Special thanks to Abe Erickson (@AbeErickson) with Ugly Chair Productions for the amazing highlights video. Check it out:

Some live tweet-up photos from the event:

Welcome to the first official Prince William County Tweet-up!

Tracking the Tweet-up action with the big screen.

Great crowd of tweeps!

Tweeps! Or Twitches?

If I missed anyone, PLEASE leave a comment. We want to know everyone who was there!

There will be another tweet-up soon! Keep following the #pwcounty hashtag to get the latest Prince William County Twitter happenings. Our next goal is to make pwcounty a trending topic (well, we can try!).

If you live, work, or play in these areas we want to know who you are:

• Manassas/Manassas Park
• Bristow/Gainesville/Haymarket
• Woodbridge/Dale City/Triangle
• Prince William County (if we missed you above) and surrounding areas

This is a simple public list for everyone’s benefit.

How could this help? Network with local Twitter users. Organize local tweet-ups. Meet cool people.

It’s simple. Just list your name, your Twitter username, and a short bio about yourself. I’ll get it started:

I’m Jonathan Arehart, President & CEO of Cavendo. I’m on twitter as @jarehart. I produce things on the Internet.

Comments are moderated, so add yourself and we’ll get it approved as soon as possible. Thanks!

UPDATE: Prince William County’s first-ever Tweet-up is now official! We are hosting the first Prince William region tweetup on Thursday, August 27, 2009 from 5:00-7:00pm at La Chapelle Restaurant in Old Town Manassas. Special thanks to the News & Messenger and the Prince William County-Greater Manassas Chamber of Commerce for their help organizing this great event. For details about the venue including directions, visit the Chamber’s web site here: http://mmr.to/pwc-tweetup/

Location (Get a map of this event):
La Chapelle Restaurant
9329 Main St.
Manassas, VA 20110

We hope to see you all there!

Thanks to @AbeErickson with Ugly Chair Productions for the intro video shot!

Your web site sucks because it’s boring. It doesn’t do anything. It’s nothing more than an online version of your boring brochure.

Would you really expect someone to convert into a sale on your boring web site? Think about it. Imagine you’re a prospect. Now look at your web site. Why would you buy anything from your company?

The problem is, there are no easy solutions. You can’t just flip a switch and be un-boring. It takes a massive amount of effort and dedication to produce an exciting, conversion-crazy web presence.

But, the first step is to realize that your web site probably sucks. What are you going to do about it?

One surefire way to get immediate action on a web site is PPC advertising. The downfall, obviously, is that the cost per action associated with that advertising can be overwhelming. Another problem is that most small businesses just don’t get PPC.

The best investment of time comes from building organic traffic. Organic traffic is visits generated from the regular listings within a search engine. You pay nothing for it and it gives you a huge boost in credibility. That’s one thing PPC can’t buy — credibility.

The first step in building organic traffic is to add valuable, keyword-rich content to your web site. This can be in the form of blog posts, articles, tips, guides, tutorials, and so forth. The second step is to keep growing that content. The third step is to evaluate and analyze whether or not you’re making any headway in search engines.

Start today and keep doing it. It takes many small actions to generate big results.

With the rapid evolution of technology during the so-called Information Age, one would expect web sites to have advanced significantly.

That isn’t the case. So what can you do about it?

The key is to break away from the noise. You want to develop a web site that guides people through a path instead of throwing everything at them at once.

People visit a web site with a specific interest or goal in mind (most of the time). It’s up to you and your web site to help those people find the path to what they desire (whether it’s a subconscious or conscious desire).

You must also further refine the path to help convert these people into taking action. Whether it’s downloading a document, making a call, buying a product, or filling a form out – the objective is conversion.

Most web sites today and 15 years ago are still stuck in the “information brochure” stage. There are no paths, simply information thrown together with the hopes of netting someone who might be interested.

Fortunately, there are a handful of ways to measure the impact a Facebook presence is having on your organization.

