Simple but not always great

The easiest tack to take is to just create an email link. But that can open the door to an awful lot of unwanted spammy attention. If you’re going to use a simple mailto link on your site, at least consider mangling it a bit so it’s not so easily spotted.

Contact forms can carry extra weight

A secure form (be sure your web developer creates one that can’t be easily hijacked) has two key benefits:

• It keeps your email address securely hidden from the casual (and possibly nefarious) browser
• It can be configured to ask an array of targeted questions that can give you a jump-start in communicating with your prospective clients

What’s a poor form to do?

The down side of forms is that the same autobots that haunt blog comments will inevitably find their way to your contact form. Forget that fact that one person in a thousand will ever click on their nonsensical emanations; those odds sound good to them. So there’s a few options.

• You can have your form programmed to discard any posts with links. Of course, if your target audience might need to communicate this it’s not so helpful.
• You can employ some variety of CAPTCHA wherein someone wanting to communicate with you must type in a word or two before the form can be submitted. Not so onerous, but consider your demographic and if their sophistication/online-experience level might be atypically low (or their impatience level might be especially high).

Back to basics

Discarding forms altogether, you can write out your email address like “john at company dot com”. Again, you need to weigh the sophistication of your audience (will they understand?) as well as the potential annoyance (will they bother to type out the email themselves)?

Full circle

There’s no purely “right answer” here and the sand (and trends) are always shifting. Take a moment to re-read my article on how to reduce spam to see if it gives you any ideas. Some good spam filter software (or a catch-all Google Mail address) might solve some issues.

In the end you’ll need to consider your needs and your audience’s needs and reach an accommodation that strikes a happy balance.

Three times someone wrote to me — people that I know in two cases, the 3rd was a local small business I patronize — and they addressed the email to or cc to from 13 to about 88 people.

I have my own friends, plus I tweet

That email was important. And you were so thoughtful so as to include me — albeit so very visibly — in your group of people you really care about. But I don’t know them. And now they can see my own email address, out there all naked and unhidden. I know that since I like you I’d probably like your friends — but maybe not.

And I do have plenty of friends. And I use Twitter and other social media all the time. I know how to socialize. So even though I’m sure they’re all great, don’t give my email address away like that. Please?

Maybe you’ve heard of these malware and spybot computer things?

I know that you keep your computer up to date with patches and anti-virals and all the other de-germing stuff you have to do with PCs. Damn hackers and script kiddies. But maybe some of your friends are not so careful? And maybe you just slapped my email address right into the middle of your cousin Andy’s machine (he’s the one who has to call you about how to print out screenshots, remember?) and I just know he’s probably got a zillion keytrackers and address-book harvesters running rampant. So, let’s just not do that again, okay?

You’ve got to protect your own reputation, too

I mean, web servers start seeing you sending out those mass emails, gives them pause, right? They know that that’s what the bad folks do, sending out emails to 20 or 50 or 100 people. So maybe they look a little harder at what you’re up to. And maybe they put you on a list of people that could be a little “iffy”. You don’t want to even go there.

Next time: stop, check, think before you press “send”

This is what I’d love you to do. It’s not a big hassle, really. And it would make it even more obvious what a smart person you are. And you are, of course, since you’re my friend.

• If you’re sending out notices regularly, and you’re a business, check into a service that will make sure you do it right, and professionally. I love MailChimp. They have great online tools, helps, and tracking for feedback. (You don’t want to guess about these things.) Other options are Emma and ConstantContact.
• Kind of chatty? Think about a blog. That way I can subscribe to you and you don’t even have to worry about telling me when you have your next great idea or need to pass along that newsflash.

Otherwise, this is it:

• Become friends with the BCC field in your email program. Put me and all your other BFFs in the BCC field. (Stands for “blind carbon copy” — crazy antiquated term, but it works.) And in the TO field, put your own email address.

Now you’re emailing everyone the right way. And because you’re my friend, I want the best for you.

And one thing I adore about Twitter is its simplicity and flexibility.

But now that Twitter’s become a known entity to most people — gaining visibility during the US 2008 election process, through several catastrophes and tweeted-about gaffes, and most notably during the #iranelection news — it seems people with outdated sales-push mentalities are multiplying on Twitter, their accounts propagating like mushrooms during a wet spring.

