I just read something that made me stop and think about everything I say to people about promoting their business. I’m a great advocate of social media and good optimisation, but it just dawned on me – if you don’t have anything to say, it’s completely pointless.

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Isn’t it just strange how people can elevate themselves to a position of ‘expert’ simply by running a seminar and charging an entrance fee? For the second time in as many weeks I’ve received invitations to seminars about Twitter run by companies that are going to tell me all about how this amazing tool can revolutionise business, but do they use it? If they do, they’re very stealthy…

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It’s only six months ago that we learned that the recession was at its worst because we were about to loose one of the most important aspects of the High Street. A shop that nearly everyone identified with, was the staple of a Sunday trip to the seaside when all other stores was shut and had an amazing selection of confectionery was dying. Woolworth was gone.

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I follow a lot of people on Twitter, you could say I’m an ‘aggressive’ user of the system and this might be seen by some as a bit wrong, maybe a bit ’spammy’. Certainly some people, after following a few people, get a bit overwhelmed by the amount of conversations going on and start to unfollow quickly, so how can I possibly keep track of everything given that I’m following about 3000 people?

Well that’s where technology comes in.

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One of the question I’m always getting asked is “how do I get links to my site”. This is a good question because I’m always banging on about how it’s a great way to get good search results and everyone should be doing it, but some people haven’t yet cottoned on to why it’s good and how it can be achieved quite simply.

So here’s an answer. It’s not the only answer, but it’s one that will get you some great results very quickly and it’s all about taking part..

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Over the past month I’ve been taking part in the Hub Challenge where a bunch of us are trying to write a crazy amount of articles in a month. I’m up to 36 now and as it’s sometimes late at night when I write them, I do try to spice them up a bit with a ‘different’ title.

Didn’t think anything of it; thought it might add a bit of humour to the proceedings to. One of them was ‘The mailto: command, a great way to harvest email addresses”.

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Things move fast in the Internet world! Only a week or so back we were being told about WolframAlpha, a tool that could apparently topple Google. It turns out that it’s a completely different type of search that is in a completely different arena to Google so it’s no threat.

But then Google say “Oh, we’ve got one of those! You want one of those? Yeah, we’ve got one of those.” and gives us ‘Google Squared’.

Blimey, what’s going on?

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It’s search tool open season at the moment! A few weeks ago ‘WolframAlpha’ was launched with a fanfare and the headlines saying it was a ‘Google Killer’ which it obviously was not, and now it’s Microsoft’s turn.

Having pretty much failed to set the world aflame with ‘Live Search’, they hope their next big thing will be ‘Bing’.

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Social Media is becoming one of the most valuable tools in our marketing arsenal.  It’s a lot easier now to reach our audiences (and target market) in a way that costs a lot less money and builds a lot more trust.

Used well, Social Media tactics can rapidly increase your businesses. However, used badly, it’s going to be a massive a drain on your time.  In some cases, done wrongly, it could even damage your reputation to the extent that it ruins the business.

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If there’s one thing that we can be sure about with the Internet, it’s multiplied the number of people who will attempt to extract your cash many times over. Today I have been reminded of a scam by Brad from 4-Security (CCTV Installations – check them out), who points me to something that’s returned after a couple of years in the wilderness…

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