1) Page Statistics

If you setup a page for your company or product, then you open yourself up to a wealth of data. Dubbed "insights," Facebook enables you to view critical visitor statistics of your page. You can see everything from the number of new fans to unique visitors to a breakdown of demographic information.

From a marketing standpoint, this information is extremely valuable. Not only can you track the effectiveness of your page, you can also get detailed information on what type of people those visitors are.

2) Real-time Interaction

Facebook acts as a powerful vehicle for interacting with people in an informal fashion. You can solicit and measure feedback from friends and colleagues via status updates, wall postings and private messages. You can also, with your page, send out a message to your entire fan base.

This type of real-time, one-on-one interaction is difficult to achieve and Facebook helps eliminate many of these barriers.

3) Measure Inbound Links

If you have a web site outside of Facebook, then you should most definitely promote it to your Facebook network and fan base. Not only should you link to your homepage, it’s also important to occasionally link to web updates such as new pages on your web site, blog posts, podcasts, and other noteworthy content. The operative word is noteworthy. Don’t needlessly push links out to your network or else you’ll end up alienating people.

Using a web statistics package such as Google Analytics, you can then see and measure how many people click those links from Facebook to arrive on your web site. When you do a status update and link to a page on your web site, for example, check your statistics the next day to see how many people clicked through.

This type of information can help indicate how engaged your audience is and how effective your Facebook content is.

4) Go Outside Facebook

You don’t have to limit your measurement of Facebook activity to just Facebook. Consider expanding data collection efforts outside into the real world. For example, if you ever survey your clients, ask them if they know about your Facebook presence. If they don’t, ask them to explain why.

Or, if you’re running a marketing campaign, think about how you can merge Facebook into it. For instance, if you’re running a print ad in the local newspaper, create a small feature about your Facebook page in part of the ad. You can then measure, using Facebook’s page insights, any increases in new fans once you run the ad.

The key is to get creative. Social media is beginning to play a huge role in the way we do business. How can you incorporate it into your organization?

In my previous post last week, I talked about using Facebook as a research tool for small businesses. Now I’m going to shift the discussion to implementation.

Facebook is a great way to find a wealth of information, but you want to take action on it. Fortunately, Facebook provides the means and tools needed to build a profile for your organization. Below I offer three ways you can start.

Create pages for your products or organization

Facebook enables anyone with an account to setup a "page." A page is basically like a profile for an organization, product, service, group and so forth. In fact, Facebook changed pages to act more like an individual’s profile this very week. With this change, pages offer an even stronger ability to connect with your audience.

What can you do?

• Invite friends to become "fans" of your page (build a following)
• Post status updates to your fan base to keep them informed about your organization
• Post links, articles, videos or notes to share resources with your audience
• Enable interaction with your fans using the page wall
• Share photos to give your organization a "face"
• Advertise your page using the Facebook advertising network to gain new exposure (I’ve heard so-so things about this)

Check out Cavendo’s page on Facebook.

Post events

If you’re an events-driven organization, Facebook offers a great platform for getting the word out. You can create events and share them with your network, allowing them to see the details and indicate whether or not they want to attend.

When Cavendo held its Business After Hours event in January, we pushed the event hard on Facebook. We invited people who otherwise would not have known about the event and built up a nice list of RSVPs. More importantly, we had a group that we could track and communicate with as it related to the event.

What can you do?

• Create and manage important events on Facebook (if you hold a lot of events, don’t put them all up, just the essential ones)
• Invite your network to attend events
• Post follow-up photos and news after the event to stay connected with those who RSVPed
• Send personal messages to those who RSVPed to thank or remind them about the event
• Share important details about the event including cost, location and start time

Use your status to communicate important developments

If you create a page for your organization, then you have the ability to post status updates that your fans can see. However, it’s also important to post status updates in your own personal profile. Everyone in your personal network might not be a "fan" of your organization. If you have something significant to announce, tell it to your whole network. Let them know how your organization is doing (in a genuine way, of course).

What can you do?

