About three years ago, I wrote a three part series on Creating an Effective Online Presence but that was before I understood anything about social media. Now if you are going to have an effective online presence, social media is one aspect that can help put you on the cyber map.

I am not a social media expert by any means but I want to share with you the sites I have a presence on and how I use them to leverage my opportunities and to promote my business.

I keep coming back to one of the tenants of my Inside Out Empowerment process, “Relationship is the root of all influence.” People tend to do business with people they like and trust. When you are on the Internet, it is difficult for people to distinguish you from all the others out there operating in your same niche. This can be done through writing articles and/or blogging. But now social media has created another stage for you to allow potential customers to get to know you in a different way.

LinkedIn: On LinkedIn, you get to create a profile of your business, get recommendations from others who have used your services and network with people you know and the people they know.

Facebook: I personally like facebook best. This is where you can connect with people you know. No one can follow you and your posts unless you approve them and you can block them if you choose. Facebook is more conducive to conversation because the length of your posts is not limited. You can post links and videos. You can make new friends there.

Twitter: Twitter works best if you can say what you need to say in 140 characters of less. This is a challenge for me but I’m working on it. You can post comments on what you are doing or link to longer articles and information sources.

MySpace: This used to be the place to network but I believe it has been surpassed by facebook. I still find many entertainers use it because you can add a lot of things to your page, e.g. music, video, etc. You can leave public comments, send bulletins, and post status updates.

YouTube: This is an excellent site to promote what you do in video. You can do a 5 – 10 minute clip and viewers will get a sense of what you have to offer.

I use all of these sites to promote my business with the exception of Youtube. I don’t have video yet but I will be adding it in a few months. I am very excited about that. However, I don’t profess to be an expert at any of them.

There are experts available to help you through the process and some very good books written on the subjects. Here is what I recommend.

For LinkIn, read How to REALLY use LinkedIn by Jan Vermeiren and/or I’m on LinkedIn—Now What??? by Jason Alba.

For Facebook, I like Mari Smith at marismith.com. Also, check out Facebook: The Missing Manual by E. Vander Veer and/or Facebook Cookbook: Building Applications to Grow Your Facebook Empire by Jay Goldman.

For Twitter, check out Carrie Wilkerson at carriewilerson.com. Also, be sure to check out Twitter Power: How to Dominate Your Market One Tweet at a Time by Joel Comm, Anthony Robbins, and Ken Burge and/or Twitter Tips, Tricks, and Tweets by Paul McFedries and Pete Cashmore.

For MySpace look at MySpace Marketing: The Promotional Revolution 2nd Edition by Nick Jag and for YouTube try YouTube for Business: Online Video Marketing for Any Business by Michael Miller.

The best tip I have is to remember you are trying to build your business. Make sure what you put out there is the way you want others to perceive you. And have fun building your networks.

Kim Olver is a life and relationship coach. She has consulted on training, leadership development, diversity, treatment programs and management styles. She is the creator of the new, revolutionary process called, Inside Out Empowerment. To learn more go to
http://www.insideoutempowerment.com.

Twitter we’ve all heard about this phenom thingy. What is Twitter exactly, how do you use it properly and why the hell should you most certainly be using it in the real estate or any other industry on the planet?

For starters as of today…

Twitter is already the 36th most visited website in the world and climbing fast according to Alexa.com, I expect it to hit top 20 website by the end of the year or higher. That s a pretty good reason to get yourself on there and benefit from the immense traffic on the site.

Next Twitter is estimated to have 100 million members possibly by the end of 2009.

Over HALF of all Twitter members are age 35 or older.

Over 51 of Twitters make over $60,000 a year.

Twitter is NOT MySpace or Facebook, or what I call the teeny bopper and booty call sites.

Twitters are mostly professionals, business owners or at least wanna be business owners.

63 of users have college and/or graduate school degrees or attended.

76 of Twitter users have wireless internet.

What this means to people in the real estate or any other industry? These Twitters are highly educated, high tech and affluent buyers that can and will need your services someday soon.

Next why Google will for sure buy Twitter this year I believe, because of the REAL TIME search capabilities.

What does that mean you may wonder?

Unlike Google where you type a keyword phrase in and on first page you usually get a lot of spam sites, articles, press releases, article directories and things not related to your search.

With Twitter if you put in say real estate Austin Texas , you will instantly see who in the world at that EXACT time or at least in the last few hours has been talking about real estate in Austin Texas.

You then can join that conversation, send those people a direct message on Twitter, maybe refer them to someone, follow them on Twitter to build a relationship with them, answer there question or direct them to your blog or website for more info.

It’s basically like these people are raising their hands waiting for you to help them. This is why you should be spending hours on Twitter daily, yes hours no kidding.

This is the TRUE POWER of Twitter, that s never been seen before in the marketing, sales and business world.

Twitter also helps you build your incoming links to your personal or business blog and website for free. The more followers you have and tweets you do, the more incoming back links you will generate to your sites. More links = more traffic = higher search rankings more the keywords your going for = more $$$ for YOU!

Wikipedia states: Twitter is a free social networking and micro blogging service that enables its users to send and read other users updates known as tweets. Tweets are text based posts of up to 140 characters in length which are displayed on the user s profile page and delivered to other users who have subscribed to them (known as followers).

So like a regular blog that you may have on ActiveRain, Wordpress or Blogger. You can build your personal brand in your niche, you can grow and show your expertise in your field, you can help educate and inform potential prospects on your Twitter profile.

These are just a few reasons why you must have and use daily a Twitter account, to stay competitive or have the edge over others in your real estate or any other niche.

Ben Jordan is the founder of: http://www.mobileaustinnotary.com. Mobile Austin Notary a Texas notary and Texas loan signing agent company that covers the entire state of Texas. Rated as one of the top: http://www.mobileaustinnotary.com. Austin Texas Notary service providers because of their Texas sized customer service, use of cutting edge technology and vast experience.