My original policy for accepting invitations was that I would only connect with people on LinkedIn that I’ve met at least once, preferably face to face. I’ve expanded that a bit to people that I’ve had virtual conversations with in LinkedIn groups or other social media, or people with whom it would be mutually beneficial to connect with. Everyone has their own criteria for sending or accepting LinkedIn invites, and that’s fine, but there are some general guidelines to follow that will greatly increase your chances of an invite being accepted (especially by me). Actually, I think I may share this article with the 245 invites that I’ve yet to accept.

1. Connect only with people you’ve actually met before or that you have some prior relationship with. An exception might be if you have a legitimate job offer for someone.
2. Make sure you’re connecting with who you think you’re connecting with. Sounds silly, yet there are 222 people named Emily Carpenter on LinkedIn, and four of them in Rochester NY. I’m sure that a few of my unaccepted invites are intended for a different Emily Carpenter. Check pictures and profile information before hitting “Send Invitation” just in case.
3. Study their profile first and see what you have in common.
4. Go to any links they’ve provided on their profile, such as to a company website or social media profile and learn about them.
5. Avoid auto-invites like the plague (pictured below). In other words, don’t send invites to all 3,000 of your Gmail contacts. It’s called SPAM, and most people don’t like to receive it.
   
6. If you do accidentally send an auto-invite, follow it up with a personal note explaining specifically why you’d like to connect with a particular person.
7. ALWAYS include a personal note with your invitation. Put that homework to use, and comment on something that will catch their attention.
   
8. Remind them how they met you, especially if you only met them once or twice at a networking event. This saves them the embarrassment of not being able to remember. It helps if you can trigger their memory with something you may have discussed, such as “I enjoyed meeting you at the training yesterday. It’s great to meet someone else that loves widgets as much as I do.”
9. Send the invite soon after meeting someone as extra insurance that they will remember you. Going through a stack of business cards and inviting everyone you met in the past year is a sure way that people will not remember you. Invite them while you are still fresh in their mind.

In the reverse, once you’ve accepted someone’s invite on LinkedIn, here’s some things you can do to make the connection more meaningful:

1. Start a conversation by sending them a personal note thanking them for connecting and commenting on something currently going on in their world (see #2 and #3 above for some ideas about what to talk about).
2. If you don’t know the person sending the invite, write a note back asking for them to remind you how they know you.
3. Periodically go through your list of connections, and reach out to people that stand out for you. Ask them how things are going, or tell them about something they may find interesting. You might even invite them out for coffee.
4. Post to groups and update your status on a regular basis so that you will stay top of mind for each of your connections.
5. Make notes on your connection so that you can refer back to important details the next time you speak with them. LinkedIn gives you a space to do this, however, put your notes in any contact manager that you use regularly. I use Google contacts for this because I can then easily access the info from my phone as well.

What are your criteria for accepting LinkedIn invitations? Share your guidelines in the comments below.

A link can send you to somewhere with valuable information, or it can send you to a virus that kills your computer, or anything in between. Some links are just annoyances because while not malicious, they send you somewhere unexpected or a place you didn’t want to go, or nowhere at all (broken links).

Whether on a web page, in an email, or in a document, here are some tips about building links that build trust with your readers:

Auto-links: It’s almost never a good idea to use a service that auto-creates links for you. When you see a random word (links to another article I wrote about optimizing images for the web) linked in an article, you assume it’s going to go somewhere that is useful to you. However, if instead it goes to an external sales page, then you’ve just lost a little more trust from your readers. Make your links count, and be clear about where your link is taking them.

Links to PDF’s: Always be clear when you are linking to a PDF. Depending on someone’s operating system and setup, it can be anything from a surprise to a major annoyance to open a PDF unexpectedly. Sometimes a PDF will automatically open in a browser, and other times it will bring up a dialog box in the browser asking them if they’d like to Open or Save the PDF. If they don’t have Acrobat installed (although most everyone does) then they will have no way at all to open the file. Be clear that you are sending someone to a PDF by either writing (PDF) after the link, or using an icon to indicate the nature of the link/file. The worst thing you can do is to link to a PDF through the navigation on your website. Never do this! Navigation on a page should only go to places within the same website and/or offer the same navigation options as the original site. Readers will quickly leave your site when they become frustrated from jumping between your site and PDF’s. If information is important enough to include in the navigation, then it’s worth the time it takes to create a page with the same information.

