Twitter is awesome! You can meet new people, keep up to date with old friends, join in Twitter Chats, create your own hashtag, follow celebrities, network, share stories and promote your blog. To top it off, all of this is done in only 140 characters.

You may be thinking “What has Twitter got to do with my blog?” The answer is Twitter is one of your best promotional tools!

Here are 10 surefire ways to promote your blog using Twitter:

1. Make an Announcement – Announce your new blog post is live. It’s exciting your hard work is finally available for viewing. Let people know about it! Artem Altman always makes sure to let his followers know about his new posts as shown below.

Bonus Tip: Post links on other social media sites as well, to help drive traffic to your blog.

2. Quote Yourself – Grab an important or shocking part of the blog post and quote it in a tweet, provide a link to the post and schedule for later that day. You can share your blog link more than once!

3. From the Archives – Share old posts this will help drive traffic to your blog. Your old content was good when you wrote it chances are if it wasn’t time sensitive it is still good content. So share it again. Thom Rainer does a good job of this.

4. Show Off your Link – Have a link to your blog in the bio section on Twitter. This is good for SEO and every time people look at your bio they will be reminded of your blog.  Crosby Noricks, Founder of PR Couture sets a great example in her bio.

5. Retweet – When people mention or link to your blog post make sure you retweet them. This way not only will their followers see, but all of yours will as well. As you can see below, Nicole Glass retweeted my tweet stating that her new article was great.

6. Get Followed – The more followers you have the more people that will see your tweets and the link to your new blog posts. Focus on providing quality content and you will see the numbers of followers you have start to rise. Also, it helps if you thank people for following, this can be a good way to get the conversation going with new followers.

7. Let People Know – Mention people and companies who are in the article with a link to the post. Most people enjoy reading about themselves and will respond to the article.

8. Favorite – Utilize the favorite button. It’s a good idea to favorite tweets sent by other people that link to your blog post. It shows you appreciate them and it will then show up under the favorites tab. I made sure to favorite this tweet when Dudepins shared a link to my blog post.

9. Engage Your Audience – If you only tweet about your blog people will not find you engaging. Provide relevant material from other sources, it shouldn’t be all about you all the time.

10. Direct Message (DM) – Know the people you follow. If someone is interested in a specific niche  topic you just wrote about, feel free to send the a DM and recommend the post. You can even recommend posts that weren’t written by you to begin fostering a relationship. If you provide content that is interesting to them they will begin to trust you. Make sure you send on topic links.

We want to hear from you: Do you have other suggestions on how to promote your blog on Twitter? Do you currently use any of these suggestions? Do you know anyone who successfully implements these 10 tips?

This guest post was written by Jenny Kay Pollock, who is the social media specialist at Four51. She assists with social media for FanTools including updating @FanTools, Facebook, and the company blog. She likes classy things and clever words. Connect with her business accounts or her personal Twitter @Jennykaypollock or Pinterest either way, she’s happy to hear new ideas and feedback!

I don’t use Twitter as much as I probably should, and I actually use it for more of a blog feed than anything else. No matter how you use Twitter, it’s important to get your name and brand across. With that being said, think about your Twitter account and how many people are visiting your profile page ever day, weekly or even yearly. Even if YOU aren’t actively posting on Twitter, it doesn’t mean that people aren’t visiting your page, so it’s important to leave a lasting impression.

Twitter Backgrounds Leave an Immediate Impression

What’s the first thing you see when you visit someones Twitter page? Most likely it’s their background image. Not only do the backgrounds give us a creative insight on what the person is about, but it’s also a cool way to get your message or web site across. Who are you, what’s your business and how can I learn more about you? These are all different topics that you can use in your background.

Since going live with a new blog design, I thought it would be a good idea to change things up and go with a new Twitter background as well. You can see the new background below, which was designed by DesignPax.com. (Use coupon code “ZACJOHNSONPROMO” and save 10%)

My New Favorite Twitter Background – View Full Profile

My first Twitter background had some basic information on myself and where you could visit my blog and social pages. This time around, I just wanted to go for a big branded effort and get “ZacJohnson.com” across to the user.

