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4 Tips for Writing SEO-Friendly Blog Posts. This post originally appeared on the American Express OPEN Forum, where Mashable regularly contributes articles about leveraging social media and technology in small business. In addition to writing for their human readers, web writers and bloggers have to consider the digital web crawlers employed by search engines like Google. Your business can't skip the task. Since most would-be readers use search engines to find blog posts, you need to make sure that Google ranks your site highly when those readers search for terms related to your business and the content you're writing. You could spend thousands of dollars to have a search marketing firm optimize your business's blog for search engines, but chances are that you can learn a lot of the fundamentals yourself, saving yourself a lot of money as long as you have the interest and the time.

Here's a basic primer on Search Engine Optimization (SEO) for your company's blog. 1. 2. 3. Most blogging platforms let you apply tags to your posts. 4. Local Tweets: 9 Ways to Find Twitter Users in Your Town. The Twittering Towns series is supported by the Comcast Town Design Showdown. Thousands of people created and submitted their apartments, and the judges have narrowed it down to four finalists. They're all vying for the opportunity to win a prize worth up to $30,000, including a room remodel, 40-inch Sony Bravia® HDTV, a Sony VAIO® AW laptop and a Philips digital phone. Submit your vote today! The number of people visiting and using Twitter has nearly quadrupled over the past few months, and as more people sign up for the hot social networking service, it becomes more useful.

Twitter is enabling everything from better customer service to easier job searches, and is being employed for some extraordinary home uses. Twitter can become infinitely more beneficial, though, if you use it to connect with people in your town. 1. One of the best ways to find local Twitter users is simply to search for them on Twitter Search. 2. 3. Twtvite - Twtvite is an invitation service built for Twitter. 5. 26 Charities and Non-Profits on Twitter. Lon S. Cohen is a writer and Director of Communications at @ALSofGNY.

He is @obilon on Twitter. What is it about social media people that make them just so darn generous? Every day I read my Twitter stream and come across one or two people who are creating awareness or trying to raise money to help one cause or another. Step back and you can certainly see how it makes sense. Social Media people are, well, social. We care about our fellow man (and woman and children and animals and environment). It’s no small wonder then that non-profits abound on Twitter. As Director of Communications at @ALSofGNY, I have embraced the benefits of Twitter. 1. Name: @the1010projectWebsite: the1010project.orgMission: "The 1010 Project is a nonprofit organization that provides income-generating grants to indigenous development partners in Kenya and raises awareness in the United States on behalf of the global poor.

" Denver is a long way from Kenya. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 17. 18. 19. HOW TO: Get the Most Out of Twitter #Hashtags. One of the most complex features of Twitter for new users to understand is the hashtag, a topic with a hash symbol ("#") at the start to identify it. Twitter hashtags like #followfriday help spread information on Twitter while also helping to organize it. The hashtag is a favorite tool of conferences and event organizers, but it's also a way for Twitter users to organize themselves: if everyone agrees to append a certain hashtag to tweets about a topic, it becomes easier to find that topic in search, and more likely the topic will appear in Twitter's Trending Topics.

So how do you disseminate and make sense of all this hashtag madness? By going through the art of the hashtag step-by-step, of course. Have a tip to share on hashtags or a unique way you utilize them? 1. For new Twitter users, and even we veterans, figuring out what a specific hashtag is being used for can be a major chore. So what's the most efficient way to figure out those nasty hashtags? What the Trend? 2. 3. 4. 8 Tips for a Successful Social Media Cause Campaign. Meaghan Edelstein has gained national media attention through her blog, I Kicked Cancer's Ass, which she started to document her battle with end stage cancer.

She is an attorney, the founder of the non-profit organization Spirit Jump, and the Social Media Director for Smashyn.com. Cause marketing can be described as the mutually beneficial relationship between a business and a non-profit organization. Social media cause campaigns are similar, but not identical to traditional cause marketing, in that they allow for more flexibility.

Small businesses can gain exposure without breaking the bank, and large companies can reach millions of consumers in a matter of hours. Social cause campaigns can be run by individuals and non-profits without big company sponsorship. They provide easier, faster involvement with supporters, and require fewer resources. For example, the hugely successful Blame Drew's Cancer campaign was started by a single person, cancer fighter Drew Olanoff. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. HOW TO: Turn Slacktivists into Activists with Social Media. Geoff Livingston co-founded Zoetica to focus on cause-related work, and released an award-winning book on new media Now is Gone in 2007. Throughout the non-profit world, organizations struggle with social media's impact on the volunteer and donor cycle. The rise of "slacktivism" — doing good without having to do much at all — challenges organizations to rethink the way they cultivate their core volunteers and donors.

There are some important social media strategies for transforming those one-click "slacktivists" into fully engaged activists. Here are five tips from some of the best in the non-profit business. 1. The term slacktivism has its own baggage. "It irritates me that we have invented this term as a pejorative way to describe what should be viewed as the first steps to being involved in a cause in 2010," said Katya Andresen, Chief Operating Officer of Network for Good. 2. Social media provides a new first step on the engagement ladder. 3. 4. 5. 5 Ways Non-Profits Can Increase Engagement With YouTube. Geoff Livingston co-founded Zoetica to focus on cause-related work, and released an award-winning book on new media Now is Gone in 2007.

According to ForeSee Results' 2010 Social Media Study, YouTube is the second most powerful social network for consumer engagement. This critical component of the social web remains vital for causes, associations and government organizations. Non-profits have been engaging with YouTube for years, but it's still important to have a specific online video strategy. The following five tips can help organizations maximize their YouTube offering for the most impact. 1. Participate in YouTube's Nonprofit Program The YouTube Nonprofit Program provides for extra benefits like branding capabilities, increased uploading capacity, and call-to-action overlays.

"In a single weekend, it was viewed over half a million times and raised enough to feed over 140,000 children," said Pierre Guillaume Wielezynski, Head of Web at the World Food Programme. 2. 3. 4. 5. 9 Creative Social Good Campaigns Worth Recognizing [Mashable Awards] As part of the upcoming Mashable Awards, we're taking a closer look at each of the nomination categories. This is "Most Creative Social Good Campaign.

" Be sure to nominate your favorites and join us for the Gala in Las Vegas! "Social good" may not immediately be associated with "creativity," but the space has become a hot bed for unique and inventive approaches to fundraising and cause awareness. We've been impressed with the way organizations and individuals have embraced the web this past year in order to make positive changes in their communities and the world. Whether raising money for disaster relief, promoting a cause, or mobilizing actions across the globe, they found effective strategies to tweet, post, blog, e-mail, virtually coordinate, or crowdsource their way to their goals. Here are 11 creative campaigns that caught our attention this year. 1. 2. Fans bid a total of $540,631.25 for Twitter interaction with their favorite celebrities at this online eBay auction. 3. 4. 5. 6. 8.