• Post interesting links or blog posts that relate to your organization
• Announce a significant "win" that you want to share (don’t brag, though)
• Solicit feedback in the form of questions
• Announce new products, web sites, services or people that you’ve hired or launched
• Invite people in your network to become a "fan" of your organization
• Remind your network about an event you’re hosting or participating in

These are three very easy and very powerful ways that you can launch a presence for your organization or small business on Facebook. Much of this is introductory level material, so as you get in and explore Facebook, you’ll find your own uses for it when it comes to building your business.

Stay tuned for a follow-up post on this: Measure.

The fact is many businesses are jumping on the Facebook bandwagon. I’m not talking about huge Fortune 500 companies — I’m talking about small businesses.

The problem is, however, that most of these businesses have no idea what to do with Facebook. I would venture to guess that they’re only on it for the ride. Everyone else is doing it, right?

So, this brings me to ask the question: In terms of business, what is Facebook good for? What uses and applications does it have for small business? How can it benefit small business?

I decided to cook up a short guide to Facebook for small business. It’s not definitive by any means because Facebook is a rapidly evolving service with new features, functionalities and uses rolling out constantly. But this guide should serve as a good starting point to get your small business or non-profit organization into the 21st century of social networking.

I’ve broken this short guide into three primary sections: Research, Implement and Measure. Today, I’ll start with Research.

Facebook can serve as an excellent source of market, demographic and psychographic research. Depending on the size of your network, you can analyze a wealth of data just by reading and looking at what people post, say and link to.

Connect with younger audiences

Facebook has been a main attraction for the up-and-coming generations. Obviously, since Facebook started out as a service geared toward college students, the average user age is pretty young. This gives you the opportunity to connect with that younger audience.

This is not to say there aren’t older generations on Facebook — there certainly are — but the core group of people using Facebook are young. I have noticed the older generations catching up, which is an interesting trend, and could serve as an opportunity to connect with those audiences as well in the future.

What can you do?

• Connect with younger audiences by branding your business with your Facebook presence
• Pay close attention to the younger members of your network — start building a persona of that younger user as it relates to your organization
• Spend some time perusing a sampling of profiles — review interests, what their friends are saying, videos posted, etc. — they don’t have to be in your network as long as the profile is public
• See what groups and pages younger users gravitate toward
• Finalize your persona and use it to better relate to younger prospects and customers

Build more personal connections

The thing I like most about Facebook is the ability to build personal connections with your network. The tools exist to allow you to communicate with other people and share things you normally wouldn’t be able to share. These could be photos, thoughts (via status updates), links or wall comments. Granted, most Facebook users don’t develop strong bonds with most of their network, you just need to go the extra mile to reach out to those you don’t know as well.

What can you do?

• Establish a good profile and make it personal
• Connect with friends, family, colleagues, partners, clients and other people you’d like to keep in touch with
• Invite those not on Facebook to start using it
• Keep your profile updated and remember to keep checking your notifications
• Reach out to your network and interact with your connections (via status updates, wall postings, links, private messages and chat)

See what people are up to

Use Facebook to keep informed about your connections. See if they change jobs, start new businesses, join new groups, list new interests and so forth. Facebook offers a wealth of data about your connections (should they choose to share it) that can help you develop more personal relationships.

One of the most addicting features of Facebook is status updates. Users can post in real-time what they’re doing and share it with their network. This allows you to gain micro-insight into what’s new with your connections. Sometimes the status updates can be mundane, but they can also tell you some things you otherwise wouldn’t have known.

What can you do?

• Stay fresh with your connections — take the time to review profiles on a consistent basis
• Don’t friend anyone you can — invite and accept connections you’re interested in developing
• Log into Facebook on a consistent basis and review the news feed to see latest information from all of your connections
• If you want to see more about particular connections, you can have Facebook show more updates about them in the news feed
• Pay attention to status updates including the comments other people post to them
• See what events your connections are attending

See who other people are friends with

In almost any case, you can see who a person on Facebook is friends with, whether they’re your friend or not. Why is this useful?

You can get a sense of a person’s social power by analyzing the quality of their connections. If one of your Facebook friends is connected with people you’re trying to reach, then it can also serve as a potential way to develop that connection. This is what LinkedIn is trying to do albeit with not so good results.

