See that beautiful ad to the bottom right? The trusted, approved and used by Anthony ad? Well, I’d like to introduce you to my hosting company. These are the people that bring my blog to you without interruption.

HostMonster is found on top of most web hosting reviews, and one of the most frequently used hosting services around. While they may have some similar features and benefits as others, HostMonster provides me some very distinct differences that should help you choose a service that’s right for your blog.

Pricing
The price is always on the mind of us bloggers looking for hosting services, Right now you can get a 24-month contract with HostMonster for $5.95 a month. The service has outperformed my expectations and always delivers.

Features
Many features of the two web hosting are comparable. One big difference I like a lot is that HostMonster uses cPanel when a lot of other companies don’t. This was a big selling point for me, as I didn’t want to have to be a techie to figure this out. Even if I were to run into a situation, HostMonster support is always there and willig to help offering unlimited domain names and email accounts and, have shopping cart capabilities, spam filters, streaming audio/video options, and MySQL databases are all a plus. Simple Scripts make it very easy to set up my WordPress application without any trouble. HostMoster is literally telling you they provide unlimited bandwidth and disk space, so take advantage of that!

Security
HostMonster pride themselves in excellent security, using SSL and encryption to secure any information exchanged between your customers and your website. HostMonster also gives you SSH or Secure Shell Access, meaning you have a very secure channel when making changes to your blog.

Customer Support
Customer Service is the best way to make your decision when choosing a hosting company. HostMonster provides 24/7 phone support and live chat (which I love!). HostMonster also guarantees a wait time of less than two minutes for phone support, and all HostMonster phone support is handled within the United States (Outstanding). HostMonster does also off tutorials if your feeling confident about your tech skills!

How do you make money?
HostMonster gives you $175 in free search engine advertising credits, as well as one free domain name for life, free set up (with two-year or longer plan), and free domain privacy service. Offering a no-questions-asked 30-day money back guarantee was the clincher for me. HostMonster affiliates are generously paid $65.00 per paid referral.

Conclusion
Currently I’ve just renewed my two year contract with HostMonster and very happy. If you have any questions about HostMonster of services they provide please feel free to contact me.
Are you looking for hosting Services? Or Do you already use a service? I’d love to hear about it!

Disclosure: I receive compensation from the companies (like HostMonster) whose product I review. I test each product thoroughly and give high marks to only the very best. I am independently owned and the opinions expressed here are my own.

Well Happy New Year everyone! I know your saying, “Hey Anthony, its February. Where have you been?” I have a good answer! I’ve been working on a ton of new projects and got sidetracked. When I sat down tonight to start writing, I thought about the one thing I needed to change in 2010, any thought’s?

Be more calm

That’s it! I really need to calm myself and get into finishing mode. It really easy to begin project and get them going, but it’s another thing to finish. Here’s my calming recipe:

Begin my day with a few minutes to myself. Just a few minutes of quiet time to organize the upcoming day.

Breakfast with my family. The most important meal of the day will also become my interfamily communication time.

Spouse updates. Scheduling the day and calendar. Very important!

Get out for lunch, whether it be to eat well or exercise.

Let go what I can’t control. This will be tough cause I always feel better figuring things out, but not at the cost of getting things done.

Yoga. I need to lose some weight this year, and this will help me immensely!

I’d love to hear from anyone that’s been having focus problems and needing to calm down. This is our year, the year of the blogger. Now lets make make money and help others!

Have you ever really thought about what your passion in life might be? I can tell you I have many, but last night I was almost sleeping and it came to me. No, not the one passion I can count on for years to come, because I have plenty of those, LOL

The best way to describe how I feel when sitting down to develop a blog is this: I love wine (passion) and I really like to explore different varieties and match them with food (another passion). When I go to my favorite store Total Wine here in Florida, I walk in and it always over whelms me to see all the selections possible. I have over the past few years learned to really drill down to a type of grape instead of saying reds, or whites. Now day’s I walk into the store and look for “Sangiovese” wines which I now concentrate on, because they are my favorite grape varietal. So, believe me, I understand when you tell me you have a hard time understanding what you passion might be. If you really drill down to a niche of your passion, you’re likely to do much better when writing your blog, why? Because you’ll love it!

Do you believe in yourself?

You should because that’s where most of your magic will come from when writing

Here’s your lesson for tonight! Sit back with a nice glass of your favorite wine, beer, or liquor, preferably somewhere quiet and answer of the following questions:

What do you love to do every day without thinking its work?

What is your motivation for this love?

What is this love inviting you to do with it?

What obstacles stand in your way of accomplishing this love?

What are a few small steps you can take today to move you forward and begin working your love?

