It was such an honor to be invited to speak at POC’s Halton-Peel Chapter Meeting last week! Since the Q&A portion of a presentation is often the most valuable, I decided to devote the entire session to answering the group’s questions about social media. I’ve posted those questions, along with my answers, here today.

Facebook:

What changes were done to Facebook pages?

On March 30, Facebook pages were converted to the Timeline layout which has been available for personal profiles for several months now. This new layout has a spot for a large “cover photo” at the top and places the page content in two columns with the posts arranged in reverse chronological order.

Why were these changes made?

Who knows why Facebook does anything?

Should we have a cover picture on our Facebook Page?

I recommend it, because it’s a good way to brand your page. And if you don’t, there will be a big empty white space at the top.

How do you add a cover picture on your Facebook Page?

When you are on your page, you’ll see an Add a Cover button near the top. Just click on it to upload an image and position it so that it displays nicely.

Is there a website/service that can help us to create the cover picture?

If you Google facebook cover photo you’ll find lots of sites that offer tips for creating a cover image.

Do you think the Facebook improvements are for better?

I think so. As I mentioned earlier, the cover image offers more opportunity to promote your brand than the original page style, and Timeline organizes your content very nicely.

How do you create a business page on Facebook?

Go to https://www.facebook.com/bookmarks/pages, and at the top you’ll see a Create a Page button.

Is there a way to separate your business friends and your personal friends on Facebook?

What you need to do is go to https://www.facebook.com/bookmarks/lists. At the top you should see “Close Friends.” When you click on the link, you’ll be able to add anyone that fits into that category.

Once you’ve created a list of your Close Friends, you’ll want to edit your Privacy Settings, which you’ll find in the drop-down menu under Home, at the top right side of your screen. Where it says Control Your Default Privacy, choose Custom.

Next, set your default privacy so that only people on your Close Friends list can view the items you post (see below).

When you post something you’d like everyone to see, set the privacy on that item to Public. Be sure to check the privacy setting before you post something personal again, as you may need to change it back.

If you don’t want your personal contacts to see business-related items you post, you can create a second list for Business Friends, and set the privacy setting on those posts accordingly, but that’s a lot of extra work. I think it’s good for our personal contacts to understand what we do in our businesses – you never know who might know someone who can use your services!

Someone I know who uses Facebook exclusively for business decided to unfriend all of her Facebook friends and ask them instead to connect with her through her business page, so that’s another option.

How do I make sure that my Facebook friends don’t see my other friends’ posts?

This is also controlled in your Privacy Settings. Under Timeline and Tagging there are a number of settings available, including one to control who can see what others post on your timeline.

Be sure to check your privacy settings from time to time, as they often revert back to the default settings when Facebook rolls out updates.

Can you schedule Facebook posts?

Yes, you can!

One way is by using Hootsuite. When you post something, you can choose for it to go up right away or schedule it for the future. You can even use it to access your other social media accounts, including LinkedIn and Twitter. For each post, you can choose which network(s) you want to send it to.

Lately, I’ve been using a service called Buffer, which also works with all three of the major social networks. Rather than setting your posts for a particular time, you just add posts to your “buffer” and they’ll go out according to a schedule you’ve created.

Keep in mind, however, that your posts have a better chance of appearing in your friends’ news feed if you create them manually.

LinkedIn:

Do you think there is a benefit of having a business LinkedIn profile along with your personal one?

I don’t really see a big benefit to solopreneurs having a business page on LinkedIn.

Where should I do my LinkedIn posts from, my personal or business profile?

You can’t post status updates on a LinkedIn business page, but you can set it up to automatically display links to your blog posts.

How else can we promote our businesses on LinkedIn?

LinkedIn  has a very powerful feature that a lot of people aren’t aware of, called Answers. Users post questions, and you can search for those you can post an answer to and get rated on your answer.

Because LinkedIn is strongly oriented towards business-to-business, this tool will be more useful if you do business organizing. If you work strictly in the residential sector, you might want to check out Quora, which features questions on a much broader range of topics.