Excellent Twitter Backgrounds and Resources

What are some of you favorite and most memorable Twitter backgrounds that you’ve come across while scouring around Twitter? Instead of running to Twitter and having to visit all of your followers pages individual, many design blogs have done the work for us. I love looking through galleries of Twitter backgrounds and seeing the creative ideas and designs that people come up with. Below are a few sites that feature some of the best designs we’ve all come across.

Effective Twitter Backgrounds: Examples and Current Practices
100+ Incredible Twitter Backgrounds
42 Twitter Backgrounds
40 Cool Twitter Backgrounds
25 of the Best Designed Twitter Homepages

If you don’t have your own unique Twitter background, you should! It’s free branding that may be getting seen by hundreds, if not thousands of people daily. Get creative and design your own Twitter background, or find someone that specializes in design work, like I did with DesignPax.com.

What’s the inspiration for your Twitter background, or some of the favorite designs you’ve come across?

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of Logo Mojo. All opinions are 100% mine.

If there is one thing I’ve learned over the past few years while running this blog, it’s the power of a good logo. The Zac Johnson toon has taken on a life of it’s own and has become a very recognized symbol in the affiliate marketing and blogging niche. Without the extra branding from this logo and having it seen all over the place, it would be tough to achieve the same success the blog has seen over the past few years.

Not currently using a logo or design to brand your blog or business? You should be. Imprint an imagine in the minds of your followers, readers and customers. Doing so will not only allow them to remember a symbol and not just a name, but it helps extraordinarily for your branding purposes. Pepsi, Apple and Nike are all recognized by their logos… not their names. Twitter has been an amazing tool for branding purposes. If you are using Twitter and just have a basic background, you are missing out free branding and advertising every day. Most of the big name bloggers and branded companies have their own Twitter backgrounds which usually include their logo, web site name and personal or company info.

As easy as it sounds to brand yourself, it’s actually one of the hardest tasks to accomplish. First you have to think about what type of message and visual appearance your logo is going to display. Since the majority of us are not designers, you will also have to find someone to design your logo and make it look professional. I’m going through this process all the time, as I like to launch new web sites with only the highest designs and with their own unique logos. Logo Mojo

is a design company that actually covers the majority of what I talked about above. I’m always looking for new quality designers to work on projects. After looking through their site and portfolio, they have a nice selection of logos that they’ve designed, and compared to other design services, they prices are quite reasonable. The design process is laid out really well on the web site, as it walks you through the process on how to best describe your logo concept and how you would like it to be perceived.

Whether you are looking to have a new logo identity created for your web site, blog or Twitter, it’s a great idea to visit Logo Mojo. Not only can you get inspired by their designs and tips, but walking through their design questionnaire will also help you determine the look and feel you are trying to get with your new logo.

Making serious money online is all about making connections. Linking up with successful people in your area, or that you can talk with over the phone or online is what it’s all about. Lately a lot of people have been building some serious partnerships and meeting new people by forming TweetUps. What once was focused on Twitter,has grown into something much more.

To help everyone start up their own TweetUps, Jermey Schoemaker has created the TweetUp WordPress Theme. What can the TweetUp theme do for you? In short, it’s a quick and easy way for people to organize TweetUps in their area and totally integrates with the Twitter and Google maps api. The true simplicity creating your own TweetUp is setting up your own functioning web site and TweetUp information, is as easy as uploading wordpress to your site, then installing the TweetUp theme. You don’t have to worry about any programming or Twitter api/user info.

There are currently two versions available for the TweetUp theme; Standard and Deluxe. With price points of $47 and $297, you will easily save in the long run when comparing TweetUp Theme versus other services like MeetUp, which costs around $250 per year. You’ll also be happy to know that 100% of the proceeds from TweetUp will go towards The Lincoln City People’s Missions charity.

For a quick over view on how TweetUp theme works, be sure to watch the short video below.

Create Your Own TweetUp with the TweetUp Theme.

After running a several campaigns on SponsoredTweets and spending a few thousand dollars, it’s time to reflect back upon my results and what I’ve experienced using both Twitter and SponsoredTweets. Being able to compare my CPM results with my CPC results is quite interesting, and will make setting up future campaigns a lot more rewarding. Even with the future of companies like SponsoredTweets and Ad.ly in jeopardy, advertising through Twitter will always be an option which these same principles can be applied.

