How I built my Twitter following is a subject that I really hadn’t considered in detail until a friend, and former colleague, asked me this question.

I thought you might be a good person to ask how to go about building an audience for your blogs etc? I saw that you’ve got around 10,000 followers on Twitter! How did you get that many?

As far as this blog goes I get about 150 visitors a day, most of which is a result of the HP articles I wrote some time ago, I haven’t written to become a successful blogger, more just to write about things that I’m interested in without too much regard to staying within a defined niche or deriving any income from this site. It’s not going to become a Huffington Post.

My business has a new site in development now (should be live by April 10) Articles and blogs on that one will be much more tightly focused on successful performance marketing on the internet.

The thing is that I never really set out to build a Twitter following, I embraced twitter for what it is, and that’s a conversation – see my thoughts in my previous article called Social Media, blowing the winds of change . I wanted to participate in that conversation, I wanted to follow the three E’s of Social Media as best I could.

The three E’s of Social Media are; be Educational, Enlightening, Entertaining.

In addition to that I made up my mind to be myself, not anonymous, and not try and sell anything – I think social networking is about reputation. Opportunities for business come from your reputation, not simply tweeting your affiliate links to thousands of people who are more likely to get pissed off than buy anything form you.

The most significant assumption to make when building your twitter following is the fact, and this is just an estimate, that 80% of the people you follow will follow you back, so it goes without saying then that growing your following is a simple as following others. People with substantial Twitter followings are typically using some form of automation to assit with managing their Twitter experience (I’d bet it’s one of those they’re either doing it, or they’re lying things) so in all likelihood they will follow you back automatically.

Kind of ironic really isn’t it – it’s not really a following so much as participation. So how do we work out who to follow?

At the outset of my Twitter experience I was influenced by two people, Peter Shankman, and Chris Brogan, both of whom delivered key note speeches at Affiliate Summit in New York when I was there in 2009. It made sense to me then to find out who they were following and follow them too – additionally I followed anyone and everyone who appeared in the course of my business activity, my reading, research, and fun.

I should mention about here that my preferred tool for monitoring the conversation on Twitter, and for that matter Facebook and Linked In, is Tweet Deck, it’s free, it’s probably the most popular Twitter browser I know of and it does what they say it does. Using the Twitter interface itself is pretty limited by comparison.

I quickly realised that manually building a Twitter following is tedious, a distraction from core business, but building that Twitter following is totally necessary if the quality and scope of the “conversation” is to improve. Time to outsource the task, enter Twitter Counter. I’ve used Twitter Counter’s featured user service several times now, to great effect. You can see my opinion of the service in the testimonials at the bottom of this page. Yes, you have to pay for it, but let me just say that, in my experience, it’s money well spent.

There’s a couple of things I want to do when I’m building my Twitter following. I want to follow people who follow me, I think that’s polite, and I want to send them a welcome message. I don’t as a rule un-follow people if they un-follow me and I also follow a number of people who don’t reciprocate, usually they have good reasons for that – like they’re the president of the USA or something. You can imagine how hard this would all get without some form of automation.

In addition to that and, perhaps, the most significant development in my efforts to build a Twitter following has been the ability to follow people who are participating in those conversations that interest me, and do it automatically. There are many great tools available that allow you to manage your tweets, lists, direct messages etc. but the only one I’ve found so for that allows you to follow people automatically by keyword is Buzzom Premium (affiliate link). This gives me the ability to tap into conversations and build a following of people who are like minded, or involved in the debate about a particular subject. That to me is invaluable. It grows your following in a more defined set of conversations.

I’ll write a more detailed review of Buzzom Premium as soon as I get time but below is an example of what I mean.

You can see here what I’m into at the moment. Twitter accounts mentioned in tweets are prefaced by @ and specific threads are prefaced by hash tags #. Buzzom Premium allows me to have up to eight of these at a time, which forces me to stay focused on specific topics and change them when my interests change. That way my Twitter following is growing automatically and on topic, and I can focus on tweeting and the three E’s.

