The Keys to a Good Press Release

I don’t want to spend a day explaining all the nuances of a good press release, but I do want to point out the two main keys to writing a good press release:

• Less is More:  The typical press release length is shortening and shortening.  I read recently that the average length is somewhere around 200-400 words!  That is not much.   But it means taking out the fluff and getting to your point.  Your press release does have a point, right?
• Don’t Be Boring:  I am on both ends of the spectrum here, sending and receiving releases.  And there’s nothing worse than writing or reading a boring release.  Have a little fun with it – a release that makes somebody laugh isn’t going to kill you.  And it might be the thing you need to stand out from the crowd of all those other boring new clips.

Examples of Not-So-Boring Press Releases

Nowfly is one of my favourites for press releases.  Why?  Because I always notice them.  They have catchy, clever headlines and there’s always a bit of a funny story involved.  I’ve never needed them or used them in an article or editorial piece, but you know what, if I did, they would be top of mind. [The cynic would point out that I'm using them in an editorial piece right now.]  And that’s the whole idea, staying top of mind, right?  Here are a few snippets from previous releases; compare them to your releases and see what you think.

• Don’t Lose Your Shirt:  ”There is nothing more terrifying than arriving at your chosen destination, only to find that your luggage has strayed off-message. “Get with the programme!” you will want to shout, but the luggage isn’t listening. It’s busy jetting off somewhere else. And secretly you fear that your suitcase is already semi-conscious on a sun-lounger, soaking up the warm sun while you are pacing the airport, wondering if you will ever see that favourite stripy jumper again.”
• In Flight Food and Drink Up in the Air:  ”Remember the days when everyone looked forward to being handed their plastic airline food tray on a charter flight to somewhere hot that did a great line in congas?  Compartmentalised into three or four delightful courses, the starter was usually a bullet-hard bread roll with a limp lettuce leaf. The main course would be a variable hot meat stew, topped with a slab of pastry and accompanied by a cocktail of tinned vegetables.  Dessert was a pink dollop of something you could grout the bathroom with, followed by a nervous-looking slab of cheese which had been sweating profusely. All washed down with a gin and tonic (no ice of course) and coffee so hot it could melt the table. Ah yes. Those were the heady days of fine dining in economy.”
• The Little Fish with Big Ideas:  ”Funny word, “now.” Feels rather immediate. Almost urgent. “The fierce urgency of now”, some American bloke said recently. And this sense of hurrying is commonplace nowadays. Rush here, absorb a little more information or advertising there, until your feet hurt and your brain is saying “remember that hammock on Koh Pha Ngan?” Clever things, brains.  And so we get used to big brands, sometimes even like them and feel comfortable with who they are and how they make us feel. Until we discover they sell guns or eat polar bears. Big isn’t always beautiful. So what if there was a new company that people didn’t know about? The new kid in the class who is looking at his shoes but knows he can knock the socks off the competition? Here at www.nowfly.co.uk we think it’s worth telling people about.  That’s why we are sending you this press release about our newly re-launched and very fast travel search engine. But what makes us different? If you want the version with technological whistles and bells on, just ask and we will shimmy it over to you.”

If you haven’t noticed, these guys aren’t writing press releases.  They’re telling stories. They are writing to one person, not to the masses.

To Learn More

Are you interested in learning more about making your online PR efforts (a.k.a “storytelling”) more successful?  Then be sure you’re on our mailing list, as we have a DIY guide coming up you’ll probably want to check out.

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It’s time for this month’s episode of TOP Radio, our monthly travel and technology podcast.  This month we’re talking with Alex Bainbridge from TourCMS about a question that seems to come up over and over again:  does your travel website need online reservations?

Listen Now

You can listen to call now by using the widget available below; the call is just under an hour.

If you’d like to download the call as an MP3 to listen on your iPhone or iPod later, you can get the MP3 here (be sure to right click and choose Save As in your browser as it’s a fairly large file).