Take the tweet in the graphic, above. Zoonini (gifted Montreal web designer, Kathryn Presner) mentioned skydiving in a tweet and immediately an “adventure expert” followed her. Last night I tweeted about a CMS (content management system) I’d purchased and I wake to two follows by other CMS developers. (At least these follows are more plausible.)

push is so past

But these all these actions operate on the premise that one can push, shove, foist oneself upon another Twitterer. They’ll search in Twitter for (their) industry-related keywords and follow anyone they find. Or, on the bottom rung, there’s the “make easy money” dreck who will follow anyone with a pulse. And I expect they anticipate a reflexive follow-back. But why would I do that? Why would I endure their “noise”?

voluntarily vexed?

Picture the most annoying, loud-mouthed, self-obsessed salesperson you’ve ever had to suffer. Okay. Clear your head. Now picture yourself at a distance from that person, and imagine yourself walking closer and closer to them. They’re getting louder. Their words are grating. A headache is ensuing. You’re asking “why? why am I doing this to myself?”

This is why I don’t follow salespeople on Twitter, or anyone else who has nothing to offer but their self-concerned, “let me get you to do this” blather. Just like I ignore TV commercials, billboards, bus stop advertising (etc.).

it’s about giving

Twitter at its best is giving. It’s human. It’s people that want to share their passion in an honest way. And themselves. Their frustrations and triumphs. It’s Chris Brogan and Havi Brooks dozens of others who don’t try to spin it. Kinda like love: let me see what you’re like (don’t stalk me) and maybe a deeper relationship (or a business contact) will evolve.

These are some things that are really bad ideas:

• Use your pet’s or family members’ names or nicknames.
• Use a word in the dictionary.
• Use less than 8 characters.
• Use anything that makes sense as you look at it.
• Use only one or two passwords for everything.

These are much better ideas:

• Use a combination of upper and lower case letters and numbers and even some other characters.
• Use more than 8 characters.
• Change your passwords regularly.
• Hide any reminders in a safe, secure place and share critical information with your executor.

How are you handling your passwords now? Think of all the decisions that could be made by others should access fall into the wrong hands. Never be too friendly when your safety and identity and security are at risk.

Password generator

For further study: who’s using Twitter?

A whole lot of companies

The US government

Who’s using Twitter but doesn’t get it?

For further study: good posts or sites about Twitter

The official Twitter blog

TwitTown, an unofficial community and forum

Five ways to gather and report news with Twitter

Five things to do as a new Twitter user

An example of when a press release was redundant

Mistakes one shouldn’t make with Twitter and branding

Twitter is the ham radio of the internet

How a premier strategist in consumer connections uses Twitter

Why one fellow follows 10,000 people

A nicely comprehensive intro and guide to Twitter

Twitter and identity, with an interesting punchline

One person’s observations on Twitter’s usefulness outside the niche

Seven good tips for new Twitter users

An example of using twitter for reputation management and another post on keeping on top of tweets when you’re a conference speaker

101 Everyday Uses for Twitter

For further study: Twitter applications, spin-offs, and “mashups”

These are for your own review and enlightenment. Many may be in testing mode. No guarantees provided.

PocketTweets lets you twitter using your iPhone

You can use these apps to twitter (and track the tweets you follow) using software on your computer instead of the web interface: Twhirl or TweetDeck or — a Firefox plugin, TwitterFox.

100 most popular Twitter mashups

Joblighted: tech jobs

TwitHire: jobs board

Twitter charts (see how much you tweet)

TwitterSnooze (temporarily quiet the loquacious twitterers you follow)

Twittervision (a bird’s eye view)

Twistori (”I love”, “I hate”, you fill in the blanks)

Tweetake (a back-up method)

Roomatic: start a themed chat atop Twitter

ReadWriteWeb’s take on the top 10 Twitter apps (as of 07/2007)

Monitter (monitor the twitterverse for a set of three keywords)

Automatically “tweet” your blog postings (though I don’t recommend this) by using: Twitpress or TwitThis or Twitterfeed.

TwitsLikeMe (find others with similar interests)

TweetWheel allows you to find out who knows who

TweetMyPage is a Firefox (browser) plug-in

TwitterCounter allows you to add your follower count to your blog

Holy cow: Twebinars are the latest craze.

RememberTheMilk has figured a way for you to send reminders to yourself using Twitter

First, I want to distinguish what I mean by “spam” as opposed to “another annoying email.” If you have an account at Macy’s or buy from Amazon.com or got some software from XYZDevelopers, and you checked (or didn’t uncheck) a box at some point that said “it’s okay to send me your newsletter and/or important news blasts,” that is not spam. All responsible emailers from responsible businesses have an “unsubscribe” link in their messages. Use it.