I hope that’s given you some inspiration as to how you can do that yourself. I’d like to close by saying if you have a moral issue with automation it’s understandable. If your intention is to automatically grow a huge following and hammer them with affiliate links or sales pitches you’re just spamming, but, if you follow the three E’s and your tweets are Educational, Enlightening, or Entertaining then I’m sure your experience will be a good one.

Social Media, to me, is a nebulous subject, constantly on my mind because of the business I′m in, more importantly, how I choose to conduct my business and my life in general.

When I traveled to New York a couple of weeks ago to attend Affiliate Summit my mind was swimming with thoughts about the significance of this "new phenomenon" called Social Media in relation to our business, what is our strategy, what are people doing with it, how are they monetizing Social Media, and so forth.

I’ve always thought that Social Media is there to be embraced, it fits squarely into my ambition to be free from constraints, able to work, and communicate, from anywhere I have a connection to the internet. I certainly don′t think that it′s a fad. I think it will be quickly identified by what it facilitates rather than what it is.

Peter Shankman’s keynote address at the Affiliate Summit, apart from being really entertaining, put a lot of things into perspective, and reaffirmed a lot of my own thinking on the matter. I wont go into the detail of Peter′s address, you can view that yourself, but the key takeouts for me were;

• Social Media is a two way conversation, it′s about establishing trust, and your reputation.
• Social Media has heralded in the age of immediacy – traditional news media is no longer the primary source of ″news″ rather it has become a secondary source of supporting content and background information.
• Social Media, despite what might be apparent right now, is not Twitter, Facebook, or any of the other applications we use at this point in time, they are merely the applications that support it, for now.

Like all new developments (is it really that new?) on the Internet, I see attempts to pigeon hole, categorize, capitalize, monetize, specialize, and generally go around in ever decreasing circles of analysis paralysis until…well…you know what, then stick on the ″I′m a Social Media expert″ hat and proclaim some sort of insight into it′s future, what it is and what it isn′t, what it means in this that or another context, oh and you’d better buy the e-book before you miss your chance and the whole Social Media bandwagon up and leaves you in the dust.

I′m a Social Media user, and an advocate, I′m certainly not an expert. Contrary to emerging opinion I regard any application that puts me in touch with a broader community, that expands my neighborhood, my peer group, business contacts, or allows me to share my opinion and participate in conversation with people who, previously, I would never have met, as Social Media.

Like many I use a number of applications; Facebook for family, friends, acquaintances, and community. Where the activity is somewhat frivolous and lifestyle oriented. Linked In as some kind of quasi resume or record of my work history, business connections and probably a source of employees at some point in the future. This Blog (yes, I know there are people out there that differentiate blogging from Social Media, but I don’t) where I write and discuss topics I’m passionate about, and Twitter.

Twitter is like a seething mass of humanity all talking at once. To make matters more colorful we have to deal with the likes of the 15 Most Annoying Types of Twitter Users (thanks to JD Rucker for putting it so nicely) cluttering up the twitter space. It′s been likened to the junction between narcissism, ADHD, and stalking, and now we′re seeing a preponderance of people who need to understand the difference between please buy my product, or, click my affiliate link, and creating the kind of reputation where people trust you enough to be compelled to do business with you in the first place.

But, every so often a wave of congruence flows through the Twitter chatter, we’ve seen it with the rigged elections in Iran, the death of Michael Jackson, etc. and that′s where the real power of the medium lies. Those who once controlled the message now face the reality that they no longer can (unless they turn the Internet off, of course), or certainly not to the same extent. Twitter can get the message out faster than you can say “shit, I hope this doesn′t get out”. I like that.

Denver Business Strategies Examiner, Kevin Boulas wrote, in a particularly astute post titled Four key questions CEOs must ask about social media…

Another question a CEO is concerned with is "How do we control the message?" There is an internal aspect to this question – "how do I control internal communications and proprietary information?"; and an external aspect – "how do I manage my brand if I don’t control the message?"