Seeing who others are connected with can also help you grow your own network. If you have mutual acquaintances and notice them in another friend’s network, you can friend request them. Just be careful not to "friend steal" or come across as someone mining for friends. You need to be genuine and build trust.

What can you do?

• Spend time reviewing the connections of others on Facebook
• See if there are any trends in terms of who other people are friends with
• Take note of anyone who has people in their network that you might be interested in connecting with
• Stay informed about new connections that your friends add

Facebook can be a powerful source of useful information. But at the same time, you want to be careful how you use that power. Don’t abuse it by being overly intrusive. Don’t use it purely for business purposes. You need to foster real connections with people who you’re truly interested in connecting with.

Stay tuned for the next part in this series: Implement.

Just "getting something up there" is the wrong approach. You have to think like the visitors who will be using your site and design for their needs.

So, how can you make your web site stronger by keeping user-friendliness and usability in mind?

5. Eliminate "doorway" and "splash" pages

We’ve seen these pages before. They’re the obnoxious, graphic-intense or Flash-designed introduction pages that try to force you to watch or read something before entering into the web site. Or, sometimes they aren’t creative and just show a line of text along with "Enter Here."

These types of "doorway" pages must go. They offer little or no value, and only serve to add a roadblock in front of users trying to get to the meat of your web site.

Users want content. They want to learn about your business. Most of all, they want to do this quickly and efficiently.

4. Always keep aesthetics in mind

This is a good rule of thumb for almost anything creative you’re working on. When I say aesthetics, I mean the basics of the web design: colors, fonts, borders, graphics, and how they’re all put together.

If your web site is trying to mesh two colors that simply don’t go together, don’t do it. The worst offense is using an unreadable color for fonts, such as bright yellow on a white background. Pick a good font and be consistent with it. Good fonts for the web usually reside in the sans-serif category which includes fonts such as Arial, Verdana, and Trebuchet. However, serif-based fonts such as Georgia and Garamond are equally as good for header fonts. When you pick a font, keep with it. Don’t use Arial on some pages and then Comic Sans on the other pages.

Finally, if you incorporate graphics into your web site, pick ones that are relevant and meaningful. If the graphic distracts in the wrong way, users may lose focus on your content.

3. Create lists

Many people are not fond of reading large chunks of text on their computer. It strains the eye and requires people to focus in an environment that is usually full of distractions such as email and pop-up notifications.

How can you get around this? Dice up your large content blocks with bulleted lists. More than likely, your users are just going to want to scan your web site over to learn about your business and the products or services you offer. And unless the content you’re providing is resource-based or technical, you have only a short attention span to work with.

Lists are good because they allow for generous amounts of whitespace and they can be easily skimmed on a point-by-point basis.

2. Design your navigation and pages with good labels

When landing on your web site, users want to be able to quickly find what they’re after. Whether it’s information about your products or filling out a service request form, your web site needs to clearly label these important areas.

Labels are especially important for navigation. You need to think like your users and determine what terminology they would use in describing your business. For example, if you operate a bank, are your users going to want to open a "deposit account" or a "checking account."

Any confusion about where to click can add seconds to a user’s decision-making, which on the Internet is close to a lifetime.

1. Build in strong calls to action

Your web site must have a purpose of some kind. Do you want users to read something? Do you want them to fill out a form? Whatever action it is that you want your users to take, you must tell them!

Designing good calls to action will accomplish this task. A call to action can be as simple as a link on your homepage telling users to fill out a support ticket or it can be as complex as a pop-up box appearing within your web site asking a user if they need help (careful with this as these are easily annoying to users).

You don’t need to skirt around your motivations for getting users on your web site. They’re there because you have what they may be looking for. Give them the direction they need!

That’s because this post is about getting traffic. And fast.

That’s one of the primary goals of why we publish content. We want people. Eyeballs to read, digest and interpret our content.