What to do if you’re getting it

So now we’re left with the cheap jewelry and the personal enhancers and wildly frisky people longing to meet you. Clearly spam. In this case the rule is quite different: never never never click “unsubscribe” in any of these emails. If you do, you’ve just done them a favor by confirming that there’s a real live pair of eyes at the other end and your email address will be even more deluged.

Mac people: If you’re using Apple Mail, consider turning off the “Display remote images..” setting in Viewing preferences. (Or choose a similar setting in whatever email you use.) And check into SpamSieve, which is a brilliant software. Simple, focused, almost entirely self-monitoring, and to-the-point.

How to avoid getting spam in the first place

The A number one bit of advice is never never never never put your email on your website. Have your web developer install a contact form. If you must display your email, have your web developer encode or otherwise obfuscate your email address. I would wager that about 100% of the spam received is received by people who put their bare naked email address on the web. Spambots are waiting to pounce.

I know this from personal experience because I’d adhered carefully to best practices with one of my email addresses but unbeknownst to me, it was put in a PDF that was posted to a web site (a business group I belonged to), and from there on out the jig was up.

Get a general-contact email address from GoogleMail

There are a lot of times when you need to sign up for a forum or a service and you’re not quite sure of their privacy rules. For example, I have an email I use for my accounting activities, and one or more of the services I’ve used decided to spread the joy by selling or sharing that email address. I’ve learned from that and now use a free Google Mail address for all sign-ups, registrations, services, etc. Not only do I have tons of space (very easily searchable, as you might expect from Google), but their email has very accurate spam-spotting algorithms and so I never have to have any of that download to my computer.

Infected friends

The recommendations above cover a lot of ground, but recognize that sometimes it’s out of your hands. You could have a friend or colleague with an infected PC and by virtue of being in their address book, your email address became compromised. The best thing you can do is to encourage your friends and associates to keep their patches and virus protection up to date (if they’re on Windows OS, especially) and to follow the simple recommendations listed above.

Spam is here to stay but there are ways to get above it!

My own inclinations are more adjectival and less portmanteau-ish but I was glad Shelly (@brassblogs) found this decisive snippet:

How should the term ‘website’ be written in official documents and on the web? Should it be website or web site, and should there be a capital W?

It always takes a little time for new words to settle to a standardized form. Our most recent dictionary, the revised 11th edition of the Concise Oxford Dictionary, published in July 2004, shows website as the standard form, and future dictionaries will reflect this.

We recommend capital initials for Internet, World Wide Web, the Web, but not for individual sites.

It’s what you make of it

One of the things I really adore about Twitter is its simplicity, which I’m happy to see is a core value. It’s blindingly easy for anyone to start using it, and your own personality can be right there, without a lot of fluff and glop and techno-decisions. Because I choose who I follow, I control the level of chatter.

Simplicity. Simplicity. I don’t have to create a community page/site or sign up for forums on distinct topics in order to participate. Though I use a Twitter app, I needn’t. I can be fluid and follow my interests. (In no particular order, they include: Boise, Treasure Valley, Idaho, web design, graphics, web development, painting and drawing, gardening…friends!) I can fade out when I’m busy and hop back to the party (bar, water cooler, coffee shop: pick your metaphor) when I want to join in. This local Twitterer, @TheImageryLab, puts it rather nicely: Twitter is like your own private radio or TV station.

Still deliberating? Jump in

If you’re reading this, you’re probably already on Twitter, but if you’re not sure about that amalgam of wiggly, ever-changing, ever-growing beasties that are in the “social media” box, I would suggest you just try a few out and see what flavors you like; you’re not obligated to any. See what fits you. You don’t have to be on everything; don’t exhaust yourself.

Bad Twitter behavior

It’s annoying when someone dumps a pile of RT (retweets) in my window. I like people who consider their readers/followers and craft good Twitter practices. I won’t follow someone who has no profile/webpage, and I appreciate avatars with people’s faces (if you’re a person; if you’re a business you’re off the hook). I recommend that everyone personalize their Twitter page (and plan on offering this as a free value-add for my web design clients). I’ll block anyone who follows me who’s Twitter spamming (including “get rich with Twitter” scum); hey: clue over here. Twitter’s about conversation, not yelling. If I want ads crammed down my throat I know where to go.

Recipe for Tweet success = balance

I try and balance my tweets between lending and offering help, a limited number of RTs, hot news, encouragement, and personal observation. Just like in real life, people on Twitter don’t all have the same world view (to include politics and religion) so I try and keep that in mind; like habaneros in a recipe, a little goes a long way.