…the post goes on to look at things, very articulately, from the CEO′s perspective, but, looking at it from a Social Media (ok, my) perspective I′d say guess what, dude, you don′t.

In as much as this is now a two way conversation, and it’s happening almost immediately, you can only control your side of the message, your brand will now, more than ever before, be intimately connected to your reputation, not some one way strategy devised in your marketing department, and your reputation will be determined by the extent to which you participate in the conversation, and should you choose not to participate in the conversation, well, we will have it without you.

Take my recent posts about HP and Mark Hurd (CEO, HP), triggered by nothing more than hearing "if you don′t like it there′s the door" one too many times and deciding, you know what, I′ll take the door, thanks for the golden handshake and, buy the way, I happen to think you′re (Mark Hurd) the living embodiment of everything that′s wrong with corporate America, you′ve never been known for innovation, made all your returns to shareholders by shafting employees, and you′re leading HP down the doom spiral that comes from competing for market share in already saturated markets. Oh, and I blog.

How do you control that message?

Social Media represents, to me, a fascinating blend of democracy, anarchy, and freedom of speech, it′s power is that it′s given us a voice outside of the established news media, and as far as I’m concerned it′s now my primary source of information.

When newspaper publishers, probably reminiscing the good old days, when people used to buy newspapers, and the paperboy dropped one on your lawn each morning, decide to deal with the massive drop in the overall value, and revenues, from printed news papers, that dish up, in my opinion, a steady stream of comoditized, politically biased, dumbed down for the masses, garbage, by making me pay for online content, I just think…

…go ahead…make my day.

Recommended reading

I′m reading this book right now.

Chris Brogan and Julian Smith are Social Media veterans. In their book Trust Agents they discuss how today′s online influencers trade in trust, reputation, and relationships to build their businesses online.

This is fascinating stuff, the Internet has completely changed the paradigm of work and business for me and it′s become obvious, through experience, and emphasized in this book, that the more we participate in transparent, honest, and genuine relationships, the more our business grows.

The book discusses how social networks, and personal connections, have more influence than marketing messages ever will, how the most valuable commodity on the Internet is not cash, it′s trust, and it gives you strategies to use the power of the Internet to build your business through social networks, now, and with integrity.

I recommend it.

NOTE: I always give my local bookshop the first opportunity to sell me a book before I go to Amazon. It would be nice if you did too.

So, I’m not exactly a prolific writer but hey, I’ve been busy ok?

A little over a year since my first post, and looking in hindsight at what I set out to achieve, and how, I have to say if I haven’t already achieved my goal, I’m pretty damn close.

As we head into the twilight of 2008 the world is quite a different place compared to when I started this blog. We’re surrounded by the fog of economic doom and gloom relentlessly amplified by the media and, largely as a result of the actions of irresponsible and greedy dimwits running financial institutions, millions of people are staring down financial oblivion or, living in fear of it.

My life too is quite different, I have a Son, I have given up my day job and, like I set out to do, I have a business that I can run from anywhere I have a Laptop and an Internet connection. I’ve moved my family out of Sydney, bought a new house on the mid north coast of Australia where the air is clean, the beaches are beautiful and there’s not a traffic light in sight. I haven’t taken a drop in income at all.

The business, in the most generic sense, is affiliate marketing, based around our network CogentAds.com , we’ve grown to a million dollar operation over the past twelve months and already have a million dollars worth of business in the funnel for 2009. Which, by the way, is there for our affiliates to share.

Why am I telling you this, and what is it’s significance in regards to the global financial crisis? The common denominator is fear, and the need to do something about it.

In my ten years in the corporate IT industry I don’t recall a time when the possibility of losing my job wasn’t imminent. Whether it was because of mergers and acquisitions or the persistent reduction of cost, the fear was always there and I decided to do something about it, no one else was going to do it for me. I started my Affiliate marketing career, the corporate position rapidly became one I could do without, and therefore the fear of losing my job, and the consequences, had gone. More about that in a future post.