Notes from the Call

Here are a few key takeaways from today’s session.  Note that this is not a transcript and has been heavily edited for brevity, so be sure to listen to the call so you don’t miss anything.

Introductory Comment

• The concepts and suggestions in today’s call are generics.  That means they are suggestions, ideas, and examples of how things have or haven’t worked for other people.  But your business is special, so you can’t take any of this advice for face value.  You should consider the content and align it to your own business goals.
• Things to know before even considering this topic for your business:
  • Online Reservations are not a panacea for poor conversions.  In fact they might make them worse.
  • Online Reservations are not a “set it and forget it” technology.
  • You cannot put in online reservations and then remove all other ways for the customer to access you. You must have a way for people get in touch with you.  What if the booking tool is broken?

What ‘Online Reservations’ Is and What It Isn’t

• A booking system is not a replace for removing other ways to take bookings.
• A booking system is not a way to remove all contact with the customer.  You need to make sure that the booking engine you use still has a human in the booking process.
• The booking engine is there to make your business more efficient, not to make your business more automated.
• Depending on the tool and how you’re using analytics, you can glean useful information about where a customer has come from and how they found you.
• Don’t worry too much about booking engines.  If you have a terrible booking engine, but still have a high quality product, then customers will just book with you via phone or email.  (Note how this is very different than major hotel websites, for example, where there are other websites where a customer can book.).
• You don’t have to have a “booking engine” — a transaction or contact for a specific product on a specific day or specific time.  You can just have a “quote request system” or “inquiry system” where the customer is just making contact to express an interest in your product or service.
• Payment processing:  there are multiple options, from taking payment up front to holding the credit card details and then charging the customer only when agreeing to a contract.
• Remove complexity but remember: consider the customer.
• Suggestion is to start with an off the shelf system, as you aren’t having to rebuild the wheel.

Reasons Why Online Availability is Bad (or, Things To Keep In Mind)

• We’re not saying online reservations are bad, just remember a few key things.
• Online booking tools add a cost of doing business; it’s normally not expensive but it is something to remember, depending on what tool a choose.
• A tool changes the adds steps or changes steps or removes steps – remember the customer and make sure you know what you need to be doing.
• If you have a very small booking pool (e.g. very small hotel, or a solo walking tour leader), a booking “wall” might prevent customers from getting to you who others you might be able to satisfy with alternative options that you can’t easily display in your booking tool.  So be mindful of this if you’re very small but nimble.
• If you offer a seasonal offering, make sure that customers know when you’re available.  Don’t let them get all the way into your booking tool to realise you are only open in the summer!
• You need to make sure that the reservation tool is the ‘master’ source of availability information.
• Remember the information required to market a product (what is it, why do you want it) is not the same as what is needed to sell (exact details, timings, rates, etc).  Ask yourself:  what is your website for, marketing or sales or both?
• With a booking tool there is a tendency to act like a “factory” – don’t remove all human interaction!  Keep it positive, simple and understandable.
• Consider your customers arriving to your tool in three states:
  • the busy, harried buyer who just needs to know right now who you are and what you offer
  • the information lover, who wants to know all the details and will linger over everythign
  • and of course, the person who already knows they’re buying with you and are just coming to make the final arrangements
• If you’re sort of a “commodity tour” provider where you just process high volume products with a similar setup every day, then you probably want  a very robust tool.

What is the Value of Having a Suitable Booking Tool or Online Reservations

• For people who have a high volume of bookings, especially when you get lots of bookings that you can’t even service, a tool does provide a way to filter these out.
• A tool can provide a way to remove friction from the process; when they’ve made a decision they’re ready to book, they can!
• You want to aim for 50%+ of bookings taken online; keeps your staff focussed on more value-added activities.  Software can help you double or triple bookings without massive increases in staff.

How To Choose?