Pinterest:

Is it good, businesswise, to be on Pinterest?

Pinterest is quickly becoming one of the most popular social media sites, and it’s a great tool for organizers because you can give visual links to organizing products, as well as showcasing your own work.

How do you pin?

You can add a bookmarklet to your browser which makes it easy to pin pictures from nearly any website. You can also click on the Add link at the top of the Pinterest screen to either upload a picture from your hard drive or enter the URL for the page where the picture appears.

Can you pin?

That is a very good question! There are major concerns about whether pinning an image from a website is a violation of copyright. On the one hand, you’re linking back to the source, but is that sufficient? I know of people who were really into Pinterest but have deleted their accounts just to be on the safe side.

If there is a Pin It button on a website, does it mean I’m allowed to pin anything I want from there?

I would say that someone who puts Pin It buttons on their site wants you to pin their content. It would be wise, however, to make sure that they have the rights to use the images which appear on their site!

Can you pin web images only? Is there a way to add magazine clippings?

You would have to scan the clippings and upload them, but that would most likely violate copyright. I suggest going to the magazine’s website and looking for the content there.

Would you agree that Pinterest is designed for younger audience (18-35)?

Yes, that is my understanding, though of course that can change at any time.

Twitter:

I found that Twitter is lots of talking about nothing. How do you find people that are worth following?

When deciding whether or not to follow someone, the first thing I check is their bio to see whether they’re likely to be of interest. I also look at their recent tweets to see what they tweet about, and whether they engage with their followers. I’ve seen bios that made me think someone would be a great source of valuable information, only to find that their tweets were trivial.

Do you know the people you follow?

I’m following more than 1600 people, and I definitely don’t know all of them. That doesn’t mean that I read every tweet posted by every person I follow either! I have them organized into lists such as women-helping-women, organizers-cda and Blog/Social Media/Mktg and I decide which list I want to view at any given time.

What is Tweetstock? Have you been there?

Tweetstock was a social media conference which was held in Brantford on April 12, 2012. Unfortunately, I didn’t go, but I heard it was really good!

To supplement this information, everyone who attended was offered a free copy of my Basic Guide to Networking on Twitter as a gift for joining my mailing list.

Since the other speaker was unable to make it, there was time for plenty more questions! Be sure to catch next week’s post when I’ll share those related to blogging, email marketing, virtual assistants, and more.

Please visit Your Organizing Business to read and comment on Social Media Q&A.

When it comes to social media, I’ve noticed that some professional organizers avoid it like the plague, others embrace it wholeheartedly, and most fall somewhere in between. Helena Alkhas views social media as an important tool for her organizing business, and I’ve invited her here today to explain why.

I have truly fallen in love with social media. I enjoy the learning, the understanding of how society has changed, the relationships that develop from it, and the connections I’ve created with fans that follow my posts on the channels I use.

When many of my colleagues approach me, two of their biggest concerns in regards to social media relate to time and if I get clients from it. They fear that using social media is very time- consuming and doesn’t bring them any tangible return in the form of clients/work.

Our society has undergone a major transformation and there are some impressive numbers to prove how social media permeates society’s daily life.

One area that has been greatly affected by the use of the web and social media was marketing and how companies communicate their message to the public, hoping to convert them into consumers.

In the past, Marketing would be something only larger companies would be able to afford, and they would use a model where a need was created and they’d make us aware of the product (new need) where we buy/consume it.

Entire campaigns would be developed and we would be “bombarded” by it in several forms:

• printed in our monthly magazine subscriptions
• aired during the commercial breaks of our favorite TV shows and radio programs
• placed in the supermarket aisles
• samples in stores

However, with the growth of social media, among other things, consumers started publicly sharing their likes and dislikes and this develops two-fold:

1. A testimonial from a friend/real person is much more powerful than a paid message brought out by the company itself, and
2. As we tend to hang out with like-minded people, our friends will see what we like and be more inclined to try it and hopefully like it. Just as we often make friends through friends, the same applies to brands we like.