If there’s one theme we’re hearing over and over again in regards to the current financial crisis it’s that it’s going to get worse before it gets better. Doesn’t that make you feel really comfortable? If there ever was a time to do something constructive about fear it’s now, and guess what, no one’s going to do it for you. I’m not about to get into a deep and meaningful description of the intricacies of affiliate marketing in this post but I am trying to plant a seed in your mind, that affiliate marketing is a very viable option, if you have the aptitude, for weathering the financial storm or making a serious full time living.

CogentAds.com is primarily a Cost Per Action (CPA) network, which means that our affiliates are generating income by producing sales leads which is somewhat easier , as opposed to sales. We have affiliates who are happy generating enough to cover their cost of living expenses and supplementing the income from their jobs, and we have some who are doing tens of thousands of dollars a month.

Advertisers, in economic downturns, are increasingly concerned about the return on investment from their advertising budget and see the affiliate marketing value proposition, where you only pay for results, as a very attractive option. I believe that this will be even more so in the coming year.

Now, if you find yourself going into the new year with a sense of financial anxiety it might just be time to start thinking outside the square. Consider affiliate marketing as an option, find out all you can about it. If you are internet savvy – you actually found this blog so I bet you are – there’s a lucrative option waiting for you. Here’s just some of the things I enjoy as a result of my choice;

• I work from home or anywhere I have my laptop and internet.
• I get to see my Son grow up through all the little changes you’d miss if you’re at the office every day. He gets to see a lot of his Dad.
• I earn good money.
• I surf every day, when I want to.
• We don’t have to spend money on Child Care unless we want to.
• We can go overseas whenever we like for as long as we like because I can operate the business from anywhere.
• On walk to work Fridays I only have to walk up the stairs to my office.

There’s something for you to think about in all this doom and gloom, remember that there’s always opportunity to be found in adverse situations. You just have to find it.

Enjoy the festive season and good luck for the new year.

If you recall, in a recent post, I mentioned that I had just gone live with an Article directory site, TotallyAwesomeArticles.com, on or about the 24th September 07. At the time I had resigned myself to the fact that, based on my previous experience, and in direct contrast to the legends of Internet Marketing who would have you believe it will happen overnight, it would take quite some time to get ranked and make some headway.

You can imagine my surprise when, just one month later, it has a page rank of 1. Not that it really makes much difference in terms of traffic, revenue, or anything but it’s rewarding to see that it can happen faster than expected.

In contrast, my freebies site, TotallyAwesomeFreebies.com, has just gone to page rank 1 too, but this is after more than a year, so what was the difference, or better still, what did I do?

Assuming that it’s not some kind of Google Sandbox anomoly and that the site is not going to disappear again, I employed two elementry site optimization techniquies, one on site, and one off site.

The on site approach was to ensure there were no off site links on the home page (ok, there’s one, but that’s an obligation of the script I used to create the site.)

The off site strategy has to be a testament to the power of Article Marketing. I wrote one quality article and had it distributed by iSnare. That’s it, nothing more, nothing less.

Looking at the other posts in this blog so far it’s interesting to note that my post on the keyword Guitar Pequannock shows up on the first page in Google for that term, and my post titled “Revisitors.com does it work?” is number one for that phrase. While this is not really anything significant at all it demonstrates that it is posible to get indexed, ranked and well positioned, very quickly and it’s not very difficult. It is certainly something that you can do yourself and you definitely should not pay someone to do it for you.

Obviously the challenge is exponentially harder when you are dealing with a lucrative, highly competitive niche but, the strategy employed is exactly the same.

Shortly after I started this blog I decided to create an article directory. God knows why but, considering that a Keyword Analyzer search reveals there are approximately 350 million sites (indexed pages) competing for around 4500 searches a month for the keyword phrase “article directory”, I figured the world needed another one! So, TotallyAwesomeArticles.com was born.