• Always start off small, near the simple end of functionality (e.g. ‘enquiry form’).  Get in and get trading.
• Phases of implementation:
  • Just using the tool to manage bookings once you’ve received them
  • Integrate a tool into your contact form or enquiry form so a customer record is created when they get in touch
  • Taking online bookings but only “quote requests”
  • Lastly, fully functional system with transaction requests taken online
• If you sell a lot of different types of tours, you probably need a more complex support tool.  If you just have one or two options, you don’t need all the bells and whistles.
• It’s not usually about turnover, nor about staff – it’s mostly about the number of bookings where you fall in the complexity scale.
• Buy a system that permits you to continue to work with your agents and partners and suppliers, and make sure your system allows you to just make quotes.
• Again, it all comes back to your customer:  who are they and what are their needs?  Be sure your online presence meets that.

Parting thought:  If you build it, they won’t come.  Regardless of whether you do or don’t take online reservations, if you don’t have enough sales, it isn’t because of our website, it’s because of your marketing.

Thanks to Alex for joining us!  Learn more about Alex by visiting the TourCMS website or their free online forum, Small Fish Big Ocean.

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• What Pop Music Can Teach You About Social Media

How's your website doing? Our TOP resources make your online presence work smarter. Check out the latest news and tips: http://www.travelonlinepartners.com

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Launch Video

If you haven’t seen it, Google’s launch videos are always well worth watching – go on, it’s just two minutes:

Off to a Bad Start

It seems Buzz got off to a bit of a bad start, as it automatically adds everyone who is one of your Google contacts as a Buzz ‘follower’ – to the outrage of those who found that a violation of privacy rights.  Indeed, it did expose your contacts to anyone else who was following you on Buzz.  You can control all that now, though I find it very odd how it chose only two people out of my contacts to follow (even though there are three images, including one strangely anonymous face).

What Google Buzz Means for You

Well, it certainly seems like a good idea on the surface.  I like the easy and simple integration with other Google tools and services, as well as an understandable interface (which was my biggest complaint about Wave).

The problem is if you don’t use GMail, then you need to start to in order to use Buzz.  If you love Gmail, then check out Buzz – it might be the solution you were looking for to pull together your social networking activities.

But, if you are a hardcore Gmail user and use any of the advanced filing and organisation functionality in Gmail to process your workflow, Buzz will probably become quite annoying quite fast.  Don’t be afraid to turn it off if it’s breaking your flow.

Also, if you’re a hardcore Facebook fan, you’ll be disappointed to note that Facebook integration is not included, nor do I suspect it will be anytime soon:   Google is trying to challenge Facebook’s marketplace dominance, so these guys probably aren’t playing nice together.  I could be wrong.

Isn’t This a Marketer’s Dream?

If you noticed, the tool allows you to actually send a status update into someone’s Gmail Inbox, “so they don’t miss it.” I can see the sleazy internet marketers salivating at the opportunity to send their ‘must have’ special offers this way, using the tool to spam everyone they can with their unwanted newsflashes and updates.

It might sound like a marketing dream on the surface, to me it just sounds like spam.

Why I Won’t Be Using It

I’ve had a good look around Buzz, and tried a few things out, but it’s not for me.  For one, GMail is not my primary email client.  I’ve wanted to transition to it, but it hasn’t gotten high enough on my priority list.  Someday.

Also, I have my social networking profiles setup the way I want, so that certain notifications do reach my Inbox and others don’t.  I get an inordinate amount of email, and to have everyone I’ve ever followed the ability to shove recent update or message into my mailbox is totally unwelcome.  Sometimes filters are there for a reason.

If You’re Scanning This and Just Want the Bottom Line, Read Here:

Bottom Line:  Buzz seems kind of cool, but you’ll either love it or hate it.  A lot of it depends on how you use GMail (or don’t).  Check it out and decide for yourself.  But don’t use it to spam people.