CPM Advertising Costs Too Much
When SponsoredTweets first came out, the only option for advertising was to buy on a CPM model. Since Twitter advertising was such a new concept, there really was no average for what advertising to other Twitter users should cost. After going live with a campaign, many advertisers would find clicks end up costing over $1 each. SponsoredTweets later introduced “ClickWatch“, which would retweet your offer up to three times if your cost per click was over $1. With the introduction of CPC advertising, this is no longer an issue.

CPC Advertising Drives Better Results
About a week before the Twitter announcement to no longer allow third party advertising through their API, I setup a new campaign on SponsoredTweets using their CPC model. I deposit $300 into my ad campaign and was paying out .10 per click (.06 to tweeters, as SponsoredTweets takes 40%) to drive traffic to my Six Figure Affiliate Blogging free ebook. The results have been interesting… I personally wouldn’t want to send a “sponsored tweet” worth only .06 per click to my followers, but over 1,050 SponsoredTweets users already have. The volume was quite low at the .10 rate, but then I increased my rate to .12 and the volume picked up. Another disturbing key point is the number of fraudulent and robot clicks, nearly 4,000 clicks. If you were buying on CPM these clicks really wouldn’t matter, but it just shows how much crap traffic is floating around on Twitter. I would definitely stick with CPC advertising.

Twitter Users and Writing Ad Copy
This isn’t surprising, but it ad copy swing either way. If you come out with an affiliate product and want other internet marketers to send out a tweet about it, I’m sure they will write something great. However this hasn’t always been the case with my campaigns. During my CPC campaign for Six Figure Affiliate Blogging, I let anyone pick up the offer and tweet out whatever they want.

Let’s view a few examples of tweets that were sent out through my latest CPC ad campaign. The majority of tweets were effective and written something like “Tell your followers to about Zac Johnson’s new “Six Figure Affiliate Blogging” ebook. It’s 100% free to download.“, but more than a handful have slipped by where they just say something like “sponsor http://spn.tw/teRwx“… which provides no value and is sure not to get many clicks. Lastly, some tweets were even offensive, such as the ““Six Figure Affiliate Blogging” ebook. its free. you can learn 2 blog for $$$ so that you can buy a gun and suicide #ad http://spn.tw/espL” tweet. If a large and well known company was to allow auto approval of their tweet campaigns, this could come back to haunt them.

Clicks, Tweets and Conversion Rates
Despite what the click amounts are, and how the tweets are written, it all comes down to conversions. SponsoredTweets tracking says there were roughly 2,000 legitimate clicks. When I head over to my Google Analytics stats, it shows roughly 700. Not disputing numbers, but just going off what the reports tell me. The overall conversion rate for my Six Figure Affiliate Blogging SponsoredTweets campaign is at 9.3%, this is quite low compared to the average 50% most JV partners and affiliates are seeing. As of now, this campaign costs a few dollars per lead when advertising through Twitter and paying .12 per click.

These are a few of the main take aways I have experienced through advertising on SponsoredTweets. As Twitter policies change and SponsoredTweets has to become more of a manual / approval process, we may see improvements in higher quality tweets sent out, and CPC/CPM bidding.

Do you have a similar or different advertising experience with Twitter or SponsoredTweets?

Earlier this month SponsoredTweets announced they are now accepting advertisers for their new CPC model. Their only previous method for advertising, was simply to pay whatever that tweeter was looking to receive. For most advertisers this usually resulted in extremely high click costs, even with ClickWatch in place to prevent high ad costs.

With the new CPC model in place, it opens a whole new world for advertising on Twitter. You no longer have to worry about ending up with high click cost numbers, and this allows more functionality and control over your ad campaigns.

Last week I set up my own ad campaign to promote Six Figure Affiliate Blogging and targeted only “blogging” and “affiliate” related tweeters. The results are below.