This may seem like a new scenario, but in fact is just a replication of how we build our relationships: through time and in several forms of contact. And this is exactly what social media is all about: relationships being built through time. So, when we think of social media, we should in reality think about relationships with those that like our services.

This brings me to a very important part of relationship-building, which is authenticity. Like in all relationships, in social media channels where you represent your service, the more authentic you are, the more successful you’ll be, because you will be attracting the “perfect match” to your service and it will resonate with those following you. Using your authentic voice will create a genuine relationship with your public and this can lead to conversion from fans into customers down the road.

With this new perspective we can see that investing the time on creating relationships with the public through social media is actually a way of marketing yourself, and truth be said, marketing yourself and your company has never been as accessible as it is now, because all you need is the investment of your (precious) time and your social media and blogging accounts! And I believe this is wonderful news for small business owners like us; don’t you agree?

By now, I hope I’ve been able to briefly show you the changes in the scenario and how it favors you as a small business owner, but you may still be asking yourself “What’s in it for me? Why should I bother spending time, giving my best tips away if this doesn’t bring me paying clients?”

Well, the use of social media channels brings exposure to your company, to you and your products – this is free advertising. Secondly, by sharing your knowledge, you are in fact educating the public about it and, most importantly, you are establishing yourself as an authority in your area to a much broader audience than just your clients and your local community.

So, how can you make use of these tools to create exposure for your business, to promote your expertise and establish yourself as an authority in your area without spending hours a day on it?

1. By selecting which one(s) best apply to you, or you feel most comfortable with
2. By learning to use each of them
3. By planning a social media calendar that is relevant to your type of organizing business – and of course,
4. By scheduling time in your working hours to do it

It’s also important to keep in mind is that social media is not a magic potion; it does not happen overnight and, like anything we do successfully in life, requires lots of TLC. You didn’t build your friendships, relationships and business overnight, and the same applies here, because on the other end of the blog post there is a human being, just like us!

In my next posts we can see how each channel works and how to organize to make the best of each of them!

Helena Alkhas is a San Diego based Professional Organizer and she specializes in residential organizing. She offers hands on organizing as well as virtual organizing services to clients across the globe. Helena is a lifelong learner and is a member of NAPO and a subscriber to the ICD. Here is how you can contact her: www.apersonalorganizer.com, helena@apersonalorganizer.com or 858.564.8500.

Please visit Your Organizing Business to read and comment on Why Social Media?.

Are you Lost on LinkedIn? Frazzled about Facebook? Puzzled about Pinterest? You’re certainly not alone! Staying on top of constant changes to social media sites and deciding whether to join yet another social network can leave you longing for the days when all you needed to market your business online was a simple static website.

Since those days are behind us, there is probably something you wish you knew so you could more easily manage your social media profiles and promote your organizing business.

You could spend hours searching the web for answers, or you can just ask me. I don’t claim to know all there is to know – and I doubt that anyone does – but I do spend a lot of time using and reading about social media, so if I can’t answer your question, there’s a good chance I’ll know where to find the information you need.

I’ll be conducting a Social Media Q&A session as an invited guest of the Halton-Peel Chapter of Professional Organizers in Canada on Monday, April 16, 2012 and I hope you can make it!

Those who attend will also have the opportunity to learn about operating a successful and money-making organizing business from Wendy Hollick of NEAT SPACES, recipient of the 2011 POC Ambassador Award. Wendy and I worked together on many organizing projects and seminars but even though I’m her VA, I rarely get to see her now, so I’m really looking forward to hearing her speak.

Click for more details about this event, including times, location, and RSVP contact information.

If you’re planning to come out as a member or guest, feel free to submit your questions to me in advance by leaving a comment below or by sending them through the contact form on this site. If you can’t be there, you might wish to send me your questions anyway, as I’ll be posting all of the questions and answers here on Your Organizing Business at a later date.

