Watch this video from SPNVideos which explains the importance of all the above points.

• Despite the fact that Twitter has more than 32 million users, has received massive publicity from both celebrities and government, and produced remarkable results for companies like Dell and Zappos, many business executives still don’t “get” Twitter. Granted, there is an awful lot of noise (“Just got back from the gym…eating pizza again for lunch…watch a Seinfeld rerun”), self-promotion and spam-like content on the world’s most popular microblogging service—and to newbies it can seem like a bizarre online cocktail party where everyone is shouting and no one is listening—but for those who understand and learn to use it effectively, Twitter can be a powerful business tool.

Please read the full post here.

I would like to add another  5 reasons:

• To build authority
• To gain exposure to your website
• To keep track of breaking news
• To learn new tips
• To get fast answers

Please add your comments or any other reasons you may wish to add why Businesses need to be on Twitter.

• Building your brand visibility and authority
• Increasing your influence with a target community
• Promoting your products and services
• Link-building and SEO
• Increasing the traffic to your website or blog
• Lead generation

These activities are very time-consuming. How do you know if your hard work is paying off and if you are reaching your goals? What is being said about your brand?

I recently found a very good article on Addme.com which lists 20 Tools for Tracking Social Media Marketing.

These tools should be part of every one’s Online Reputation Management toolbox. Let me know if you have any others to add to this list.

Please read the post on their blog

• Even if you’re a small business, there’s some great insight to be gained from Marla Erwin, Interactive Art Director for Whole Foods Market. Marla was instrumental in creating Whole Foods’ acclaimed social media program and the results have been phenomenal! For example, in the first year, Twitter.com/Wholefoods gained a million Twitter followers. It has now surpassed 1.75 million people

SocialMediaExaminer, Reaching Millions with Twitter: the Whole Foods Story, Feb. 2010

I found this great article about Google Page Rank on Ezine.Articles.com:

Google describes PageRank (which is a patented name) as:

“PageRank relies on the uniquely democratic nature of the web by using its vast link structure as an indicator of an individual page’s value. In essence, Google interprets a link from page A to page B as a vote, by page A, for page B. But, Google looks at more than the sheer volume of votes, or links a page receives; it also analyzes the page that casts the vote. Votes cast by pages that are themselves ‘important’ weigh more heavily and help to make other pages ‘important’.”

PageRank is just one process out there for measuring the importance of a web page. Others have followed.

From hereon in, it gets more and more complicated behind the scenes but the above gives you an overview of what it is.

So how can website owners improve their own page ranks? Here are just a few suggestions:

• Include useful high-quality information on your site
• Submit your site to various web directories and reference sites
• Publicise your site to everyone with whom you communicate
• Write a newsletter and send it out
• Provide an RSS feed
• Ask other high-quality websites to link to your website
• Check out a site before you link back
• Tell the press about your site
• Keep your website up and running
• Translate your website into foreign languages
• Search Google for your website
• Avoid devious tactics to improve your ranking – Google doesn’t like it!

There are also websites out there which allow you to check your own Google PageRank such as prchecker.info and pagerankalert.com. Your site has to be in the Google Directory already so you will need to have added it. You can also be notified by email alerts as to when your PageRank changes. There is some doubt as to the actual usefulness or accuracy of these checkers but they are there.

Above all else, when considering your PageRank, remember to concentrate on your SEO techniques and inter-twine them all. The more types of SEO you use, the better chance you have of having your web pages ranked highly.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Peter_J_Moore

People aren’t born into leadership positions. We usually start in the trenches, as the doers. The bricklayers. The people touching all the parts, from the inside out.  We earn the right to lead the projects and the vision by doing the work itself, and doing it well. But therein usually lies the rub.altitudebranding.com, Growing Into Leadership, Jan 2010

You should read the whole article.