? If website owners could only pick one to invest their time into, which would you pick and why?

I could say it depends on your target market, but that would be dodging the question.  Or, I could say YouTube, because I’ve just finished writing a book entitled, YouTube and Video Marketing: An Hour A Day, but that would be self-serving.  So, I’ll say Facebook.  Why?  According to Compete, Facebook had 104.1 million unique visitors in April 2009, YouTube had 77.8 million, Digg had 37.8 million, Twitter had 19.4 million, and LinkedIn had 12.1 million.  Although bigger isn’t always better, the biggest social media site is the right place to start.  And at 104.1 million unique visitors, Facebook reaches a lot more segments than just college kids these days.  Plus, with more than 52,000 Facebook apps, there are countless ways to connect with social networks of friends and family.

4)      What change in the search engine world over the past year has had the biggest impact on your business?

Over the past year, the change in the search engine world that’s had the biggest impact on my business has been the recognition that the #2 search engine isn’t Yahoo!  It’s YouTube.  According to comScore qSearch, there were 9.8 billion expanded search queries in the U.S. during April 2009 on Google, 3.2 billion on YouTube, and 3.1 billion on Yahoo!  That’s game changing.  We’ve also found that video content can generate more links and higher rankings than text content.    In fact, The Technorati Attention Index for May 14, 2009, shows the top site with the highest number of blogs linking to it in the past 30 days was YouTube with 60,644, followed by The New York Times with 17,374,  guardian.co.uk with 8,039, The Wall Street Journal with 7,513, and The Washington Post with 6,891.  What does this mean to search engine marketers?  You are more likely to see a YouTube video in the top results pages than a news story, blog post, or website page.  That’s a change with a big impact.

5)      Which session (apart from yours) are you most looking forward to at SES Toronto and why?

I’m looking forward to the keynote by Emanuel Rosen.  I’ve read his book, “The Anatomy of Buzz,” and can’t wait to hear about his latest book, “The Anatomy of Buzz Revisited.”  As for one of the conference sessions, I’m looking forward to “How to Speak Geek: Working Collaboratively with Your IT Department to Get Things Done.”  Why can’t we all just get along?

1)      What are you 3 favorite tools website owners should know about that you would consider “hidden gems”?

There are lots of tools that a website owner should know about. I personally advocate trying a large number of tools and then determining which suits the individual’s workflow best. Here are three tools that I consider really powerful: Spyfu for keyword research. It is an excellent second line of research that enhances and enriches the data gathered from Keyword Discovery or Wordtracker. With Spyfu, I particularly like the Keyword Kombat feature that lets me clearly see comparative strengths and weaknesses relative to competitors. A second tool that I consider valuable is Crazy Egg. I use this tool on a regular basis to check how users are interacting with my pages. This gives me quite a few insights into how I can improve conversion and improve the user’s experience.  I must include in my tool kit the Web Developer Plug-in for Firefox. It is a super tool for analyzing sites. I use this in conjunction with YSlow to understand how a site is performing.

2)      In your opinion, how important is it for website owners to reduce their page load time and do you recommend they enable gzip compression?

Page load time is important for both users and search engines. Users want to receive the information immediately and are increasingly impatient. Speed issues also impact search. Every site has a “crawl budget,” and performance issues can impede how much of a large site is crawled. Managing performance is essential to indexing for large sites. Gzip compression is a recommended speed enhancement. The choice and recommendation would, of course, depend on the site. As I indicated above I use YSlow as part of my tools for evaluating sites. Speed is an issue.

“If I was looking to promote my business, YouTube is the place that I would choose to target. Twitter is the current media darling, but I’m not sure that I would recommend it at this time over YouTube.”

3)      LinkedIn, Twitter,YouTube, Digg, or Facebook? If website owners could only pick one to invest their time into, which would you pick and why?

My choice would be YouTube since the sheer volume of traffic that comes to the site is so huge. YouTube’s traffic is the second largest online. It is also readily optimizable so the site owner can ensure take measures to get maximum performance from their videos. If I was looking to promote my business, YouTube is the place that I would choose to target. Twitter is the current media darling, but I’m not sure that I would recommend it at this time over YouTube. As a professional, I would urge the website owner to have a personal LinkedIn account and a Facebook page. Both are good networking tools. I personally prefer LinkedIn.