Please visit Your Organizing Business to read and comment on Ask a Question about Social Media.

You probably put a lot of time and thought into choosing a name for your organizing business. Perhaps you even invested in registering a trademark to ensure that no one else could use that same name. It’s no wonder then that you take great pride in that name and are pleased to display it on your business card and other printed and online marketing materials.

© Jaimie Duplass / PhotoXpress

What about your personal name? Is it on your website as well? It should be! Maybe not on the home page, unless you’re a well-known personality or it’s part of your business name, but it should definitely be on your About page. After all, whether you organize for individuals and families or for large corporations, you’re providing a service, and prospective clients will usually be more comfortable inviting you into their homes or places of business if they have a sense of who you are as a person. If you’re concerned that focusing on you rather than your company will make your business look small, consider describing yourself as the Owner, Founder, CEO, or Chief Organizer.

It’s even more important to put your name on your social media profiles. Even if you choose a Twitter user name such as @goodorganizer, be sure to enter your real name in the name field of your profile. After all, you wouldn’t introduce yourself at a live networking event with just your business name! Social media is mainly about forming relationships, and most people want to network with other people, not with companies.

When you think about it, using your real name is one way of being authentic, and is therefore a great way to build trust.

For the same reason, many people would recommend that you use a headshot rather than your logo on your social media profiles. I would agree, unless you have several people posting on behalf of your business. In that case, to make it seem as though you were doing it yourself would be inauthentic.

How do you represent yourself online – as yourself, or as your business? What reason(s) led you to that decision?

Please visit Your Organizing Business to read and comment on Who Are You?.

New social media sites are cropping up all the time and it seems like I’m being invited to join something-or-other nearly every week. Since it’s unrealistic to try and maintain an active presence everywhere, I tend to wait and see whether a particular site is going to be worth my while before jumping on the bandwagon. Such was the case with Pinterest.

If you haven’t had a chance to check it out, here’s how Pinterest describes itself:

Pinterest lets you organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. People use pinboards to plan their weddings, decorate their homes, and organize their favorite recipes.

Best of all, you can browse pinboards created by other people. Browsing pinboards is a fun way to discover new things and get inspiration from people who share your interests.

You can almost think of Pinterest as an online bookmarking service, but instead of saving titles of blog posts and web pages that you like, you save an image from the page along with a note about it. Once pinned, the image retains a link back to the original website. You can pin images from any website, and you can even “repin” images that other users have pinned, whether you are following them or not.

A lot of my clients and other contacts were talking about Pinterest, so I signed up, but didn’t immediately see it as a business marketing tool.

I quickly realized that Pinterest is a great way for professional organizers to showcase their organizing projects and their favorite organizing products. Here are just a few of the really great boards I’ve seen:

• Geralin Thomas: New Professional Organizer Info
• Heather Burke: Organize – Laundry Room
• Heather Shute: Room for the love of reading
• Clare Kumar: Organized Under the Stairs
• Helena Alkhas: Office Organizing

I decided to create a few boards to reflect my personal interests so I could get a feel for how it works, and it didn’t take me long to realize why Pinterest is so popular and so addictive. I was having trouble figuring out how I could use it to promote Organized Assistant®, however, until Clare Kumar suggested that I post some Before and After screenshots of websites I’ve redesigned. It’s not a complete collection as I haven’t always remembered to take a Before screenshot, and the pictures have to be posted online somewhere in order to pin them to a board, but I think I’m off to a pretty good start!

I’ve also created a Professional Organizers Blog Carnival board with links to all the Carnivals, going back to the very first one in June 2009.

Over the past few weeks, Pinterest has been making big headlines, not just in social media circles but on major business websites like Forbes, Fast Company, and The New York Times, and I’m convinced that it’s going to be an essential marketing tool for promoting your organizing business.

Are you on Pinterest? If so, please post your user name in the Comments section, and let us know how you’re using it.