Tell reader what will happen when they click on a link: For example, there are a couple of tools such as ClickToTweet that will provide you with links that you can use to help someone to share text that they can share on Twitter. This can be useful if you want someone to tweet chunks of your article, however, if readers don’t want to tweet about your article, or are not even on Twitter at all, then you’ve only managed to annoy them and lose a little more link trust. A better way might be to use social media buttons that allow readers to link to the article or dedicate a section of your post where it’s clear that clicking will take them to Twitter.

External Links: Links to external pages should always open in a new tab or window. If you’re writing this in HTML code it would be <a href=”http://www.somewebsite.com” target=”_blank”>, where the target=”_blank” is a new tab or window. Most likely though, it’s just clicking a check box when you create the link within WordPress or other blog system. So now when the reader clicks on the link, goes to the external site, decides they don’t like the site and close the tab or window, they are right back to your site instead of on to the next Google search result.

Links in Comments: If you’ve ever set up a blog and forgot to turn on SPAM controls, then you know that spammers  L O V E  comments. They leave general or nonsensical comments about a post and include links to websites hoping to rise in the search engines. Google’s latest algorithm has targeted links within comments to have a negative impact on a page. When a link is posted within a comment, it should be set to “nofollow”, meaning that Google will not follow it. This prevents spammers from posting junk comments to your site since it will not benefit them to do so. Hear what Matt Cutts has to say about nofollow links, or read about it in Google help. Matt also issues a reminder about selling links that pass page rank.

As an aside, Google also penalizes the blog that the junk comments are posted on. This includes comments with no link at all. Short comments or comments that are too general in nature may be considered as SPAM and can damage a page’s ranking. You should closely moderate any comment on your blog to be sure that this does not happen to you.

Broken Links: This happens when a page that was once linked to no longer exists. This can happen for many reasons, such as going out of business, a redesign with no 301 redirects set up, or perhaps the links were never properly formatted to begin with. If users click on enough of these broken links on your site, they will simply leave because they realize that your page is outdated, irrelevant, or think that you just don’t care. How many times do you take another bite after you realize that your grapes are sour? Check links periodically to be sure that they are working. The W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) offers a free link checker to help you with this process.

A word about affiliate links: Affiliate links are when you get paid when someone clicks on a link. Since I write a lot on the web, I am an affiliate for lots of things. You can bet that when you click on a link I’ve created, that I’m going make money on it if I can. While I don’t put out links for the sole purpose of making money, if I’m going to be mentioning a product anyway, and they have an affiliate program that is easy to join, then I’ll join and be rewarded for it. Affiliate links get out of hand when someone posts links everywhere without regard to whether they have a legitimate reason for posting the link. Do that and you will lose trust. On blogs where I have affiliate links, I post a disclosure so that people know I will get paid if they click on an affiliate link. This is actually now the law, and also makes Google happy.

Are you already doing these things? What else do you do to build trust on your website?

How can you avoid this problem of distorted and slow-loading images? The answer is to optimize images before loading them onto your website. Web designers use tools like Photoshop to do just this. While Photoshop is a powerful tool to use for manipulating images, it also comes with a steep price tag, and an even more steep learning curve. I have Photoshop on my machine, but I do most of my image work in Fireworks, also owned by Adobe. What do you do if you don’t want to spend the big bucks or the time to learn these programs? There are plenty of alternatives that will get the job done. I recommend a number of programs that can either do everything you need, or at least part of it. With each of these programs in your toolbox, you should be all set to get your images web ready for your next blog post or web page.

1. FastStone Photo Resizer: This handy little app has the ability to batch process your images. For example, you may need all of your images to be a certain width, or perhaps you want them all to have a drop shadow. Just open up FastStone Photo Resizer, select the files you want to change, enter the dimensions and effects you want to apply, and presto, all of the selected images are changed to your specifications.