To Learn More

For more resources to make your small business efficient online, be sure to visit our resources by topic pages.  They’re both popular and useful – you never know what you might find, such as our TOP Travel Business Toolkit: it can tame any unwieldy business situation, even if your GMail has been buzz’ed.

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How's your website doing? Our TOP resources make your online presence work smarter. Check out the latest news and tips: http://www.travelonlinepartners.com

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So, I’ve noticed a common thread with most email newsletter signup forms.  There’s one piece of information that 90% (or more) of them lack.  Are you making this common mistake that’s putting a barrier between you and your potential readers?

Why?  What’s In It For Me?

Why should I signup for your newsletter?

What’s In It for Me? (literally!)

In this case, this is quite a literal question:  what actually is in your newsletter?  How often do you send it?  And why the heck do I need another newsletter bombarding me with stuff?

Hardly anyone bothers to take 2 minutes to explain to the customers what they’re signing up for.  Hence why nobody signs up – people hate surprises, especially in their Inbox.  What are you hiding?  Besides, if you’re newsletter is any good, you want to show it off – make it so people are tripping over themselves to get on the list.  That’s remarkable.

To Learn More

Our Stop Annoying Your Customers newsletter check-in promotion ends this week, for those of you with failing newsletters and poor subscriber rates.  If you haven’t started using email promotions yet but want to, our Email Marketing Jumpstart might just be the thing you’ve been looking for.

Photo by USB

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• LinkedIn now more Linked In

How's your website doing? Our TOP resources make your online presence work smarter. Check out the latest news and tips: http://www.travelonlinepartners.com

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But many companies overlook one key way to find their perfect keywords…

Ask Your Customers

Change your feedback form to include the question “How would you find us in Google?”  Play around with the wording, but I chose the word “would” intentionally – you don’t really care what keyword eventually worked, as you can find that in Analytics.  You want to know what was the first thing they tried, because that’s the keyword you want to be on.

You also want to make sure they understand you’re asking them about keywords – you might just have to spell it out for them: “what words would you type into Google to find us?”  In my experience, more often than not, when consumers answer one of these referral questions like ‘who told you about us,’ they just say the Internet, which is a charming answer but doesn’t give you anything helpful.

You will also need to play around with where/when you ask this question.  For you, it might be better to ask at the time of taking a booking.  For others it might be useful to do so with a follow-up feedback form.  (You do ask for feedback, right?)

This information only works in aggregate, so don’t start spending time or money for one goofy answer.  Look for trends and commonalities.

To Learn More…

Take advantage of everything you need to know about the world of search in our popular do-it-yourself guide, DIY SEO – Do It Yourself Search Optimization.  It’s an ethical, practical guide to all-things-search and full of other expert tips.

Photo by TMAB2003

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How's your website doing? Our TOP resources make your online presence work smarter. Check out the latest news and tips: http://www.travelonlinepartners.com

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Managing Your Business

Life can be pretty hectic as a small business owner, right? You spend all day out with your clients and “doing your thing” and then only have a few hours in the evenings to catch up on emails, do a little marketing, and check in on your accounts. Maybe you work an extra day here and there to do special projects. The process repeats itself each week, so there just isn’t a way to squeeze in much more, or to evaluate and change course where appropriate.

Only about 40% of small businesses manage to be profitable in the long term; most fail with in the first 2-3 years. What will your statistics be?

Manage Your Business Better

Making your business more effective isn’t about spending hours and hours in meetings or paying by-the-hour rates to consultants for months to come up with your latest business strategy. All you need is here in our TOP Travel Business Toolkit:

Inside you’ll find both our TOP Business Guide, a short guide to help you understand the principles of a forward thinking, holistic approach to your business.  Alongside that, there’s the TOP Business Dashboard: an organised set of worksheets you can use to make effective business decisions.

Entrepreneur Rachael Acklin said “It’s kind of a no-brainer – I believe your long-term business perspective, as well as your explanation of SWOT and how to create a SWOT analysis, was DEFINITELY worth the price and more. Seriously.”