So far 128 different users have sent out a tweet, and only 120 legitimate clicks have been sent in. Sponsored Tweets has done a really great job at managing fraud, as they have captured 640 clicks that they describe are from “Clicks that are from bots or were considered fraudulent, duplicates, generated from click farms or otherwise considered invalid.“. If these weren’t weeded out, it would have ended up costing me an extra $64.00.

My settings are to pay out .10 per click to twitter users that send out my message, but SponsoredTweets takes a 60% cut, which brings it down to .04 per click in the marketplace. I think the 60% rate is way too high, and makes most of the advertisers look really cheap, but they are actually willing to pay double what it looks like. You can see the rest of available CPC tweets to send out below.

If the volume was there and ST didn’t take such a big chunk of the deposit, I think there would be a lot more action. This would also make for a great opportunity to push affiliate offers, as you have a set price you are paying per click.

So how is my campaign actually perfoming? So far only $12 of the $300 I deposit was spent. Of the 120 valid clicks that came through, the landing page converted at 13% vs. the 60% average it’s seeing from most others promoting it. Roughly 15 leads for $12… not looking too good, but we are only 5% into the total spending of my ad campaign. I might end up raising the CPC to see if more tweeters decide to pick it up in the marketplace.

UPDATE: Today Twitter came out with news that they will no longer allow third party advertising through the use of their API. This will dramatically affect companies like SponsoredTweets and Ad.ly. Ted Murphy (founder of Izea / SponsoredTweets) had the following to say. The biggest take away is the following quote from Ted;

“We are going to make some changes to the way Sponsored Tweets works. We will no longer be publishing directly to your account through the Twitter API. Instead you will have to write the tweet yourself in whatever Twitter client you see fit.

Yes, it will be a more manual process. Yes, we liked the old way better too. But we want to comply with Twitters guidelines and be a good ecosystem partner. We have always made adjustments to our system to remain in compliance. Twitter has allotted 30 days to make this change, we will try to get it out as soon as we can. Until then it is business as usual.”

- Try SponsoredTweets

Since internet marketing first started, email addresses have been scraped, sold, bulked up and spammed to death… so why should Twitter be anything different? Yesterday Jonathan Volk wrote a post on a service called Followers for Sale. The concept is simple… pay these advertising networks to bring new followers to your Twitter account. In addition to Jon’s post, I also had a request this week to review a paid Twitter service on another blog I run. With two Twitter services gaining my attention in one day, I thought it would make for an interesting case study to see how well these companies work, what they charge and if these followers will actually stick around… or most importantly, are of any value!

First I had to go out and find what services are available. The best way of doing this is just going to Google and searching “buy twitter followers“. You will get a big mess of results.

The best way to setup this case study and to measure results, is to create a few new Twitter accounts and use them separately on each of the Twitter follower services. This is also necessary because Twitter limits the amount of people you can follow daily. Using the same account along with each of these services would be a huge red flag and would ultimately ban your account.

For this Twitter Follower case study, let’s use 10,000 followers as the price point and what I will order for each Twitter account.

Here is a list of paid Twitter services and their rates.
BuyTwitterFriends.com = 10,000 Followers for $49.99 (0.0049 each)
TweetSourcer.com = 10,000 Followers for $60.00 (0.006 each)
UnlimitedTwitterFollowers.com = 10,000 Followers for $74.95 (0.0074 each)
Twitter1k.com = 5,000 Followers for $104.97 (0.0209 each)
SocialKik.com = 10,000 Followers for $150.00 (0.015 each)
USocial.net = 10,000 Followers for $447.30 (0.044 each)
Tweetcha.com = 10,000 Followers for $474.99 (0.047 each)
PurchaseTwitterFollowers.com = 5,000 Followers for $249.99 (0.049 each)

As you can see, there is a bit of swing between follower services. USocial.net being the most expensive. For this study, I will use the first three providers, test results, the possibly compare to the most expensive solutions and see if it’s actually worth the money.

The majority of these sites specialize in bringing you “untargeted” followers, but for a higher price it’s possible. If you are looking for a self managed and cheaper solution, I’d recommend Tweet Adder. Instead of paying a service to send a select amount of users for a one time cost, you can use your own software to continually bring in new targeted followers every day, and for multiple accounts. It can be a pain to follow users, then remove the ones that aren’t following you back… but you can build up a 10,000+ Twitter account for under $100 with adder software programs.

