So, yes, you do need one if you want to give people a reason to pay attention to you as you sell your book or your services. What makes you different from the other people who write and talk about in your field? Why should anybody care?

Try this exercise is creating your USP:

1. Have a blog on your website and update it regularly. I’m amazed how many web people think it’s okay to just have your website linked to your blog on WordPress.com. You’re just driving traffic to WordPress.com, who’s doing quite well, thank you very much.

2. Import your blog to your social media profiles in Facebook and LinkedIn. If people like your posts, they’ll check out the rest of your site.

3. Use a Twitter plugin like Wordtwit to notify Twitter when you’ve updated your blog and provides a link to your post.

4. If you have a brick and mortar store, get a free listing in Google Local Business Center and Bing Local Listing Center.

5. Use keyword descriptions in your blog posts and in your listings that people are likely to use if they’re looking for your services. I get a lot of traffic from people searching for “book marketing” “self published books” and “sell your book on the internet.”

6. When you start doing these things, be consistent. I had a client a while ago who was concerned he wasn’t getting any traffic to his blog. Trouble is, he hadn’t updated it in a month. Search engines love new content. When you don’t update your blog, the search engines lose interest in your site and favor the ones that are putting new stuff out there. (Kind of like us – always attracted to what’s new and shiny.)

2. The thousands of how-to sites that tells you everything you need to know about marketing online, how to fix your plumbing, buy a car, cook your Thanksgiving dinner, and darn near anything else you want to know.

3. Google Analytics/Feedburner/free keyword tool Google may take over the world someday, but at least they’re giving us some useful tools in the meantime.

4. YouTube – another Google-bot, I’m grateful to YouTube for giving me a way to take a silly break in the middle of a stressful day. And for giving creative types with fevered imaginations a place to post their work. Anybody up on what Chad Vader, Darth Vader’s younger brother is up to these days?

5. Amazon.com – and other online shopping sites that I intend to use for my holiday shopping again, enabling me to skip getting up at 3 am on Black Friday to wait in line outside of Best Buy.

6. The online community – Who would have thought 20 years ago that you’d have “friends” all over the world that you’ve never met, but share hobbies, obsessions, and marketing tips with? Heck, I know more about my Facebook friends than I do about my next door neighbors.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I live in the Denver metro area and have no ties to Salt Lake. But, surprise, surprise, the now-defunct Rocky Mountain News and the Deseret News were both Scripps-Howard papers – and the Deseret picked up a Rocky story quoting me in 1996 about the worst bridesmaids dresses ever and how my friend Debbie and I recycled our dresses as “Bridesmaids from Hell” the Halloween after our (now) ex-friend’s wedding. (She couldn’t understand why we hated the dresses. Maybe it was because we all looked HORRIBLE in them!)

In the spirit of full disclosure, here’s the guilty photo:

I’m the ghoul on the left.

Aside from this being one of the best costumes we ever came up with for bar-hopping on Halloween, this is also a great example of how stuff you might have posted say, on Facebook or on a forum might pop back into your life when you least expect it. (Maybe you should rethink that hooker costume for this upcoming Halloween….)

Generally, I’m a big believer in the Mom Rule of what content is suitable for posting online.  I don’t post anything I wouldn’t have wanted my Mom to read. (Mom thought this story and picture in the newspaper was pretty funny, by the way.) But maybe it’s a really good thing I’ve never applied for a job in the bridal industry.

And, oh, yes, the bride no longer speaks to us. The dresses eventually went to Goodwill where someone else probably snagged them for Halloween costumes. But I’m happy to say this picture will live on in cyberspace. Happy Halloween!

For once, I feel I am in the middle of the new “latest thing.” (I am not an early adaptor. I’m still excited about getting an iPod shuffle last Christmas.)

I’ve wondered for a while whether it was such a great idea to be on so many social media sites that I never visit most of them. What’s the point of having all of these “friends” that I’ve collected and never made an effort to get to know? Do they even know who I am? Or care? I doubt it.

On the other hand, I’ve enjoyed several online conversations with people I actually know on Facebook and LinkedIn. I’m now in the habit of logging in to one or the other during my work day to see what conversations are going on, adding my 2 cents when I want to, starting my own threads. It’s become an added conversation in the day. (And when you work in an office with only 3 other people, your conversations can be someone limited.)

20th century marketing emphasized getting your message out to masses of people. This was a one-way conversation. New marketing via social networks emphasizes a two-way conversation where people actually communicate. One of the common concerns business people and authors voice is where do you find the time to communicate with all of these people on these networks?

Answer: don’t try to have so many conversations.

Wow, is that simple or what?

If you only pick one or two places to hang out, you’ll actually have the time to get to know some of these online “friends” and maybe they’ll become friends without the quote marks. They, in turn, will get to know you and what you do. If they like what you do, they will recommend you to others. You will get calls, and hopefully, business.

That’s not so hard, is it?

I got a book awhile ago on dog behavior called The Other End of the Leash. According to the author, if you want your dog to come to you, don’t chase them. In pack behavior, running at the dog means run away (or get your ass kicked, I suppose.) But walking away from the dog tells that dog to follow you.

I tried this with Maggie. It works some of the time. But, we think she’s kind of an alien being anyway, not a dog.

My newly minted “Lead, Don’t Chase” strategy for leashing my dog could very well be applied to social media marketing.

1. To attract followers, lead by giving good information, answering questions, and being an authoritative voice on your topic. Those interested in your topic and your information will likely follow you and perhaps become your clients or customers.

