Social Media Marketing

For those of you who run a small business and are weighing the cost of starting some online marketing, a new article by Sarah Perez at ReadWriteWeb is a must-read: How to Reach Baby Boomers with Social Media. Believe it or not, Forrester Research says that 67% of people ages 43–52, and 62% of people ages 53–63 are active social media users. If you’re not marketing to your consumers online with blogs and social media, you should get on the bandwagon!

Starting a Blog

The best thing to do if you’re not very involved in online marketing is to get your business started blogging regularly, and then you can branch out into other social media. Mark Hayward, owner of a successful Caribbean-based business, has 10 Tips for Blogging Your Way to Small Business Success over at Problogger.net.

If you’re starting a new blog on a tight budget, this is a wonderful place to start: Pavel Ciorici compiled a fantastic list of over 50 beautifully-designed WordPress Themes (all free!)—there are rich, premium-type themes that will be a great application for everything from travel blogs to personal pages to your business blog: 50+ Free WordPress Themes for Personal Blogs of High Quality

To Twitter or Not to Twitter?

When you’re ready for the next stage of social media interaction, a ton of folks are getting involved on Twitter.com and raving about it. A lot of you probably still don’t know what Twitter really is or how to get any value out of it, so here we have a Twitter triumvirate for you:

• Twitter: The how to get started guide for businesspeople from Computerworld
• Kristi Colvin shares 7 Habits of Highly Effective Twitterers at the Blog of Mr. Tweet (follow her @kriscolvin)
• Timothy Ferriss gives you 5 tips on How to Use Twitter Without Twitter Owning You. (Follow Tim @tferriss)

Other great stuff from around the web this month:

• Seth Godin’s 7 Tips for Startups in a Down Market (an interview by Andrew Warner)
• 10 Things to do After Installing WordPress at Pro Blog Design
• Beyond TweetBacks: Introducing TweetSuite by Dan Zarrella
• Blog Post Ideas That Always Generate Buzz at TheFutureBuzz
• 15 Things I Wish I Had Known When I Started My First Blog by Neil Patel
• Five Best Cities to Live in 2009 if the Economy Keeps Tanking from Matador Abroad

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Read the original article on Thrilling Heroics here: Best of the Web: February Edition