Please visit Your Organizing Business to read and comment on Are You Pinteresting?.

Twitter is a great tool for busy professionals whose schedules often keep them from attending live networking events. You can take part in conversations at whatever time best suits you, even if the other parties aren’t online at the same time as you. Although convenient, this is not without its drawbacks.

The most obvious is that you can’t answer time-sensitive questions. If someone is looking for a restaurant in Pittsburgh that’s open at 11:00 PM on Sunday night, they aren’t likely to welcome your suggestion on Monday morning, even if you know where they can get the Best Cheesecake Ever.

A second problem arises if your followers aren’t online when you post your best content. Of course, it will still be there when they log in, but they might not go back far enough in their feed to see your posts, especially if they’re following a large number of people and don’t use Formulists or another way of organizing the people they follow.

The situation is compounded if you like to post a lot of retweets and/or links to other content. I’m very sorry, but if I go into my Twitter account and see 10 or more tweets in a row from you, chances are I’m not going to look at any of them, unless I am a rabid fan. There might be some really good stuff there, but I’ll probably miss it, just because you’ve flooded my newsfeed.

Fortunately, none of these challenges are insurmountable.

In the case of the time-sensitive question, don’t assume it’s too late for you to answer. You can always ask if they found what they were looking for. Even if they did, or if they no longer need it, they’ll probably appreciate your asking, and you never know where a conversation might lead.

Much to my delight, I’ve recently discovered a solution for the second problem as well. Timely is an online tool that analyzes your last 199 tweets, determines when you tend to get the most engagement, and suggests the best times for you to tweet based on those results. If you use a service like HootSuite or TweetDeck, you can use those results to schedule your tweets to be posted at that those times, even if by then you’ll be busy with your client or tucked in for the night.

You can even take things a step further, and create a Timely account. Choose how many posts you want to make per day (1, 2, 5 or 9) and whether or not you wish to schedule tweets on weekends. Then, instead of typing your tweet into the Twitter site or your usual app, enter it in Timely, and it will be scheduled for publication at the time when it’s likely to have the most impact. There’s even a bookmarklet available, so when you’re reading a great blog post that you want to share with your followers, you just click on the bookmarklet and it will ”create a Timely” with the title and URL for the page you’re on. Simply edit it to incorporate your own words and any hashtags you want to include, and add it to your queue.

For every tweet you post using Timely, you can see how many people clicked on your link, who retweeted it, and the potential reach as a result. You can even add multiple Twitter accounts and multiple users! I think it’s pretty amazing for a free service, but there’s a pro version available for $9.99 more if you’d like priority email support.

I still use TweetDeck for sending replies, but am beginning to use Timely more and more for my regular tweets. My followers benefit, because they’re more likely to see the valuable content I share, and they’re not getting it all at one time, and I benefit from the increased engagement and exposure. It seems to be a win-win situation!

For more tips on using Twitter to grow your business, check out my Basic Guide to Networking on Twitter.

Please visit Your Organizing Business to read and comment on Are Your Tweets Timely?.

When we asked our readers to identify their biggest blogging challenge, the number one answer was “attracting readers.” It can be very discouraging to spend valuable time researching a topic and writing what you think is an amazing post, then to get no comments, retweets, or other indications that anyone even read it. Sometimes it’s enough to make you wonder why you’re blogging at all!

Before you throw in the towel, ask yourself the following questions.

1. Do you blog strategically?

Is your blog about you and your interests, or do you consider the type of information that your target market is looking for? When you answer your ideal client’s most pressing questions, using terminology they can relate to, you stand a much better chance of them finding your blog and sticking around to read it.

2. Do you read and comment on other blogs?

Do you know what blogs are popular with your target audience? If not, find out! If you do, make a point of reading them as well. Leave comments that demonstrate your subject knowledge, without giving a sales pitch. Most blogs allow you to include a link back to your own blog, and people who see value in your comments will often  click through to explore what you have written.