4)      What change in the search engine world over the past year has had the biggest impact on your business?

The biggest impacts have come from the global recession. As a result I have seen an increase in the demand for SEO services as businesses that previously were prepared to spend lots of money on SEM are now reconsidering the virtues of SEO.  Many are taking budget from other marketing efforts to put them into SEO and SEM. There is also an increasing demand that search deliver results.

5)      Which session (apart from yours) are you most looking forward to at SES Toronto and why?

I am keenly interested in the future and use conferences to tune up my radar for what is the next big thing. For this reason I am looking forward to the session entitled “Follow the Carrot: Cool Mobile Apps.” As search migrates to the phone we all need to understand mobile marketing. Overall, the session line up is so good that it will be difficult to chose one session vs. another being held at the same time. I am moderating the session “SEO Then & Now: What’s the Same? What’s New?” which should be very interesting, but at the same time there is also a session entitled “Signals: What Relevancy Indicators Are Search Engineers Watching For Today?” that should be an excellent forward-looking session. Overall, this should be a terrific conference.

Thank you to both Greg and Amanda for spending the time to answer these questions. To learn more from them you can always attend SES Toronto! If you’re planning on coming out let me know and we can have lunch together.

I meet and hear from entrepreneurs every day as a part of my business and one of the most frequent questions that I keep getting is “Why should I be on Twitter?” There are many sceptics out there who believe that Twitter is not worth it and is only for people with too much time on their hands. Used intelligently however, Twitter can be a powerful way to grow your business so long as you know what you’re doing and why.

“As a marketer you always want to be where your customers are. If your customers are using Twitter and you’re not a part of the conversation then your competitors will scoop the market from under you.”

Twitter is a tool, and just like any other tool, you have to know how to use it. If you’re still on the “Should I use Twitter?” fence, here are 9 reasons why you should consider opening an account and get involved.

1 – It’s where your customers are

As a marketer you always want to be where your customers are. Think about using Twitter as another networking opportunity. If you were invited to a wine and cheese party with a room full of your potential customers, would you want to attend? Your approach on Twitter should be similar to what you would do at a networking event – join the conversation. You wouldn’t go into a room full of strangers with a hard sales approach trying to close them on the spot. You need to learn about who you’re talking to, understand their needs, and see if there is a potential fit with what you can offer. If your customers are using Twitter and you’re not a part of the conversation then your competitors will scoop the market from under you.

2 – It’s where your customers will be

One of my favorite quotes is by the famous hockey player Wayne Gretzky who when asked to explain his success said “I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been.” If your customers aren’t already on Twitter, they will be and as a business owner you can’t risk losing out on capturing this market. Twitter is already one of the most popular websites in the world and it is not showing any signs of slowing down. Think about it as having a website for your business. The businesses who got in early captured most of the customers and many of them still rank #1 for their important keywords in the search engines. If you are just setting up a website for your business today then you are far behind the game. Don’t fall behind the online marketing game by missing out on Twitter and where your customers will be.

“People are more responsive to Twitter messages than email (provided you are providing value, of course), so it can be a great way to get in front of customers and other important decision makers who can impact your business.”

3 – Twitter can drive targeted traffic to your website

Twitter has recently entered the top 10 sources of visitors to my website which is impressive given that I’ve been doing other methods for years and Twitter has already surpassed them. Twitter doesn’t drive anywhere close to the traffic that Google and the other search engines produce and the visitors don’t convert nearly as well as search engine visitors but the increase in the number of people on my site is noticeable. Twitter already drives more people than any other non-search engine partner of my business. Twitter also is sending more visitors to my website than Facebook, Wikipedia, LinkedIn, and StumbleUpon combined. Again, my search engine traffic far outweighs Twitter results and it converts to business much more easily. If I had a choice it’s a hands down decision to focus in on SEO instead of Twitter but why not do both if they are generating results?