Choose tasks to perform on processed photos in FastStone Photo Resizer.

Select photos to process in FastStone Photo Resizer, as well as format to save photos in and where to save them on your computer.

2. FavIcon Generator: You know that little icon that shows up next to the name of the site when you open a new tab in your browser? That’s a favicon. If you don’t have one, your browser or web host will gladly take the branding opportunity from you. Brand yourself easily by creating the file you need to add a favicon to your website.

Choose an image to upload and transform it into a favicon for your website.

3. FindIcons.com: This site is a must-have resource to add social sharing icons to your website. Search by keywords, size, or color options. Be sure to check copyright info before using.

Find social media icons to match your website.

4. Glassy Buttons: This is great for setting up quick “Buy Now” or “Download” buttons. Think landing pages or squeeze pages. When you want someone to take action on your site, a button may be just what you need.

Set options for your button, reload a preview, and download completed button to add to your website.

5. Google Plus: Google+ just got better recently when they began to automatically enhance photos as well as create new images from images you upload to Google+. I have my Android phone set to automatically upload any photo I take to Google+. This provides instant backup as well as instant access to my photos from anywhere. If I take a series of shots of the same subject, it will create a moving picture for me as well as a collage that I can easily share without doing additional manipulation. Also built in is an impressive photo editor that lets you do basic edits like crop, rotate, adjust colors, and resize. In addition, you can add text, effects, and decorations to your photos. If you remember Picnik, an online photo editor that was bought and killed by Google awhile back, you’ll be glad to see that it has been resurrected here.

Google+ has preserved the interface from Picnik to edit images online.

6. Pixlr: About the closest you can get to owning a free copy of Photoshop, Pixlr is an advanced online photo editor.  The user interface includes features such as layers, masks, and filters and tools such as a wand tool, smudge tool, clone stamp tool, dodge tool, burn tool, red eye reduction tool, and a spot heal tool. You can do some serious editing here. If this seems like a little much, there is also an Express version available as well as Pixlr-o-matic which is a fun editor with overlays, borders, and filters similar to the effects you might see in Instagram photos. Mobile versions of each of these apps are also available so you can do most of your edits right on your phone or tablet. Save altered images to your computer, Pixlr, Facebook, Flickr, or Picasa. Be sure to save you photos in PXD (Layered Pixlr Image) format if you’d like to be able to adjust your changes later.

Choose an image to start with in Pixlr Editor.

Have fun transforming your photos in Pixlr-o-matic.

Choose where you’d like to save your Pixlr photo.

7. ScreenHunter: ScreenHunter does come equipped with a basic image editor, but I don’t use it for that. Instead, I use ScreenHunter to capture images from my computer screen to share in blog posts and social sharing sites. It comes in handy to put together slideshows and training documentation as well. This blog post would be just words were it not for ScreenHunter.

Set up your options in ScreenHunter, and then start snapping shots of your computer screen.

What is your favorite tool to use for image manipulation? What other alternatives to Photoshop have you found useful?

Let’s assume someone goes to your website or blog, and sees something they like enough to share, what can you do to help them to pin your site and spread the word?

1. Add images to EVERY post and page. Pinterest is visual, so the first thing it’s going to do is look for images on your site. No image, no pin! You may even have to make up an image (like in this article) with the name of the post. This gives a quick visual of what the article is all about.

2. Use interesting images that tell a story and represent what your web page or blog post is all about, yet make someone curious enough to click and read the whole article.

3. Use multiple images in a post whenever possible, without going overboard. This is especially important for how-to-type articles. People love images, it reinforces reading, and helps them to skim over an article on subsequent visits. It also gives pinners a selection of images to pin.

4. Add Title Tags to EVERY image. This is a best practice anyway, but it’s especially important for pinning images in Pinterest. Ever wonder where the text comes from that pops into the area where you can write a description? This is the Title Tag that you specify for the image. Think of it as suggested text for someone pinning you page. Make it as descriptive as possible, and enticing for potential visitors. For good measure, you should also add Alternate text to each image.