2. Do not chase your potential customers by constantly pitching your products and services. Like Maggie the unrepentent hound, they will respond by leading you on a chase and duck under the (figurative) dining room table to escape you at every opportunity. I can guarantee you will be frustrated!

I think ebooks definitely have their place along with audio books, podcasts, and print books. Do I read a lot of ebooks? Only when I have to. My laptop screen is big, but after a while my eyes burn. If it’s something I really want to read and keep, I print it out. (I think that makes me a heretic in the digital world.)

I buy ebooks for the immediate delivery. That’s the big advantage for buyers. The big advantage for sellers is low cost for producing your ebook and no inventory.

Here’s a short list of where you can sell your ebook:

1. scribd.com: Scribd started as a social community site where you can upload documents to share. A few months ago they started an ebook store where you can sell your ebooks.

2. amazon.com (kindle): Amazon only sells ebooks in the Kindle format. Any other format (for running on a computer or cell phone can only be sold through their subsidiary company, MobiPocket.

3. mobipocket.com: Mobipocket is a French company acquired by Amazon. They offer tutorials on how to create your ebook and also how to choose a smartphone best suited for reading ebooks.

4. your website.

5. other ebook sites: There’s dozens of them. Check out their sellers terms carefully before you commit. (This is good advice for all of the sites listed above.)

I had always assumed that posting on Wikipedia was about as simple as posting to my blog. You write, hit publish, and bam! it’s on the internet. Not so fast…

Wikipedia has editors. And lots of guidelines. And anyone can edit your article or delete it, for that matter. So, if you’re considering using Wikipedia as part of your web marketing, here’s a few guidelines:

1. Dust off your academic guidelines for how to cite sources. Wikipedia wants to know where you got your facts from. Blogs and Facebook sources don’t count. Think newspapers, academic journals, books for sources. Sources you’d see in any encyclopedia.

2. Don’t post original research. Wikipedia wants substantiated stuff – info that’s been circulating and tested.

3. Don’t post blatent press release materials. The editors will take it down.

4. Read their guides and take a look at articles on similar topics. You’ll see what’s approved and what isn’t.

Judging from the webstats and Google Analytics on how much traffic Wikipedia can send to your website, it could be useful if your topic can withstand their scrutiny.

One of the worst things about the Internet is how we can all publish our opinions and call them facts and people believe them.

You saw it last year during the election and you’re seeing it again with the health care reform debate. I’ve been appalled at the misinformation, half-truths, and outright lies at what healthcare reform will or will not do.

And before you jump to any conclusions as to my political leanings – let me add that I’ve seen misinformation on both sides. I also just got a bill from my health insurance company informing me that our premium was going up over $200 a quarter. Reform looks really good to me.

But I digress.  Here’s my librarian-inspired list of how to be a bit more critical of the tons of data that come at you via the web and forwarded to you from well-meaning friends.

1. Check the “About us” section of a website to see who’s behind the rhetoric. Do they say they’re bipartisan, conservative, liberal, liberterian, or whatever?

2. Rather than believe everything they tell you on the “About Us” page, Google the name of the group to see if they’ve been in the news. Consider the news sources as well. Fox News? Unfair and unbalanced. New York Times? Liberal, liberal, liberal. (I always think of Bob Dole when I hear that.) Jon Stewart? Really funny and liberal. Rush Limbaugh? Also really funny is twisted, sick, sort of way. Blogger? Read some of his/her other posts to see what else they’ve written. And take everything with a grain of salt.

3. Check Snopes.com to see if your info has hit urban myth status.

4. When was the info published? Whatever you’re reading might be old and out of date.

5. It could also be satire. How many times have you heard a story about people thinking something written in The Onion was true? (I’d just like to believe it’s true.) Apparently this also happens with The Colbert Report.

6. And still be critical about what videos you see on YouTube and what get’s forwarded to you by your friends. Before I worked on a newspaper, I thought the news was brought to us by people who had the ultimate authority and were trustworthy above all. The reality is that it’s brought to us by individuals who may or may not have agendas and a particular reason for wanting to slant information one way or another. It’s up to us to sort through the crap.

Are you looking for quantity or quality in your LinkedIn and Facebook connections?

I’ve been reading a lot about why we should limit our connections online in order to actually build relationships. What’s the point of having a billion contacts online if they don’t know you and wouldn’t have a reason to take your phone call? What do you think?

When I posted the question, I was researching the “Answers” function on LinkedIn for a seminar that Brian DeLaet was giving at EduCyber that week. I wanted to see what kind of a response I would get from my 107 connections. I was pleasantly surprised to see several responses come in that day. And, 2 weeks later people are still responding.

The overwhelming response is that people are looking for quality connections. While it might look good to have thousands of connections – and many people have huge networks that they’ve worked hard to cultivate – most people are looking to build networks that will have an immediate value to them. My personal contention is that we should look for contacts that will actually take our phone calls rather than add people who contact us out of nowhere. I’ve usually regretted adding them as they tend to send me lots of “Buy my stuff!” messages.

Several responses also addressed using LinkedIn and Facebook as a way to become better known in their field. One respondent wrote that she got a speaking engagement through a network by making contacts with people she didn’t initially know.

Others addressed a desire to know people face-to-face before adding them to their online networks.

What was really cool was that they responded to my question and are still answering. We forget that our networks are real live people and not just numbers on a screen. It’s good to have a conversation with them, even through email.

Thanks for responding!