4 – People are talking about you

This is the main reason that pushed me into Twitter. I went to Twitter Search, typed in my name, and found that people had already posted entries about my business. Most of them were very positive and I was genuinely surprised to see that the conversation was already taking place about my business without me having prompted it. More importantly, the conversation was happening and, until that point, I didn’t even realize it. You can never control a conversation in any social media setting but you can at least get involved to help get your message out as you want it. An easy way to get started is to do a search for your name / business name and then subscribe to the RSS feed. This way whenever somebody talks about your business, or any other important keyword you want to track, you can get updated through your RSS reader.

5 – Connect with people you want to get in front of

If there are companies or prospects that you are trying to get in front of, Twitter can be an excellent medium to help make the connection. Getting someone’s email address or direct phone number can be difficult and you don’t want to appear as a spammer. Why not look to see if the person you’re trying to get in front of is on Twitter? You’ll be able to learn more about what they are interested in, what issues they are concerned about, and what is going on in their businesses. You can comment on their posts, offer insightful information, and begin to build a bond with them. People are more responsive to Twitter messages than email (provided you are providing value, of course), so it can be a great way to get in front of customers and other important decision makers who can impact your business.

6 – Add credibility to your business

Twitter can be a great way to boost the credibility of your business. Like it or not, the number of followers that you have count as votes in the minds of many people – the more followers you have, the more important and credible you must be. The best way to start building your followers is to begin posting! The more time you have to build your base, the easier it will be. Once your base is established it’s easier to get people to pay attention to you. For example, I’ll often let my customers or partners know that I’ll Tweet about them because I appreciate their business. The result invariably is a warm “Thank you!” and it’s a great way to add another touch point to my business relationships. The media is another great way to leverage your followers. The more followers you have, the more of an authority you seem to be and the more likely you can get the media to pay attention to what you have to say.

“Twitter can also be an excellent tool to help you leverage some of the work that you’ve already been doing to build your business. If you have a blog then you can set up the RSS feed to automatically post to your Twitter account.”

7 – Stay on top of trends in your industry

In point #4 I talked about staying on top of what people are saying about you through Twitter Search. You can also use the same tool to know what’s being said about your industry, competitors, and customers. It can be a wonderful market research tool but beware of the “Garbage in, garbage out” principal. If you don’t make use of the right keywords to track then you won’t get meaningful results. Another great way to stay on top of trends is to follow thought leaders in your industry and other people who you respect. Don’t follow the people who feel inclined to share every detail about their personal lives and Tweet about brushing their teeth and going for sushi. Follow only the people who are adding valuable information that can have a meaningful impact on you and your business. Just like the blogging world there are some blogs worth following and most that are not.

8 – Rank higher in search engines

While individual Twitter posts do not generally rank that well because they have so few characters, the username that you choose for your account has a very good chance of ranking on the first page of Google. Because of all the inbound links that Twitter has, Google is rewarding the site with extremely high rankings. My Twitter account, for example, ranks just after my own site for my name. If you’re targeting competitive keywords make your keywords the names / username for your Twitter account to help you dominate the first page of search results. Think about that .com domain name that you wanted to buy but was already taken when you started your site. You could soon lose the ability to get the Twitter account of your choice and rank well for it if your competitors get in before you.

9 – Leverage the work you’re already doing

Finally, Twitter can also be an excellent tool to help you leverage some of the work that you’ve already been doing to build your business. For example, if you have a blog then you can set up the RSS feed to automatically post to your Twitter account through services like TweetLater. Every time you post to your blog it will automatically create a new entry in your Twitter account to help expand your reach. Another simple way to leverage your existing content is to add the TweetMeme button on all your pages. This essentially makes it easier for anyone viewing your pages to post about it to their Twitter accounts if they think that it is of value. After you set it up you don’t have to put in any additional time and you can generate increased traffic from work you’ve already done.

Are you convinced yet? I would recommend starting small and not overwhelming yourself. See what people are talking about, register your own account, and begin posting. Set a posting schedule that works for you and don’t get caught up in it past the point of it being a valuable tool for your business.