5. Consider adding a watermark to your images with your blog address. Pinners sometimes don’t link back to original articles, so this will help ensure that you still get credit for your ideas, and traffic going to your site. I’ve demonstrated that in articles on this page.

6. Beef up your page titles. In case you forget to add alt text to an image, Pinterest picks up on page titles as starter text in the description area.

7. At the end of each article, show other articles that may be of interest to readers based on what they just read. After all, the point of getting pinned is so that visitors will stay awhile, and come back from time to time. Give them a good reason to! (See end of article for a live example, and try it out!)

8. If you notice an article is getting a lot of Pin love, start your article with a special note to welcome pinners inviting them to further explore your blog. Also make sure these articles are current, making updates as necessary.

9. Have social sharing buttons on your website, including one for Pinterest. Make it easy for visitors to pin your article by giving them a button to push that will start a new pin. (See end of article for a live example, and try it out!)

10. Get on Pinterest! It helps to understand where your readers are coming from, and what interests them. The best way to do this is to hop on over to Pinterest, create an account, ans see what it’s all about. Happy pinning!

What else do you do to make your blog or website pinnable?

The first device I tried was the Obi110, available from Amazon (affiliate link). Great little gadget, and it does give you absolutely FREE home phone service. Getting 911 service is optional, and at $1.50/month form CallCentric, it’s very cheap. Integration with Google Voice is a snap, and call clarity is very good, most of the time.

Here’s why I decded to switch:

1. When someone invited me to a conference call with a free conference call provider, Google Voice simply would not make the call. It was a 1-800 number, so I really couldn’t understand why, but for whatever reason, Google Voice would not allow the call to go through. This left me with having to use CallCentric to make the calls. CallCentric does have low calling rates, but at the rate I was using them, it would cost me about $15/month, hardly FREE.
2. My XBox kept kicking me out of Netflix. I tried calling Netflix, Microsoft (XBox), and Time Warner, but no one could fix the problem. I hard wired the XBox into the modem, but still had the same problem. I even had Time Warner replace the modem. Seemed to help for awhile, but then the issue started again. Someone suggested that it might be my Obi110. I figured any device might cause this trouble, but no way to tell unless I tried for myself.

The Ooma Telo had great reviews, and was already high on my list, so I thought I would try it out. When I saw a refurbished model on Woot for $60 below retail price, I figured I should give it a shot.

What I like about the Ooma:

1. The Ooma allows me to make those conference calls that I couldn’t make with the Obi110. They do make you listen to a message that says something like, “The number you are calling may try to get you to spend more money” and they direct you to a page on their website with more info. A little annoying, but they do connect the call.
2. If you decide to use the Ooma to receive calls, you can listen to messages from the box or on http://www.my.ooma.com. You can download an MP3 of your messages.

What I don’t like about the Ooma:

1. Ooma makes having e911 service mandatory, so there is a monthly charge even for the FREE version. Ooma bills you government charges according to your area. For me, it’s $3.75/month.
2. Ooma doesn’t allow you to set up alternate phone services like CallCentric. There are Google extensions available with Ooma Premium, but not with basic service.
3. The Ooma didn’t eliminate my Xbox/Netflix issue. I’ve given up on that issue for now. Some days seem worse than others. I think it may be a cable issue, but no one wants to claim it as their own.
4. Ooma assigns a phone number to you (which you can choose from ones available). That’s OK if you need one, but I’d like to use my Google Voice number for everything. Although I can forward my Google Voice calls to my Ooma number, I can’t make outgoing calls from my Google Voice number without paying for Ooma Premium. This means that sometimes people call me back on my Ooma number and leave messages for me, which I don’t check nearly as often as Google Voice.

Having said that, Ooma Premium does have lots of cool features, including an instant second line where you can make two calls at once from different handsets on the same line. Additional features include: Three-way Conferencing, Multi-Ring, Back-up Number, Google Voice, Extensions (Telo customers only), Free calling to the provinces of Canada, Enhanced Voicemail, Do Not Disturb, Send to Voicemail, Call Screening, Voicemail Forwarding, Voicemail-to-Text, Community Blacklist, Anonymous Call Reject, 911 Alerts, Personal Number, Private Voicemail, Transfer Your Number, Call Forwarding, Free number transfer, Extended Warranty, Wireless Adapter or Bluetooth Adapter (Telo customers only).