However, for most of us, getting hordes of people into the door is no easy task. Usually, it takes months of maintaining a steady flow of useful content, working connections and responding to reader comments. It’s hard work but it pays off.

But seriously, I want traffic now. I want people reading this post right now.

Well, here are three super simple tactics I employ to get some instant traffic. I’m not talking hordes of people, but a few individuals within my target audience who I know can appreciate the content. Who knows, if your content is good enough, they may even spread it for you (Malcolm Gladwell would call these people "connectors").

1) Brand It In Your Marketing Materials

This is one of those "duh" things, but if you have a blog, brand it with your marketing materials. This could be anything from business cards to letterheads to promo giveaways.

Your marketing materials are walking advertisements for your organization. And I would hope that these marketing materials are getting in front of not only your clients, but prospective clients as well. If you have a prospect who’s interested in your organization, they’re probably going to check you out.

I brand the Cavendo blog in several important places including:

• Cavendo’s web site (not just links, but post summaries as well)
• Email signatures (the cheapest of advertising!)
• Social networking profiles

That’s really it. If you notice, all of those marketing channels are electronic. That’s mostly because Cavendo is a web design business that lives on computers, but also because I want people to have one-click access to the blog. I could put it on business cards, but that would require effort on the other person’s end to access the blog.

I’m not saying that you shouldn’t brand the blog on business cards or other print materials (I would be contradicting what I said earlier). Instead, carefully evaluate where you place links to your blog. Is it going to get you maximum exposure? Is it in a spot that is going to facilitate ease of access? Maybe your target audience likes being handed a piece of paper with a URL on it to access at their convenience. If so, then advertise the blog on your business cards, letterheads, invoices, quotes and so forth.

2) Update Your Status

The internet is now a social medium. People thrive on social networking utilities such as Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, Twitter and others.

If you’ve just completed a masterpiece of a blog post, publish it in your status message. All of the social networking tools I mentioned have this capability. It draws immediate attention from your network to the blog post, and depending on the quality of your network, can result in a number of clicks and reads.

As a special case, Twitter is in a unique position to get you even more exposure. Granted, you need to build up your network to include a good number of followers, Twitter has the ability to enable others to spread the word for you. Called "retweets," other Twitter users can see your latest status update about the blog post and send it out to their network. The result is a potential brush fire effect in which you could have multiple people from multiple networks spreading your blog post. That’s the best case scenario, but even if you get a couple of retweets, you’re still getting some pretty valuable traffic with minimal effort and time involvement. Dan Zarrella, a self-professed social and viral marketing scientists, offers a wealth of research on Twitter and retweeting including when you should post an update, how you should ask for a retweet, how to plan a viral campaign and much more.

When I create a new entry, I’ll sometimes post it to my status and do a Twitter update. This has resulted in a number of easy clicks and reads. One of the previous entries I did was retweeted several times with no effort on my end except posting the initial update. The power of social networking is at your hands and it’s not difficult to employ. You just have to create a message that has stickiness (another Malcolm Gladwell word), sincerity and attractiveness.

3) Tell People About It

This is another point that should seem obvious, but many people miss out on it. When you post your next best entry, tell people about it.

I mean physically tell people about it.

If you’re at a networking event and you run into someone who you think might benefit from your knowledge, tell them about your blog and new entry. Or, if you strike up a conversation with someone at the supermarket, tell them. Co-workers, bosses, friends, family, business partners, suppliers, members of the media and even strangers. These are all types of people you could be talking to.

If I create a new post that I know someone from my network might benefit from, I’ll send them a personal message letting them know. I’ll even ask them to pass it on to their network if they find it useful. Basically, this approach is like Twitter except much more powerful in that it’s personal.

So there you have it. Three very easy and very effective ways to generate quick, valuable traffic to your web content.

There’s nothing special about these methods, either. I’ll be the first to admit that. However, chances are you’re only doing one or two of them, or maybe even none.

I used to be hesitant to send off blog entries to my network because I didn’t want to get criticized or judged. But I’ve learned to take the risk and the reward has more than paid off. These are your networks – use them!

What are some of the ways you spread your message quickly?