Great photo taken by my daughter-Sierra Dennis

Visually the site was crisp and informative, but the pieces of information were sectioned off in too many areas around the page– moving, calling, and requiring the reader to do exactly what I had burnt myself out from doing- taking in too much at one time. Because all of the pieces of the blog were visually available at once, I too suffered from overload. I found myself overwhelmed and pressured to write for each section in each moment so that it all looked fresh all the time. This took much from my organic promise of observations from the road less traveled. Instead of coming across life and observing it, I began seeking observations simply to produce for a category. We all know that when we try to accomplish 10 things, we likely fail at even getting one done and so it was for me. Not at all the principle of my life or blog!

So now my thoughts, experiences, and observations will be placed one post at a time in a more organic but regular format. This contributes to the more personal feel that I wanted from the beginning. All of the categories and ideas remain, but you will be able to experience them singularly with me through my words without that unnecessary visual overload. To grab inspiration and info from categories and grouped ideas, just look to the sidebar and find, “I’m blogging on.” You can also organically click on a keyword under “Hot Topics” for a list of posts that consider that subject matter.

You’ll also note a conscious request by me for you to share the blog through social media. There are share buttons after each post. Please feel free to show your support of a post by sharing it on Facebook and Digg. Digg is a great way to push posts into the broader net world, so give it a try. If you have a twitter account, feel free to click the green retweet buttons on at the top of each post and automatically tweet my work. As always, please feel free to comment and post your views on post topics!

~Spencer Hope

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screenshot from Twitter 4/29/09

I was already on Twitter for months when the Ashton Kutcher/CNN follower race began. I shuddered when Demi Moore posted that she was going to be watching when Oprah made her first tweet on the day that Kutcher broke 1 million followers. Could Twitter handle the Oprah effect? You know, the midas touch that she has on everything from books, cookies, to Facebook…. and now Twitter?

As of today, Oprah has over 690,000 followers in a little over 10 days. With a whooping 10 updates from her in that time, it seems clear that this was a Friday news story for an already saturated Oprah. Did we really think that she would have the time, purpose, or desire to pop in and tell us “what are you doing?” Sitting next to Oprah and in front of millions that day, the powers that be over at Twitter did a sucky job of describing what Twitter is, and many were left pretty confused. What 690,000 followers likely represent is a whole lot of new Twitter folks. Many gave it a shot that day and since have probably had fewer updates than Oprah, because they don’t know what the heck to do. Or, they actually think they’re talking to Oprah when they say “@oprah…can you buy me a car?” or “@oprah youre a racist for wanting to promote the black community,” and wonder why “the bitch isnt answering me!” (real posts)

So, for those peeps (perhaps) I present to you, 5 key things to know about starting on Twitter:

Finally. I know. You may not admit it, but you want some celebrity juice. Here’s a few of the more talkative and sometimes interesting ones. Check their links and follow at will!

http://Twitter.com/serenajwilliams

http://Twitter.com/RealHughJackman

http://Twitter.com/billgates

http://Twitter.com/KimKardashian

http://Twitter.com/jimmyfallon

http://Twitter.com/MCHammer

http://Twitter.com/TinaFey

http://Twitter.com/LennyKravitz

http://Twitter.com/snoopdogg

http://Twitter.com/mileycyrus

http://Twitter.com/TheEllenShow

http://Twitter.com/maddow

http://Twitter.com/johncmayer

http://Twitter.com/iamdiddy

http://Twitter.com/mrsKutcher (Demi Moore)

http://Twitter.com/aplusk (Ashton Kutcher)

http://Twitter.com/tonyrobbins

http://Twitter.com/lancearmstrong

and of course…

http://Twitter.com/Oprah

although it’s far more interesting to just search “@oprah” and see what people are asking for….. uh… I mean talking about.

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Pump up the visibility of your business by choosing relevant and interesting events to blog on real time. Taking a laptop to a centralized location that has wifi is great, but working with a smartphone device such as the iphone can make it a breeze. Click photos and post shots as they are happening. Upload video clips and supportive links. Create a blogging voice that your audience will look for!

4 Steps to Get Started:

1. Get Your Phone Ready Find a smartphone application for your blog or sign up for text ability. My iphone is set up with the free blog application WordPress and the fee based BlogPress ($2.99). If you don’t have a blog set up, go to Blogger.com (run by Google) or WordPress, and set yours up for free. If you don’t have an iphone or phone with these applications, you can still submit blogs by text through a Blogger account, or by email sent from your phone to your WordPress blog. Check your blogs help forum for setting this up. Regardless, become familiar with the different setups, tabs and screen options for blogging on your phone by shooting a few quick test posts through the system.

2. Dry Live Blogs First just sit at your computer and type a “live blog.” Remember, you will be communicating with your readers in real time. The idea is to figure out if you can create interesting content, finding something both subtly descriptive (not super detailed) and interesting on a regular schedule (say every 10-12 min). See what you can do as a writer first before dealing with the tech part of the live blog. This is about getting practice in so choose something that you will enjoy and will be comfortable talking about. Blog through a sporting event, popular show (like American Idol), or even a cooking show. Try to make each entry 50-100 words unless something really hot is going on. The first paragraph of this blog post is 70 words! If you believe your blog is relevant to an outside event that you’re involved in, like a 10k run or a boxing class, you should probably do a test run in that environment as well. Remember, this is just about the writing part. When you’re done, review your work.

3. Live “Test Blog” The title of your post should include “Test Blog.” You should begin the test by letting readers know that this blog is real, but it is a test of live blogging that will be coming to your site. Now that you’re dealing with both the writing and the technical part of posting on the fly, pay close attention to any issues that might cause problems in the future. Wifi access? Crowds and distractions? Humidity on your equipment? From a tech point, remember that you are not creating a new post. You are adding new comments to an established post by using the edit function! Remember the 100 words or less mantra. Keep a notebook handy to jot down quick thoughts that will help you form your posts. Stay focused but relaxed and let your voice shine through!

4. Review Make sure that you go to your physical blog as soon as possible to get a visual of whether this worked for you. This does not mean that you change the content, because that would change the integrity of the live blog. What you’re looking for are issues such as formatting errors and typos. If it looks good and is relevant to your audience change the title from Test Blog and leave it posted. If not, remove this test. Make sure you create a blog folder for live blogs so your readers can find all of them in one place in your archives. As always, try to get feedback from friends on the content and relevance of your live blogs. Pay close attention to your readers posted comments.

In general, live blogs are about the event. Unlike your regular blogs, they don’t hold the same shelf life. However, your ability to pull them off regularly will draw an audience to your site and expose new readers to other components of your business model. Don’t over do it though. Pick events wisely!

Extra Tip: Consider micro-blogging live events to your Twitter account. These events don’t have to be as relevant to your main business. These tweets are designed to attract an audience to draw hits to your primary site.

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