I’ve setup the new Twitter accounts, made orders with the first three follower services listed above. Now we just play the waiting game and I will report back next week on first results.

How exciting! It’s time for a new social advertising platform to go live. First we had Facebook, then MySpace and PlentyOfFish all opening up their networks with killer advertising platforms. With amazing demographic targeting we haven’t really seen before, it opened a whole new world for affiliate marketers. With another platform being released, we are all anxious to get in early and reap the profits of being first to place new ad campaigns. However, what should we expect to see from the Twitter ad platform?

For anyone who has used SponsoredTweets or Ad.ly, you may have been given a taste of what you might see. Unfortunately for many, advertising through sponsored messages on Twitter hasn’t been everything is cracked up to be. It’s often hard to pull a profit and the CPM prices are usually too high. It will be interesting to see how Twitter’s advertising platform compares not only to the likes of SponsoredTweet and Ad.ly, but also how much they are changing advertisers.

TechCrunch broke the news and provided even more details on Twitter’s new ad platform and what we can expect:

Here are the details outlined in the articles:

• As we previously described, the new system serves up ads based on keywords in Twitter search queries.
• Promoted Tweets will appear at the top of the search results page, with small text indicating they were sponsored. The Times piece notes that companies could use this to combat negative tweets (they can place a positive tweet at the top of the page)
• A Promoted Tweet isn’t guaranteed to stay afloat for a long time — if the tweet isn’t tracking well in terms of replies, clicks, and a number of other metrics Twitter is calling “resonance”, it will be pulled, and the advertiser won’t pay for it.
• One ad will be shown at a time



• Initial ad partners include Best Buy, Virgin America, Starbucks, and Bravo
• Advertisers will be paying on a CPM basis initially, with plans to adjust the model once Twitter can better gauge how people are engaging with Promoted Tweets

As with most ad platforms, it’s usually limited to only a few major companies in the beginning while tests and ad results are being studied. Once the platform opens to the masses we will see an onslaught of new advertising like Twitter has never seen before. Will Twitter end up going through the same hassles as Facebook Ads in continually updating their terms and conditions, while allowing less and less affiliate related offers.

Branding can only go so far, so let’s hope for something unique and special from those first big name companies who are advertising on Twitter.

Remember when the idea of getting paid to send out “Sponsored Tweets” to your Twitter followers? It didn’t go over well and many were disgusted and hated the idea. Now with Twitter releasing their own advertising and have stated “In the next phase of Twitter’s revenue plan, it will show promoted posts in a user’s Twitter stream, even if a user did not perform a search and does not follow the advertiser.“… everyone will have to accept the fact that Twitter is a real business too and needs advertisers.

A few sites have already been reporting their thoughts on the new platform.

• AdAge -  “Twitter Has a Business Model: ‘Promoted Tweets’”
• NY Times – “Twitter Unveils Plans to Draw Money From Ads”
• TechCrunch – “Full Details On Twitter’s Long-Awaited Ad Platform: Promoted Tweets”

What are your thoughts on the new Twitter Ad Platform and how does it affect the future of businesses like SponsoredTweets and Ad.ly?

Maybe it’s just the new budgets in the beginning of the year… but it looks like some of us are just killing it with earnings on Sponsored Tweets. This month was easily my best month with Sponsored Tweets, and that’s even with turning down a few offers. Why would I turn offers down?… some just aren’t relevant at all. With that being said… the business on Sponsored Tweets has just exploded lately.

SponsoredTweets has one of the best monetization concepts around. As a Twitter user, you just need to click YES or NO to accept a new advertised tweet. How much money is being made in whole by “sponsored tweeting”…I don’t know exactly, but it’s enough to make a full scalable business. Sponsored Tweets isn’t the only game in town… Ad.ly is also a huge player in this space, however in the past several months I’ve had an account with them, I’ve had only ONE tweet request. Ad.ly has the big name advertisers, and the backing of many Twitter celebrities… but something just isn’t ticking like it is at Sponsored Tweets.