Click here to check out the details and download your copy today.

Photo by stuartpilbrow

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• What Matters Now

How's your website doing? Our TOP resources make your online presence work smarter. Check out the latest news and tips: http://www.travelonlinepartners.com

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Why Mountain Threads is Remarkable

Mountain Threads is offering up rentable skiwear.  It might sound kind of boring, but consider the difference:

The Typical Ski Rental Experience

• You fly, then drive, to your ski resort and arrive tired, possibly jetlagged, hungry and cranky
• You go to the rental shop to get your equipment.  You have to wait an hour to get what you need, your children get restless, you’re losing valuable time on the slopes (that you’re paying for anyway as you already bought your lift tickets).

The Mountain Threads Experience

• Before you arrive you order all the equipment you need.
• You arrive and everything you need, all the right sizes and styles, is waiting for you.
• You hit the slopes stress free and glad you didn’t waste all that time!

This is so awesome because they’ve managed to fix what was a major problem in the skiing experience.  It’s a product so good it almost sells itself!

So – what problem are you fixing?

Why I Love Their Website Too

Mountain Threads is proof that you can have a gorgeous, snazzy website that is still simple and functions.

• Big Font, Easy to Read. There’s no squinting here.
• Simple Menu Options.  I know what I’ll get when I click.
• Standard Layout.  I never felt jarred during the entire experience; everything was just where I’d expected it to be as I navigated through the buying process
• Plain, Clear Language.  Their typical buying customer is a frazzled parent trying to wrap up loose ends on a skiing break.  So Mountain Threads cuts to chase with what they do, what’s in it for you, and how to get it.

My only tweak (hey – I’m allowed – this is my job!) is that they should include the text from their title tag, High Performance Ski Wear For Rent, underneath their logo.  Saves people getting confused if they arrive on a page that isn’t the homepage.  And I’m not sure why there are options on the bottom menu that aren’t on the top menu .

To Learn More

Want some inspiration for your own travel marketing campaigns?  Then check out our do-it-yourself guide, 33 Fun and Effective Ways to Promote Your Travel Business Online.  From the characteristics of a good campaign, to ideas and inspiration for your own plans as well as a helpful planning worksheet, it’s all you need to get started with great online promotions.

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How's your website doing? Our TOP resources make your online presence work smarter. Check out the latest news and tips: http://www.travelonlinepartners.com

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Lessons Learned

Here’s a few things I picked up from the lyrics of this video:

“I’ve got the dreamers disease“

So called ‘permission marketing’ or social media marketing is about making your brand unique, interesting, and discussion-worthy, as often mentioned in Monday’s TOP Radio podcast.  So, why don’t YOU get dreamers disease.  If you’ve read our 7 Common Mistakes People Make Online (free with our newsletter), one of the pieces of homework was to think of some CRAZY ways to promote your business.  Could you change your prices?  Could you turn your products upside down or your services inside out?  Get some dreamers disease and see what you find.

“Don’t let go – you got the music in you.“

This is kind of like the persistence effect mentioned in the old school marketing article.  If you’ve done your dreaming and found something that you’re passionate about and that you think your customers will rave about, just showing up doesn’t command an audience.  You need to keep showing up, and you must keep reminding people why they should pay attention.  Remember that old tired advertising cliché that your customer needs to see your message like 20 times before they pay attention?  Yup.  Same thing.  So keep humming the tune.  Someone will hear you.

“We’re flat broke – but hey we do it in style.“

Most small businesses are cash poor but time rich.  It doesn’t matter which one you are as long as you know where you fall.  But if you are flat broke, social media is awesome because it’s FREE — free like free speech, NOT free like free beer. So work with what you’ve got, and do it in style.  Shake your hips.  Dance.  Sing your song.

