Social Media

I created a MerchantCircle account a very long time ago and at first did not see any value in it. Today, my account as a Google rank of 3. It's not the best of the best, but it points to all my main websites, such as Snap!, equally increasing their rank and this without having to do much work, really!

Link from your site

First, assuming you are a small business, you want to add a link from your main website to your MerchantCircle account. This will send some traffic to your MerchantCircle account and end up in some people connecting with you.

For this purpose, you can use your MerchantCircle vanity URL. This is done by going to your Dashboard and after clicking on Business Information, scroll down to Website Links (at this time, the last entry on the page) and then click the Edit link. Here you are given a way to enter two links: your main website and your Custom Link (or vanity link). In there, enter your preferred alias. In general, the best is your business domain name. Say your business website is http://www.example.com/ then use example. Finally, hit Save.

Isn't that an ugly spider?!
As ugly as those URLs!

When you first create your group, business page or application its URL looks deadly ugly. It includes your page name, but it has a very large number too... A number you can be sure no one will remember. Okay, maybe one or two people, but I hope you're really looking into getting a few more than that to Like your page! Oh! And Speaking of that, don't forget to click the Like button of this very page, look up there...

Now there is a good example: the Snap! Websites page. Really, it went like this:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Snap/1522773647853491

This reminds me of those URLs sent to you by pretty much all the websites where you can create an account or download something after you entered your email address. They will include one really ugly usually random number. Actually, some of those websites will send you 3 or 4 of these long numbers. I'm still not too sure why they cannot do the same thing with one small number. When you register for Snap! I generate one very small number and you still have something like 1 billion possibilities, so the chances for a hacker to get the right number are quite slim. Okay... sorry... that was my rant about silly billies better known as website programmers.

• 1. Note that when you click on this URL, Facebook automatically changes it to the new URL which is http://www.facebook.com/snapwebsites

Today, October 1, 2010, is certainly a special day! The Social Network movie directed by David Fincher just came out nationwide.

I think that, one more time, that proves the success of The Facebook1 and all the other online social media systems.

Of the two hours movie, I only saw the official trailer (click on the social network button above to find the official movie site.) But from the little I read, I can say that it has to be good because it got exceptional ratings. I don't

• 1. This was the name given to Facebook at the start. It became Facebook before the public heard about it.

I think that if you are interested in Blogging to talk about yourself, your dog, your awesome cooking, then you are certainly not affected by all the Internet Marketing Hype trends! On the other hand, if your end goal is to make money with your blog, you probably read all those sales letters each one telling you that the previous won't work because no one uses that technique anymore.

Blogging has been around for more than 10 years and the same people still make money and new bloggers are getting there every day.

The difference between the hype and a good sane approach is quite simple...