Now, I realized very early on in my Internet Marketing journey, or at least I realized that it was my opinion, that people with no web site development skills, who wish to become Internet marketers, unless of course they can afford exorbitant programmer fees (and have a lot of patience), are at a distinct disadvantage to those who have, especially if that skill comes combined with a sound understanding of marketing concepts. I also realized, with the definite exception of SiteSell , which is actually a complete online business model, that using prefabricated sites, or site builders, (and I’m generalizing here ok…and not referring to CMS like this one…) is rife with compromise. There is something very empowering about being able to write a site from scratch, and in code, and then see it take on a life of it’s own in terms of traffic, search position, and revenue.

So why an article directory?

It was quite simple really. It occurred to me while I was doing some article marketing to promote my other sites (you do use article marketing don’t you?), here was a perfect opportunity to have legitimate, and value adding, interaction with other Internet marketers and webmasters while at the same time owning a steadily growing site full of highly indexable (if that’s a word) and relevant content, that can be monetized in several different ways. I liked the idea that, ultimately, article authors would provide me with all the content. There were also a number of readily available, and free, article directory scripts to choose from which provide the back end to the site.

So, with any website, or with any site that’s purpose is to generate revenue, there is the design and development aspect, the promotion, and the eventual monetization, to consider. The rest of this post centers around design and development as far as an Internet marketer is concerned.

An experienced web designer is a beginner web designer who kept on designing web sites. More practice grasshopper!

If you’d said to me a year ago that within twelve months I would be able to write reasonably standards compliant sites, in code, I would have laughed. My motivation was simple, I wanted control of my Internet marketing destiny, and that meant freeing myself from those that would use my inexperience, or inability, to pull at my heart strings, to extract my wallet from my pocket to pay for products that were generally disappointing at best.

Now, if you want to wait until you have a complete understanding of web design before launching into your first site you are destined to go into an ever increasing spiral of analysis paralysis until you finally disappear up your proverbial you know what. As somebody famous (Tao Te Ching?) once said “a journey of a thousand miles starts with the first step”. The mere fact that you decide to create a site will start you on a cycle of challenge, problem solving, and learning that, if you persist, will see you become adept in no time. There are plenty of great books and related resources to help you along the way but we’ll save that for another post.

TotallyAwesomeArticles.com represents the latest point in my personal evolution as a web site designer. An evolution that started with the question; “how do I get a site on the Internet?”, and progressed steadily from there. I very quickly formed the opinion that table based layout was to web site design what the model T Ford is to automobiles, and set myself the goal of writing CSS based designs (see this), and that in turn developed into a determination to understand and write standards compliant code, which has as it’s essence the separation of structural code from the presentation.

When you combine this with my preference for minimalistic design (yep, I actually chose this WordPress Template over hundreds of others), fluid and accessible (wont fall apart when the reader changes the font size) layout that uses all the available screen real estate, and achieving the maximum from minimum code, then you can see where my next set of challenges, and consequent development, lies.

I’m pleased to say the code in TotallyAwesomeArticles.com , at least the code that I was responsible for (the PHP behind it generates code that I can’t change) validates to XHTML 1.0 Transitional. I have achieved a reasonably fluid layout, moved most of the presentational code into CSS , and as far as tables are concerned, I don’t agree with the “thou shalt not use tables” brigade, I have relegated them to form layout, which I think they’re quite suited for, taken the mountains of extraneous code out of them, banished spacer gif’s and banned nesting, and I’m happy with that.

Comes a time though when you have to be satisfied with your development, settle for the best you have done so far, take your learnings and challenges into the next project, and get on with promoting and making revenue from the new site. After all, regardless of whether you’ve created a masterpiece of standards compliant design, you’ve just created the equivalent of a grain of sand in the Sahara desert, and now the job, with an equal amount of challenge and learning, is to promote the site to the top of the rankings. I’ll let you know how I go.

Some credit where credit’s due;

During this round of development I really began to appreciate what a better experience using the Firefox browser is. Do yourself a favor, change.

Chris Pederick’s Web Developer extension for Firefox rocks! This is a great help.

Piotr Petrus’ em calculator makes fluid layout a breeze.