It’s been a long while since I blogged here, but that doesn’t mean I’ve not been blogging. My focus over the past few months has been on the topic of social commerce, which is using social media in a retail environment to produce, get this, actual dollars.

I’m currently writing weekly feature articles for Practical eCommerce, an online publication I’ve worked with for years. More recently, I started blogging for Social Commerce Today, a site with a strict focus on social commerce.

Why a focus on that particular topic? Because, where social media is concerned, it is the new black. In his post entitled The Future of the Social Web: Five Eras, then Forrester analyst Jeremiah Owyang evidenced that social commerce is the “future.” We’re just now entering into this particular era and its not due to mature for another couple of years, according to Jeremiah. I’ve always tried to stay on top of social trends, so it makes sense to hitch my wagon to the social commerce star.

I hope to resume blogging here whenever possible, as I realize the importance of doing so, but time is limited. Until then, look for my writings at those other two venues.

Most of my writing these days is done at Practical Ecommerce, an online magazine devoted to helping smaller online businesses grow and prosper. I cover two beats – social media and social commerce. I write weekly feature articles and maintain a blog called The Social Retailer. Here is a roll up of some of my more recent articles and blog posts.

Feature Articles

• How to Create Facebook Ads, Part 1: Setup, Design, Targeting
• How to Measure Social Media Marketing; 3 Steps
• Google+: Overview, Ecommerce Use
• 5 Influence Measurement Tools
• 5 New Social Media Management Platforms
• One Merchant’s Experience with LivingSocial and Groupon

The Social Retailer Blog Posts

• Merchants Need to Adopt a Social Media Mindset; 10 Principles
• Planting Social Media Seeds in Ukraine
• Bing Brings “Friend Effect” to Search
• If Not Sales, What is Social Media Good For? (Can be sung to the tune of Edwin Starr’s “War.”)
• Twitter is an Information Network, Not a Social Network

Lastly, it’s worth mentioning I also maintain a blog on the Practical Ecommerce Facebook Page called F-Commerce Insider, which covers the topic of Facebook Commerce and is updated weekly.

If you’re in and around San Antonio Thursday and Friday, June 9 -10, I’ll be there leading a two-day B2B Social Media Marketing Bootcamp on behalf of the American Marketing Association and the local AMA chapter.

“This Boot Camp is designed to meet the needs of people involved in business-to-business marketing. The curriculum was created for those who consider themselves to be at entry level stages of how to incorporate social media to support their business (marketing, customer service, communications and sales) objectives and goals.”

Click the above link to learn more. Click here to register.

Since it appears that most of my posts lately have to do with social media consulting, allow me to pass along a resource I found last week – Invest In Social - an online directory for social media agencies, vendors and consultants. The site was created by SocialFresh, a social media education company. Getting listed in the directory is easy enough and, the best part, is that is free to do so.

However, you will note that some agencies, vendors and consultants are “featured.” Gaining inclusion in featured status requires payment and its not inexpensive. A company spokesman told me it costs $1,000 per month to get featured at the directory level and $300 per month at what the company refers to as the “per strength” level. That leaves me out!

In terms of how you rank in the list, that’s based on the degree to which you complete your profile (100% is good!). All things being equal, the database pulls randomly from those listed.

The site includes a number of areas where those listed can show competency. These include: analytics, blog development, community management, Facebook, Twitter, long term strategy, email, market research, monitoring and 14 more. You are limited to a choice of up to six areas total, however.

One of my interests is in how well the site ranks in terms of SERPs. Since I’m not showing up on front page returns for the keyword “social media consultant,” I’m dependent on directories such as this to help.

If you’d like to take a look at my profile, which, at the time of this writing, I’ve gotten up to 85%, feel free. And, if you qualify, I would encourage you to add yourself to the list.