TIP: You can get a cheaper annual Ooma Premium rate by calling customer service rather than ordering online.

With both devices, I have periodically noticed echo on the phone, or dropped calls. I experienced similar issues with Time Warner, so it may be with any VOIP service.

Bottom line: Both the Obi110 and Ooma Telo are great gadgets! If you don’t need premium features or if you don’t need to make calls that Google Voice won’t connect then the Obi110 is your best bet. If you decide to go with Ooma, you won’t regret that either!

TIP: To check if the Obi110 will make a call or not with Google Voice, first try it out through your computer using Google Voice. If the call won’t go through on Google Voice, it won’t go through with an Obi110 using Google Voice.

This solution takes some work initially, but if you don’t mind a little sweat, it’s a great way to save some money.

My goals:

1. Keep my old phone number to forward to voice mail;
2. Get free/cheap phone service;
3. Receive calls wherever I am; and
4. Have access to 911 emergency service from my home phone.

My first goal was to keep my old phone number so that I could forward calls to voicemail with a message giving out my new phone number. Google allows you to port a phone number (for $20), but porting only works with cell phone numbers. I wanted to port my home phone, so this wouldn’t work with my home phone number…unless I first converted it to a cell phone number.

If you want to port your home number, first go to T-Mobile and buy a “T-Mobile SIM Card Activation Kit” for as low as $4.99. I paid $9.99 for mine. You can buy it online, but I chose to go into a store so that they could help me with activation. Tell them you want to port your home phone number to the SIM card. They will take care of setting this up for you while you wait in the store. Then you just have to wait. T-Mobile ended up calling me for additional information, so it took a couple of days for the number to port, but it usually takes about 24 hours. Note that once your number ports, you will no longer be able to access your voicemail from your old carrier. You may also not be able to get calls for a bit until you get the number over to Google.

Next, get your hands on a T-Mobile phone. If you already have a T-Mobile phone, great! If you have a friend with a T-Mobile phone, offer to buy them coffee (somewhere with internet access). Or, for about $20, you can pick up a pre-paid T-Mobile phone. Once you have your T-Mobile phone in hand, open up the back and take out the SIM card (if you bought a new phone there won’t be one in there yet) and replace it with your own.

Replacing the SIM card with your own allows you to receive calls on the number you’ve ported over. This is necessary so that you can next port the number over to Google. If you haven’t done so already, create a Google Voice account and select the option to port your existing cell phone number. Google will call your number to verify that it belongs to you. Now that you’ve verified your number, you can do whatever you want with that T-Mobile phone. Keep it, return it, or give it to a women’s shelter. You don’t need it anymore.

Now that you have a Google number, you can get home phone service for “free.” Google may charge for US calls in the future, but for now they are free. I actually set up a second Google number for this purpose, and the above exercise was solely so that I could give out forwarding information when someone called my old number.

With a Google Voice number, you can forward calls to any phone you want to. I only forward my main Google Voice number to my cell phone since it already rings at home on my Obi. Now I never miss a call!

So, how do you start getting your Google number to ring to your house? I chose the cheapest option of going to Amazon.com and buying an Obi110. Obihai makes two different Obi’s. You want the 110 if 911 service is important to you. Since Google does not provide 911 service, you need a device, like the Obi110, that allows you to set up two VoIP (Voice over IP) services.

The Obi110 is simple to set up. Plug it into your modem, and your phone into the Obi110, and go to www.obitalk.com to create an account and register your Obi110. If you get stuck, you can call their very helpful technical support at: (408) 634-5904.

While you’re still in www.obitalk.com, be sure to also set up a local area code so that you don’t have to enter an area code for local calls.

Now, to get 911 Service. Go to www.callcentric.com and register for a paid account. All you will need to get is a “Pay Per Call” account. There’s no monthly call fee, but you do pay a monthly fee for 911 service. It’s $3 for the first month, and $1.50/month after that. You can pay into your account in increments of $5, $10, $20, $30, $40, $50, $80, or $100 and then CallCentric auto-bills each month from the remaining balance. I put enough in there for about one year.

