Good Morning, and happy day-after Thanksgiving!  Five Sparrows is coming to you live this morning from Howell, Michigan, in our mobile office that is currently parked right ON the parade route!

Five Sparrows Mobile Office

We will be providing updates all day long here on our blog, and also through our other social networking channels (Facebook, Twitter, etc.) to share updates, photos, and the general festivities going on today for this long-standing Livingston County tradition!

We arrived this morning at about 7:30 a.m., and there were already chairs lined up in several “key” positions on the parade route…we were very lucky to find a great parking spot, with room for the mobile office as well as front-row seating for our chairs on the sidewalk for later.  The parade doesn’t actually start until 7 p.m., but we (like a lot of other early-birds) are all set for the main event this evening.

Traffic is still flowing on Grand River Ave., although some of the side streets have already been closed off.  I’m sure as the day goes on, we will be seeing fewer and fewer cars as more traffic barricades go up!

More later…

If you’re not convinced that the social networking site Twitter can be useful for your small business, you’re not alone.  Twitter may have started out as a novel way for users to share random details about their lives (like what they had for breakfast or what movie they’re watching), but that is changing very quickly.  Businesses of all sizes are finding Twitter to be an effective online marketing tool, and there is growing evidence to suggest that the major search engines (like Google and Bing) are now starting to add Twitter “tweets” to their search results for users.

Why does that matter to your small business? Because using Twitter in your marketing mix means that it could also improve your visibility in the search engines. It’s another way to gain exposure for your business, get your business listed higher on the search results pages, and get your brand mentioned more often in the web resources that users still turn to the most – the search engines.

Here are a few reasons Twitter has become so valuable as a small business marketing tool:

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) – Like most small businesses, you probably have invested at least some time, money, or both into optimizing your web site for the search engines (and if you haven’t, you already know that you should!).  Being active on Twitter can support those efforts and make your investment in SEO even more valuable.

Studies show that nearly 80% of people still turn to search engines first (mostly Google) when they look for products and services on the web, and that’s not likely to change any time soon.  Getting your business to show up for your most important keywords and phrases is just as important as ever, and using Twitter can help attract the attention of the search engines, and improve the chances that they will include your business in the search results.

Qualified Traffic – Often, the traffic that comes from being active on Twitter is highly qualified, since users have already opted-in to follow you and are interested in what you have to say.

Real-Time Search – Social networking sites have really pushed the search engines into focusing on how to add real-time search to their results, since sites like Twitter are excellent at providing users with news as it happens.  On Twitter, users can search for news and events and get instant, up-to-the-minute results, where a search engine’s results may be hours, days, or even years old.  It’s only a matter of time before the search engines have real-time search rolled into their results, making your Twitter activity more powerful.

Viral Marketing – Because social networking is so popular with users, the information you provide to your Twitter followers can travel all over the web as they share your “tweets” with their networks of friends and colleagues, who then share with their networks, and so on.  Your tweets are also not limited to Twitter users, either, since people can pull your tweets into their Facebook pages, link to them on a blog, put them in their bookmark lists on Delicious, etc.

Building Relationships – Twitter, as with other social networking sites, is all about providing something of value to your followers, and being a part of the overall conversation happening online today.  Customers want to connect with the companies that they do business with, and they are participating with businesses in a whole new way.  Twitter can help you build those strong relationships with customers that can increase brand loyalty and help you stay top-of-mind.

Constant Innovation – The speed with which new social networking applications, ideas, and features come out means your small business must find ways to stay in front of customers, no matter where those customers are.  Twitter has only been in existence for a couple of years, which means it is just getting started in building up its repertoire of gadgets, widgets, and applications that people will find useful.  By using Twitter now, your small business will be poised to take advantage of these new innovations as they come along. It can also give you a significant advantage over competitors who may have to play catch-up with building up followers and establishing their own presence in the social space.

No Time to Waste
Twitter, like many other social networking sites, is changing the way small businesses market online, and it’s a change for the better.  Twitter is a free service, it’s easy to use, can be customized, and is a great way to boost your presence online.  Your Twitter efforts can also increase your customers’ loyalty to your brand and your company, and meets a need that consumers themselves revealed to you by opting-in to follow you in the first place.  And now that Google and Bing have announced the upcoming inclusion of Twitter “tweets” in their search results, Twitter can support your SEO efforts like never before as well.

Clearly, Twitter can be categorized as many different things (a viral marketing tool, customer service channel, SEO strategy, etc.), but a waste of time?  Just the opposite.

One of the most important elements in optimizing your web site to rank well in the search engines is to select the right keywords and then use them appropriately on your web pages. Sounds pretty simple, but with all the bad advice floating around on the web today, we thought you might appreciate some simple, tried-and-true tips for correctly using keywords on your web site. Here are some common “do’s and don’ts” that can help you avoid mistakes and improve your search engine optimization results:

DO research your keywords to find out what users are actually searching on in the search engines right now. Be sure to review your selected keywords periodically, since the terms that searchers use will change over time.

DON’T just guess which keywords you think searchers would use to find your site; you know your business so well that you may overlook the phrases that “outsiders” use to describe what you do.

DO limit your keywords to between two and four per page. This will allow for more natural-sounding text, and will help keep the page focused on a single topic.

DON’T cram as many keywords as possible onto a web page. This will only dilute the effectiveness and value of each keyword, and can lead to page content that is confusing for visitors.

DO select keywords that match your business and services. Keeping a narrow focus will help drive the most qualified traffic to your web site.

DON’T use keywords that are only loosely related to your business. For instance, if your site is about auto engine repair, don’t include keywords like “auto body repair” or “oil changes”, even if these terms pull in a lot of traffic. You don’t want to waste your visitors’ time, or attract visitors who are not looking for engine repairs.

DO write keyword-rich titles, descriptions, and link text, since these elements are taken into consideration by the search engines and can help improve your rankings.

DON’T count on the keywords meta tag to help you – Google, as well as other major search engines, have repeatedly said that they do not use the keywords in this tag when ranking sites. You need to know which elements are useful to the search engines and focus your time and attention on those.

DO write content that reads well to your human visitors. Make this a priority, because the text must make sense to your target audience first and foremost. Write your text so the keywords seem natural and they don’t “stick out” as obvious keywords.

DON’T use keywords in your content at the expense of readability for your visitors. Sure, you need to appropriately mix your keywords into the content of your pages, but nobody wants to read awkward, nonsensical content that has been obviously stuffed with keywords to please the search engines. It can also make you look amateurish and can damage credibility with your target audience.

DO pay attention to how often you use your keywords on a page; you need to use them enough to show that the page’s subject matches the keywords you are targeting for that page.

DON’T over-use the keywords in the text on your page; high keyword density levels may get your page flagged for keyword spamming by the search engines.

By following these “do’s and don’ts” when working with your keywords, you can avoid some common errors while improving your visitors’ experience, your optimization process, and ultimately your results in the search engine rankings!