Back to the money… it’s not enough to retire or quit your day job… nevermind, it is! Let’s get serious… no one is really going to retire from tweeting, because anyone who is making that much is already in a position where they most likely don’t have to work. But to keep things fun, let’s just look at some of the earnings going around. John Chow just posted an image of his Sponsored Tweets account with his $4,000+ in earnings. I asked how long of a time period that was for, and he said about a month and a half. That’s pretty damn good for clicking an approval button! Let’s bring it up another level. Another big name is Jeremy Schoemaker of course. In a post a few months ago, Jeremy talks about how he sometimes makes over $15,000 a month for sponsored tweeting!

Even if you had the extreme following and brand awareness on Twitter to make $1,000 a month, that’s still an very honorable figure. However, in reality, most people are using Twitter for fun, see what other people are saying and just to be part of the group. These big name players are the exception… but there is definitely enough money to go around!

With this month being my busiest month yet for Sponsored Tweets, I’ve also come across a few new advertisers. Three new advertisers I had request a tweet this month are below, each with their own reasoning for ordering a sponsored tweet and how they got their message across.

1.) ShoeMoney System – Jeremy already had all the branding and following he needed to easily fill the 500 lead cap on his new ShoeMoney System program. However, that didn’t stop him from ordering a ton of targeted sponsored tweets by well known names in our affiliate industry. I’m not sure on his end numbers and ROI, but Sponsored Tweets was able to get his message around to a targeted audience in a short period of time.

2.) $DGDM Awareness – This was the first stock related sponsored tweet I’ve seen. I also decided to promote this one because I found it quite interesting. I do a fair amount of stock trading, but didn’t jump on this one. The tweet url went to a site by 8020m which gave an overview on DGDM stock and why you should own their stock, and highlighting company achievements. During the past week, this penny stock went from .10 to .75! If anyone else decided to buy this stock based on their paid tweets, it would be hard to tell.

3.) MyHosting / Affiliate Summit West – Bringing awareness to an event that you’re attending is an excellent idea. MyHosting.com has tweets going out to display they had a table at Affiliate Summit West, then to promote their $100 activation bonus on new hosting accounts. Both relevant ad copies, and unique to anyone attending ASW.

This is just the beginning… it’s only a matter of who can find the best ways to monetize their Twitter traffic, and who can monetize your Twitter followers with new ad buys. Which side will you be on… or can you manage both?

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of LeapFish Inc. All opinions are 100% mine.

What has Twitter brought into your life? From a business aspect, it’s opened up worlds and brought us together. However, what is the real value in Twitter for those who aren’t making money online? While I was at BlogWorld in Las Vegas, there was a lot of discussion about raising money through Twitter. This was an excellent concept, just for the fact that you can easily participate and reach millions of people with a single click. Soon, charities may no longer need to waste funds on tv advertising, pamphlets or ad campaigns. If we can get more people to participate and come up with new methods for generating money and helping those in need, the future of raising money just be a “tweet” away.

The “Make a Wish” Foundation has created the Make-a-Wish Tweet-a-Cause and is putting the power of Twitter to work! In a partnership with LeapFish, the Make a Wish foundation is looking to raise $10,000 to send Jacob and his family to Disneyland. Jacob, age 4, has a rare and life-threatening disease that has affected him since birth. Personally, I went to Disneyland once when I was very young, so I don’t remember it that well. What I do remember and know, is that every child, (especially those less fortunate), should have the chance to dream and visit such a place as Disneyland in their lifetime.

So let’s send Jacob to Disneyland!

As mentioned, Make a Wish foundation and LeapFish are combining forces to make this “wish” possible. Every time a user “retweets” the text line below, LeapFish will make a donation of 5 cents to the Make a Wish Foundation until the $10,000 and been raised.

Click HERE or copy / paste the following into your Twitter client:

Just tweeted 2 grant a childs wish! #LeapFish donates to #makeawish foundation for each tweet. http://bit.ly/3KgyQX Please retweet!

The campaign will run from November 16 through November 27, 2009. LeapFish will match each Tweet with 5 cents to a target of $10,000 which will get Jacob and his family to Disneyland.  Click here to view progress chart and donation earnings.