3. Do you take advantage of social media?

After you’ve spent time and effort to write a new blog post, don’t just put it up there and hope someone notices! Promote your blog posts on Facebook, Twitter, and any other social media sites that are popular with your target audience. Even if you only use Facebook to stay in touch with friends and family, it’s a great way to make sure they’re aware of what it is that you do and how you can help the people they know. Make it easy for others to promote your content by taking advantage of one or more of the many social sharing tools that are available.

I’ll be expanding on these strategies and more in my session on Blogging: Beyond the Basics at the POC 2011 National Conference in Toronto this November, and I hope to see you there!

In the meantime, please let me know how I can help you with your blogging strategy.

What is YOUR biggest blogging challenge?

Please visit Your Organizing Business to read and comment on 3 Ways to Attract Readers to Your Blog.

After engaging Organized Assistant to help her implement her blogging and social media strategy, a professional organizer asked me how much time she should plan to devote to these activities. This is such an important question that I decided to answer it here on my blog.

To begin with, let’s look at marketing as a whole. Regardless of whether you’ve just become a professional organizer or you’ve been at it for years, and whether your organizing business is your full-time career or a part-time venture while you work at another job, attend school, or care for your young children, marketing is an essential activity that needs to be scheduled on an ongoing basis.

When you’re in the start-up phase of your business, you should be spending nearly all of your working hours on marketing activities. If your greatest priority is working with clients, and your available time slots aren’t filled, then you need to put forth every effort to filling them!

As your business grows, you will obviously need to cut back the time you spend on marketing so you can serve your clients, but never make the mistake of thinking you’re too busy for marketing. If you fail to keep promoting your business during busy periods, once things settle down, you may find yourself with no clients lined up, and back at square one again!

My recommendation is that you devote a minimum of 20% of your working hours to marketing your organizing business. By that, I don’t mean you should be spending 8 or more hours a week on social media alone. Websites such as Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn can be valuable marketing tools, but should not be your only resource.

People are much more likely to do business with you after they’ve had the opportunity to know, like, and trust you. Although this can be accomplished online, if your primary service is providing in-person organizing services in homes or businesses, or live training in the form of presentations, seminars, or workshops, you need to spend a good portion of your marketing time attending local networking events. Social media sites can then become a tool for staying in touch with the people you’ve met in person and for connecting with other people in your area that you can then invite to events you’re attending.

You might find it easiest if you set aside one day or two half-days for marketing every week. To make the most of this time, plan your activities in advance. On different occasions they may include attending business networking events, writing blog posts, posting to your social media profiles, engaging with others on social networks, updating your website, and designing flyers or other materials.

As your business grows, it might become challenging to fit all of these activities into your calendar. When that happens, it may be time to think about delegating some of them to Organized Assistant so that you can focus on what you do best!

How much time do YOU spend on marketing?

Please visit Your Organizing Business to read and comment on How Much Time Should I Spend on Marketing?.

When you’re getting started on Twitter, your first goal is to attract followers. After all, what’s the good of saying brilliant things if no one is listening? What’s just as exciting as getting your first few followers is the first time someone likes one of your tweets enough to pass it on to their followers in the form of a retweet.

Being retweeted is a great ego boost, but there are much greater benefits than that. For one thing, a retweet confirms that what you’ve said is interesting or valuable to someone else and gives you an indication of the type of tweets you should continue to post. Even better, when your message is retweeted, your audience is no longer restricted to your own followers, but opens up to include the followers of the person who posted the retweet.

With each person who reads your retweeted message, there’s the possibility that they’ll decide to follow you as well, to click through to your website, or to subscribe to your blog. Any of these actions may ultimately lead to product sales or other business opportunities. Some of those people may decide to retweet the message as well, expanding your reach even farther – an excellent example of viral marketing at work.

If you have good manners, and I’m sure you do, you’ll want to thank your retweeters for sharing your message with their network. There are many different opinions about the best way to do that.