“Can’t forget – we only get what we give.“

This is my final and most important point.  Social networking is about RELATIONSHIPS.  Good hospitality is about PEOPLE.  If  you treat people with respect, encourage them to be a part of  your community, and treat them as you’d want to be treated, it will come back to you.  Don’t forget – we only get what we give.

A Silly Suggestion

Here’s a silly suggestion for you. Does your business have a theme song? You don’t have to tell anybody – but wouldn’t it be nice to have a little tune, something upbeat, that you could play on those days when you think “this will never work”?

Try it. Rally around it. Your business is remarkable, so figure out how to tell everyone.

To Learn More

Need help figuring out your theme song?  Take our free business assessment.  We’ll help you start humming the right tune to small business success.

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How's your website doing? Our TOP resources make your online presence work smarter. Check out the latest news and tips: http://www.travelonlinepartners.com

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We’re very excited to present the first edition of TOP Radio, our new podcast series.  Every month we’ll feature guests and discussions on relevant industry topics and technology news.  We thought it would be fitting to start off the first radio podcast of the year talking about The State of Tourism: an hour of frank discussion about the big picture on travel and technology.

Why is it called TOP Radio?

Well, the reason we call it a radio show is to illustrate the fact that while the delivery means and mechanisms have changed entirely, the principles are the same, just like in many forms of social networking.  Sure, it isn’t available to listen in live – yet! – but at the end of the day, it kind of is just like a radio programme.  So, listen in and enjoy!

Today’s TOP Radio Guests

Joining your host Andy Hayes from Travel Online Partners we have two guest who are well versed in the latest and greatest of tourism technology:

• Ian Cleary from RazorCoast
• Rene Looper from Tuminds

Be sure to follow these guys on Twitter, just click their name and you’ll get their Twitter profiles.

Listen Now

Use the widget below to play this podcast live in your broswer window.

Or, Download the MP3 here (right click and choose ‘Save As’ – it’s a large file!).

Discussion Topics

Below is a summary of the conversation.  This is not a transcript as it has been heavily edited for brevity, so be sure to listen in for all the details!

Themes for 2010

Andy:

• The themes from World Travel Market (November 2009) continue to ring true: mobile, Google dominance, Twitter, and economic recovery.
• Andy also mentioned the trendwatching report which he summarises as: Opportunities aplenty in 2010 for those obsessed with satisfying consumer needs in new ways.
• It’s an investment, not an expense.
• Small business actually has an advantage on social media against brands.  People who have passion and amazing products win in this ‘perfect storm’ of inexpensive social networks and finely tuned search capability.

Ian:

• Social media will become of increasing importance to small businesses in tourism 2010 to realise cost efficiencies and benefits.
• Mobile is of huge importance, such as Google’s android phone.  Far more uptake of location-based services.
• Twitter getting more on target, more used to recommend services, and expects the spam problem to be reduced.  Ian’s advice:  you need to get on Twitter and be interesting, be a personality.
• Suggests that Foursquare, a location-based application, will continue to see huge growth.
• Tips:  Make sure to test your website in a mobile browser, make sure your site is listed in Google Local Search.
• Social media has reached the point where small businesses cannot ignore this technology.  If you need the help, get it – but you need to start building something now as it takes time to build a community.
• It used to be about who had the bigger advertising budgets won the game.  Now it is about who has the best personality as well as great products and services.
• Social media is not only marketing.  Why not doing hiring people?  Market research and customer feedback? Networking.

Rene:

• Huge growth area in mobile.  Everyone is becoming more reliant on mobile for recommendations, suggestions and information.  A great example of this is augmented reality.
• Foursquare also a major force.  Rene shared an example of localised marketing.
• Social media is such a powerful platform for small business to connect with customers in ways that just weren’t possible before.  Businesses are recognising this and are starting to take advantage.
• This technology levels the playing field, giving small players the chance to complete for presence alongside bigger brands.  There are proven success stories – it works!

Economic Recovery

Boring but important!