Once you can answer these questions, I’m certain you will be that much closer to finding your passion! The cool part of this is once you find your passion you’re ready to begin the best times of your life! Now let’s look at the equation we just came up with and repeat it every day.

Love = Passion

Now, that we’ve handled the hard part, it’s time to “embrace your passion” that’s right, you heard me. Most people will tell you to “follow your passion”. Why in the heck would we do that, when we can give it a big fat hug and say I Love You!

It’s time for you to take responsibility and know that you’re the only limit to you success. Stop making excuses about why you can’t embrace your passion, because anything is possible. Be open to living your passion and toward the goals you’ve created.

I can’t wait for you to comment and tell me you’ve found what you’ve been looking for (no U2 pun intended).

Being a reader of my blog, not only will you get awesome content, but real pictures and video of me showing the life of a blogger. At times it may not be glamorous, but at least you get to see me in true form! This is a tribute picture of my Black Friday!

What are you doing to celebrate Black Friday?

Comment or send me a picture to post!

I already know what you’re going to say, “We don’t want people telling us what they had for dinner” right? Well, Twitter is much more than 140 characters of nothing. It’s a business tool, and you need to use it now!

Getting Started – (Don’t be intimidated)

1. Sign up for an account at http://twitter.com. Try to use your first and last name, or your blog name as the account name. Insure that is easy to remember, and easy to type. Note that there is a 15 character limit on the account name.
2. Go into Settings and fill out your profile information. Make sure to include the URL to your blog in the “More Info URL” field. Add a picture, it makes it more personable to your followers. Pick a design and you’re almost in business!
3. Start “tweeting”, (More on this below) no more than a few a day to start. This is a marathon, and you don’t want to lose your followers for being too chatty.
4. Follow some people you know. (Go to their Twitter page and click on the button that says “Follow”.)

I recommend two favorites:  @suzannefranco (Suzanne Franco) @anthonyauguglia (Anthony Augugliaro)

1. DO NOT use Twitter solely as a promotional outlet for your blog, or everyone will think that is boring and will not want to follow you
2. As you get more familiar with your account, and Twitter, follow more people with the same interests as you. In the long run you’ll be a lot happier!

Build Credibility by sharing – (This is HUGE, get it right from the beginning)

1. Be a problem solver, not a problem maker.
2. Share your business tips.
3. Post original Content for your followers.
4. Highlight an event or conference you’re attending.
5. Alert followers to news related to your niche
6. Provide valuable links to articles and content that helped you!
7. Followers lover your photo’s, share them. (Example: Twitpic)

Build Your Network of Followers – (Don’t rush these steps)

1. Tweetup or Meet up. In fact, do both!
2. Be responsive. The faster the better, don’t leave a question hanging.
3. Ask for help…Follower point you in the right direction.
4. Check out your potential “Follows” before following them.
5. Use the search bar to look up keywords that will increase your potential leads.
6. Participate in people talking about you niche, or passion.
7. Give and Get referrals from the community.
8. Recommend other Twitter users in your group.

Market yourself and Your Blog (Marketing equals $$$$ if done correctly)

1. Be honest and transparent with the information you post.
2. Use polls and surveys. Just don’t go crazy with them.
3. Share some of your strategy’s
4. Avoid the hard sell (good way to get unfollowed)
5. Put your Twitter ID on all business cards, blogs, emails signatures, etc.
6. Link your posts, audio, and video to Twitter (It may become a viral Tweet!)
7. Everyone loves breaking news, post it!
8. Always respond to tweets talking about you or your blog.

Do’s and Don’ts

1. Do have a good time
2. Do work hard
3. Do post to your followers
4. Do appreciate social media
5. Don’t say anything that can come back to haunt you.
6. Don’t post boring things
7. Don’t tweet more than 10 times a day.
8. Don’t retweet anything without the original poster.

Quick Twitter Lingo

1. DM = Direct Message ( You can only DM people that follow you)
2. RT= Retweet
3. @username =  a link to that persons account
4. Tweetup = A gathering organized via Twitter
5. Hashtag (#) = #topic – ways to group keywords
6. Shortened URLs = To use you 140 characters wisely, we like to use Bitly.com Let’s say we need to shorten http://www.suzannefranco.com/ we’d get this http://bit.ly/Cfqb9
7. TwitterStream = a collection of tweets
8. Follower = Someone who sees your tweets in their TwitterStream

Like any new form of communication, we must take time to learn what the medium has to offer us and our brand. Take time to learn, and experiment with Twitter. This is not some fad the will pass in a few weeks, month, or even years. This is a seriously powerful tool for you to use for your blog, your brand, and your business. Treat it with respect, and it could provide you with a bounty of prospects.

What’s your Twitter ID?

Do you have any Twitter tips to share? We love to know about them.