I recently read a post by Shea Bennett, Co-editor of AllTwitter: The Unofficial Twitter Resource on this very topic. In response to the question, Should You Thank For Retweets?, he says

No. Almost never, in fact. With a few exceptions, I don’t believe there’s any need to thank for retweets at all. It might seem polite, or good etiquette, but all it really does is add a lot of unwanted noise to the stream.

I’d never thought of it in those terms before, but it made a lot of sense. We already expend a fair bit of time and effort filtering through clutter on Twitter. Does anyone really benefit from reading our “thanks for the retweet” messages, other than the recipient? I decided to retweet his post, in which he suggests that thanks should be sent privately by direct message, if at all. In response, I received an interesting email from one of my clients, who told me she’s received nasty messages from more than one person to whom she’d sent a private thank-you. They seemed to believe that by thanking them privately, she was depriving them of valuable exposure they’d have received if she’d thanked them publicly.

I was astounded. If someone complained that they didn’t like the way I thanked them, I probably wouldn’t thank them at all next time – and they probably wouldn’t notice, because who keeps track of whether or not they’ve been thanked for retweeting something? It sure doesn’t sound like anyone I want in my network! And seriously – do they really think that ”@apersonontwitter Thanks for the retweet” is going to make even one person say “Hey, I want to follow @apersonontwitter”?

With Twitter, there are no hard and fast rules about anything – each user develops strategies that work best for them, including whether or not they acknowledge retweets and the way they do it. And fortunately, there are lots more ways to express your appreciation than merely saying thanks, whether in the public stream or by direct message. Angie Schottmuller wrote an excellent post where she outlines 7 Ways to Thank Someone for a Retweet that really opened my eyes to the possibilities and has begun to shape the way I approach this important part of online networking. Yes, it takes more time to be creative than it does to simply post “@personontwitter Thanks for the retweet” but like most things in business (and in life), the more you put into something, the more you’ll get out of it.

If you’re new on Twitter, or you haven’t signed up because you’re not sure what to do, you need my Basic Guide to Networking on Twitter. It’s packed with tips and action steps to help you leverage the power of Twitter to grow your professional network and market your organizing business.

Please visit Your Organizing Business to read and comment on What Do You Do When Someone Retweets You?.

Due to popular demand, I’m thrilled to announce that I’ve put together a Basic Guide to Networking on Twitter! It’s packed with tips to help you leverage the power of Twitter to grow your professional network and market your organizing business.

When I signed up for Twitter in 2008 on the advice of a colleague, I had no idea how it worked or how to use it. Since then, I’ve spent a fair bit of time reading, attending seminars, and simply observing what other people are doing on Twitter in order to learn what works – and what doesn’t.

I’ve shared many of the strategies I’ve learned in presentations for POC Chapters and local business groups in Southern Ontario, at POC’s National Conference in 2010, and here on Your Organizing Business, but now for the first time, I’ve organized all that information into a concise, easy-to-read e-book.

My Basic Guide to Networking on Twitter walks you through each of these key processes:

Step 1: Create Your Account

Step 2: Set Up Your Profile

Step 3: Decide What to Tweet About

Step 4: Follow People

Step 5: Attract Followers

Step 6: Plan Your Twitter Schedule

Each section includes how-to’s, my personal recommendations, and action steps for you to carry out so you can learn to effectively use Twitter as a marketing tool.

The Guide will be most helpful for readers who would like to use Twitter but aren’t sure how to get started, as well as those who are already on Twitter but are feeling lost or overwhelmed.

Even experienced Twitter users will benefit from the helpful tips and recommended resources!

That’s not all!

You can make money by promoting the Basic Guide to Networking on Twitter on your own blog or website (or anywhere else)! Join our new Affiliate Program today and earn 35% commission on any product currently offered by Organized Assistant, including Organizing Your Life, Your Way.

Please visit Your Organizing Business to read and comment on Basic Guide to Networking on Twitter.