Now go back to www.obitalk.com and add CallCentric as your second service provider. Obihai makes it easy to set up CallCentric as an emergency 911 service. Keep Google as your primary service provider, and set CallCentric to “Use This Service For Emergency 911 Calls.”

That’s it! For an initial investment of about $100, and a monthly fee of $1.50, I have free calls from home. I must note that I have noticed some echo on the phone line, but it’s not all the time. I’ve also had a couple of dropped calls, but that used to happen with my $40/month plan as well. But, hey, did I mention that it’s FREE?!

What do you think? Is it worth the work? I’d love to hear from someone with the Ooma ($200 device similar to the $50 Obi110).

After really thinking about it, I realized that all we really need to have is internet. With internet we can go online, watch Netflix (which we mostly do anyway), and use VOIP for phone.

I’ve already started using Google Voice to receive calls (and texts). I love Google voice, but don’t want to use my cell phone for all of my outgoing calls. Using my cell phone, I can make calls FROM my cell phone or Google Voice number, but both options use up my cell phone minutes (currently 700/month shared between three phones).

This has me looking at additional options. I’ve pretty much dismissed Time Warner VOIP and Vonage (both have high monthly costs), and I’ve found some interesting alternatives so far:

Magic Jack Plus: Unlike the original Magic Jack, no computer is needed and you can port your old number (where available), and e911 is available. Their salesy website is a big turnoff. Reviews I’ve found are not encouraging. Live Chat, but no phone support. COST: $69.95 for the device and one year of telephone service with all subsequent years of service for $29.95/year. Device insurance for $10, and number porting for a one-time fee of $20. Also available at Radio Shack.

Obi110: www.obihai.com Cheap, one-time equipment fee and can be set up with Google Voice. However, no 911 service (can be added with CallCentric) and requires Google username & password to work (security?). Some people will set up a secondary dedicated Google Voice account, but I’d like to keep the G-Voice number I already have, and not have to login to different Google accounts on my Droid to see Gmail and Voice. Obi110 has two ports so you can set up more than one VOIP service with one device. COST: $49.99 equipment charge. No monthly fees.

CallCentric: www.callcentric.com 911 Service for $1.50/month to use with Obi110.

VOIPo: http://www.voipo.com Offers VOIP services as well as Cloud Numbers. With a cloud number, I can port my old number to them, and for $36/year forward those calls to my Google Voice number that I can access with Obi110. They have US-based phone support during normal business hours (Monday – Friday from 10AM-6PM Central). I’ll be calling them tomorrow for more info.

A couple more options I’m considering:

Ooma Hub: http://www.ooma.com/products/ooma-hub

Ooma Telo: http://www.ooma.com/products/ooma-telo

Lots of cool features, including a free second line. Compatible with Google Voice. Looks like it’s necessary to use a DECT 6.0 handset, if you plan on using a cordless phone. COST: Both Ooma devices are about $200. Calls are free for basic service, or $9.99/month for premium service. Free service isn’t 100% free, as you must pay for e911 service at about $12/year. One-time $39.99 number porting fee, or Free with premium service signup.

I’d love to hear your experience with any of these services! I’ll keep you posted with what I end up doing and results.

My high school colors were gold and blue, yet one year the yearbook committee decided to make the yearbook shades of one color to save some money on printing. For some unknown reason they chose the color Red for the yearbook cover. They decided that the lettering would be 90% red, and the background color would be 50% red. Can you guess that we ended up with a Pink yearbook? We all learned a lesson in the importance of color that year.