• Andy: UK has just barely squeezed out of recession.  US has conflicting news reports.
• Rene:  recession was a good thing for the tourism industry.  The downward cycle has forced businesses, particularly in Scotland, to refocus on their customer’s needs and improve their products and services.
• Ian:  Lots of growth in Ireland, almost too much, so it is the people that are innovating and keeping competitive will be successful.  Recommendations are very important.

Good hospitality in tourism is not about fancy linens or a fancy website.  Hospitality is about people.  And social media

Choose your networks and nail them – it isn’t about being everywhere, it’s about being somewhere.  Be the one that everybody is talking about.  You don’t need to always be promotion – be funny or interesting or whatever, but be yourself.

Tourism & Social Media News

• Interesting that Ryanair  has finally decided to be listed in a flights website (Kayak, specifically)
• Google still rolling out new features – Caffeine, the new algorithm which will be faster, is coming out soon.
• The Apple iPad:  unclear yet how beneficial and useful will be, but everyone wants one!  Ian’s idea is to have the iPads as part of a table in your cafe or restaurant so tourists can check out recommendations, bus schedules, etc.
• Google has launched real-time search for both Twitter and Facebook.  A recommendation (or complaint) for your establishment could appear at the top of a Google search.

Remarkable is the New Tourism

• It isn’t about being on Twitter or Facebook.  It’s not about being a selling machine.  It’s about having great products and services – it’s about people!
• Social media enables people to see more dimensions about a business – something vitally important for people who expect quality in tourism.  It helps ensure a consumer that a product is good. Who wants to have a bad  holiday?!
• You can’t ignore social media. Do you always ignore the external changes to your business?
• You don’t have to use all these tools.  Use what you find works best.
• How can you promote yourself as different – what would you tell people that is interesting and exciting about you?

We’d like to give a special thank you to our guests Ian and Rene for today’s TOP Radio!

To Learn More

Be sure you’re subscribed to our newsletter so you can catch the next episode of TOP Radio.  Meanwhile, don’t miss out our resource library where you’ll find more guides and tools to help you succeed with many of the topics featured in today’s radio show.

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Introducing HootSuite

Mari Smith and I actually mentioned Hootsuite last week in our Facebook for Travel and Tourism call.  That’s because this tool actually allows you to update/manage your Twitter profile, Facebook Fan Page, as well as Linked in updates.  Here’s a screenshot of my Hootsuite page (click to make it larger):

I’ve highlighted above some of the reasons why I like Hootsuite so much:

• Fun Name:  Who doesn’t like “Hootsuite?”  Sounds like an Owl hotel.
• Schedule/Monitor everything from one place:  This doesn’t remove the need to actually access Twitter or other sites, but it makes it a lot easier to maintain.
• Easy Stats:  See who has clicked on what.  Very easy to read and use.

Everyone’s different, so I encourage you to check out Hootsuite or other popular Twitter applications, such as Tweetdeck or Seesmic, to see what is best for you.  Or heck – just use the Twitter website, it isn’t as bad as people make it out to be.

An Update on Twitter Lists

Not that long ago, Twitter rolled out new functionality they called “lists.”  It was a new way to segment your followers and people you want to connect with.  The social media pundits claimed it was a revolution in the way we would connect on Twitter and rushed to shout from the rooftops that this would be the change that would rock our world.

I said it was another number that people would obsess over and another layer to the noise.

Now, I’m not one to say “I told you so” but here’s a screenshot from the list of lists that I am on. (play on words unintentional)  You tell me how valuable this kind of stuff is:

I have screenfuls of those list.  Just sayin’.  Ignore the numbers folks – they don’t show the number of relationships nor the brand awareness you’re building!

To Learn More

Be sure to visit our Twitter resources page to find other useful articles and resources to help you maximise your Twitter results.

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How's your website doing? Our TOP resources make your online presence work smarter. Check out the latest news and tips: http://www.travelonlinepartners.com

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