When designing a website, it’s important to choose colors that compliment each other well and are consistent with your brand. Here are the three tools that I use the most that will help you to do just that:

ColorZilla: This is a powerful Firefox add-on with a collection of tools to help you select colors for your web projects. The Eyedropper tool gives you the RGB and hex values for anywhere that you point to on any webpage, as well as the CSS selector of any area you point to. The Ultimate CSS Gradient Generator helps you to create CSS gradients that you can save and bookmark to reference later. Color Picker and Palette Browser help you find just the right color by allowing you to select colors from a list, thumbnails, or palette and provide the color values in HSV, RGB, Lab, CMYK, and Hex. In addition, these tools provide the CSS code that you can copy and paste into your style sheet. Want more? Use the Webpage DOM Color Analyzer to analyze the colors on any page on the web. It will give you a color palette for the selected page, and list each color with values and CSS selectors it’s associated with.

Javascript Hex Color Preview: I use this tool all the time. It comes in handy when you’re looking at a bunch of code (especially CSS) with hex values and you can’t remember what the color actually looks like. Just enter the hex value into this web-based tool and the color renders in a nice square to see if it’s what you thought it was. Use this tool in combination with a screen shot to create the perfect palette to show your customer or your web designer.

COLOURlovers: You’re not the only one in search of the perfect color palette. COLOURlovers is a web-based community of people who love color! Browse over a million existing color palettes or create your own. You can also browse nearly a million seamless patterns (think web page background image) or, you guessed it, create your own. Start from scratch or color in an existing template to really customize something great for your site.

What are some other tools you use to select colors for a website?

While you may be limited to a 160 characters on Twitter, Google+ and other sites give you seemingly unlimited space to tout your wares. Here are some things to consider as you build your next Social Media profile.

Why do you want people to find you online? Seriously think about this. Is it to make money? Is it an ego trip? Is it to reconnect with lost loves or old friends?

What do you want people to do once they find you? Do you want them to contact you? Hire you? Buy something? Talk about you? Go to a specific website? How are you conveying this?

How do people want to contact you? Do you want them to email you? Call? Skype? Direct message? Text? Facebook? Guide people to contact you how you would like to be reached, but also consider that they may have a different preferred method of communication. Provide alternatives that work for both of you.

What’s your Full Name? OK, this may seem like a no-brainer, but it can be a confusing area. Let’s say your name is say, Robert Jones. Do you like to be called Robert, Bob, Rob, Bobby, RJ, BJ, Bert? See where I’m going with this? Give people the name that they can call you to feel like their instantly your friend. If you put your name out there as Robert, and you say, “Oh no, no one ever calls me Robert. My friends all call me Bob,” well, you’ve just told them that they’re not your friend. Ouch!

Do you have a Nickname? Is your real name something like Stephen, but folks only know you as Skip? Include your nickname somewhere in your profile so that people can find you in a search.

What’s your Maiden Name (Facebook/LinkedIn/Google+): This is a matter of preference. Maybe you don’t want to be found by people in your past. In that case, leave it off. As an in-between, Facebook, allows you to be searched on by an alternate name without making that name public.

What is your Title? As the owner of a company I wear many hats, so I’ve chosen to list several titles for myself. Use something catchy, but also throw in some common words that people might search on.

Company Name? OK, not much to explain here. However, if you’re in a big company, you may want to also include a division name.

What other Social Media Sites are you on? Especially if you have the space, and can add links, tell people where else they can connect with you via Social Media. Bonus if you register your own name and link to all of your profiles in one place.

What special Skills do you have? Are you an expert yodeler? Can you do stupid human tricks? Really think about this and be creative with what you share.

Do you hold any Certifications? This could really mean a lot to potential employers or mates. You worked hard for that raised seal. Talk it up!

Educational Highlights. Don’t limit yourself to just where you attended school. What else have you learned that will impress the masses?

Fields of Expertise. Think about those categories you choose when you fill out a government form or online job application. Sprinkle a couple of these words into your profile (in a meaningful way) if they might be terms people would use in a search for you.

Association Memberships: Do you belong to the BBB? NSA? ASTD? Careful with acronym soup…it might help to spell out the names to avoid confusion.

Do you have any Awards? Don’t be afraid to brag a little. Awards tend to beget more awards. Someone might be looking for you to bestow a new award. Let them find you!

What else interests you? You never know how someone will form a connection with you. It might be the type of books you read or movies you like to watch. Giving people multiple touch points opens up greater possibilities.

What are some key search terms? Knowing you, and if you were looking for you, what search terms would you enter to find yourself? Are those terms already covered with the information above?

Do you hold an Patents or have you written any Publications? People love an expert! Show off your stuff so that people can keep reading and find out more.

Next Steps: Call upon a friend that you trust (actually, a complete stranger might be just as effective for this exercise). Describe to them what you do and then ask them to tell you what you just told them. Any differences? Be sure that the message you’re sending at least vaguely resembles the message received.

You obviously can’t put everything you do into every online profile. However, the web is a big place. Revisit all of your online profiles and make sure that together they tell the whole picture as you would like it to be told. Keep going back so it’s fresh and relevant.

What other tips can you give about creating a robust online persona?

1. WordPress has been installed in its own directory (i.e. www.your_domain_name.com/wordpress
2. You want someone to go to www.your_domain_name.com and go directly to your WordPress installation
3. A simple redirect will get them there, but the path shown will still be www.your_domain_name/wordpress and you want it to simply show www.your_domain_name.com

WordPress gives directions on “Giving WordPress its Own Directory While Leaving Your Blog in the Root Directory“, but I always initially install WP in its own directory to begin with. Every time I tried to modify their directions and follow them, I’d end up with an error (with maybe one exception). I eventually got so nervous about moving the index to root that I stopped doing it and set up a simple redirect which gave me those ugly subdirectory urls. So, here’s my modified directions that have worked for me.

The following are simply a modification from the WP Codex article “Giving WordPress its Own Directory While Leaving Your Blog in the Root Directory.”

Many people want WordPress to power their site’s root (e.g. http://example.com) but they don’t want all of the WordPress files cluttering up their root directory. WordPress allows you to install the WordPress files to a subdirectory, but have your blog exist in the site root.

This process will keep WordPress in its own directory and move the index file to the root directory. It may help to print out these instructions before you start:

1. First do a FULL backup of your website, including databases.
2. Go to the administration area of WordPress and go to the General panel (under Settings).
   
3. In the box for WordPress address (URL): change the address to the new location of your main WordPress core files. Example: http://example.com/wordpress (This step is not necessary if WordPress was already in it’s own directory before starting this process, but it’s a good idea to check anyway!).
4. In the box for Site address (URL): change the address to the root directory’s URL. Example: http://example.com
   
5. Click Save Changes. (Do not worry about the error message and do not try to see your blog at this point! You will probably get a message about file not found.)
6. Move your WordPress core files to the new location (WordPress address). Example: http://example.com/wordpress (This step is not necessary if WordPress was already in it’s own directory before starting this process.)
7. Copy (NOT MOVE!) the index.php and .htaccess files from the WordPress directory into the root directory of your site (Site address). The .htaccess file is invisible, so you may have to set your FTP client to show hidden files. If you are not using pretty permalinks, then you may not have a .htaccess file. If you are running WordPress on a Windows (IIS) server* and are using pretty permalinks, you’ll have a web.config rather than a .htaccess file in your WordPress directory. As stated above, copy (don’t move) the index.php file to your root directory, but MOVE (DON’T COPY) the web.config file to your root directory.
8. Download your root directory’s index.php file to your machine.
9. Open your root directory’s index.php file in a text editor
10. Change the following and save the file. Change the line that says:
    require('./wp-blog-header.php');
    to the following, using your directory name for the WordPress core files:
    require('./wordpress/wp-blog-header.php');
    
11. Upload your changed index.php file back to the root directory of your site.
12. Delete any other index files (index.html, index.htm) that are already in your root directory (after you’ve saved a copy of them, of course)
    
13. Login to the new location. It should still be be http://example.com/wordpress/wp-admin/
14. If you have set up Permalinks, go to the Permalinks panel and update your Permalink structure. WordPress will automatically update your .htaccess file if it has the appropriate file permissions. If WordPress can’t write to your .htaccess file, it will display the new rewrite rules to you, which you should manually copy into your .htaccess file (in the same directory as the main index.php file.)

*I have only done this procedure on a Linux server, so I the instructions about a Windows (IIS) server in #7 have not been tested by me.