I strongly recommend Dotster. They are not the cheapest (sometimes you get what you pay for), but they have a clear web site, a good frequent questions area, and are responsive whenever I’ve contacted them for personal assistance. They also have an excellent reminder service and that is worth everything to me. If your registration expires your domain name is gone and all the work on your site (search engine listings, advertisement, email, etc.) is down the drain. I also have heard good things about GoDaddy and would expect you’d be happy with them as a second choice.

Now let’s get down to the nitty-gritty: the settings.

Name servers

If your site is hosted with CFDS, we will provide you a pair of name servers to enter at your domain registrar. It will look something like this:
ns1.cflinnxxxxx.com
ns2.cflinnxxxxx.com

If you are handling your own hosting, you’ll need to contact your host or look through their frequent questions area to determine which (typically 2 or 3) servers they want you to designate.

If you are using Dotster as your registrar, select your domain name and under “Name Servers” look for “Update Name Servers” and enter the information on that page. If you are using another registrar, search their help area to find where you should enter this information. Search for “name servers” or “domain name servers” or “DNS.”

Contact information

There are four categories of contact information for a domain. It is drop-dead important that this information be kept up to date and be correct. There are ICANN requirements that demand accuracy, but even more important from a practical point of view, you need to be able to be contacted for reminders and other time-sensitive domain name registration business.

• Owner. This is the person who is viewed by the registrar as having the right to make decisions about the domain name. This must be you.
• Administrative. This should be you as well.
• Billing. This should be you or can be a designee who handles your payments.
• Technical. This could be you, or it could be your web developer, or it could be your host.

Please note that all four items of contact information are public information (ie: they will come up in any WHOIS search on the Internet). It is strongly suggested that you not indicate your home address or home phone number or personal email address. Use a PO Box. Use an email address (perhaps a Googlemail, Yahoo, etc.) address that you regularly check but which can sift through the spam you will get from having a published email address online. Do note, though, that most registrars will offer to “shield” either all of your information or portions of it (ie: email) for a small yearly add-on fee. This is recommended.

If we initially helped you with your domain name purchase and later transferred the domain(s) to your own account at Dotster or another registrar, please update your Contact Information to reflect your own name, address, etc. CFDS cannot be responsible for updating your account information to which we have no access. Please do this at your first opportunity.

And there are a few really good reasons why any business or nonprofit should look into how they might benefit by using Twitter. But first, what is it?

Twitter has been called a microblog (because each “tweet” or message can’t go longer than 140 characters) and a free-for-all IM (instant messaging) service. One signs up for a free account online, and you get a page (which you can customize) and which displays — not your own messages, interestingly enough, but the messages of those folks you “follow” (subscribe to). And others can choose to “follow” (subscribe to) you and your posts. It’s very transparent.

So what does this have to do with you?

Twitter was originally used as a way for friends or family to keep up with each other. Key words: light and social. But it was a great concept that kept evolving, and now it’s useful on several levels (including the original one). It’s a free-flowing meeting place, an immense “water cooler” where people that wouldn’t or couldn’t brush shoulders can exchange ideas, vent, share.

People have gotten jobs via Twitter. Independents have picked up new projects via Twitter connections. I’ve found it a tremendous source of industry news. Businesses and organizations (nonprofits, news, media) use it as another way to spread the word.

I could go on for pages, but much of this has already been said, so my advice is:

(1) Sign up for a Twitter account.

(2) Read the “good posts” section below.

(3) Jump in. Listen more than you post, to start. Get the lay of the land.

(4) Find some interesting people, follow them, and see who they are following.

(5) Learn. Communicate. Share. Create relationships.

Read item #5 again. See the tone? Remember when I said that I wasn’t going to tell you how to manipulate Twitter to jack up sales and site visitors? That’s because that strategy is doomed to fail. Twitter is the ultimate “opt in”. You can’t make people follow you — so you need to provide value. Heavy boots and blasting out noise will pique no one’s interest.

So try it out. See you there.

This was driven home as I watched this news broadcast (in English) from DW-TV [YouTube]. It’s only five minutes long and well worth the time. You’ll be introduced to a Romanian internet criminal who was sent to prison by a grossly undermanned police force for scamming people in western Europe and the US who thought they were buying BMWs for a fifth the usual price via eBay.

And here on the “cutting edge,” a report (BBC) that baddies are promising a naughty file via their Twitter account. The most common bogus, malware, and/or spam links are those that are appealing to the pocketbook or the libido. What’s the common lesson? We’ve heard it a hundred times and it’s still valid: If something looks too good to be true, it probably is.

So what are a few other smart things to keep in mind?

• Especially if you’re on a Windows OS computer, use protection. Most mentioned by the Windows users I know: ZoneAlarm and AVG.
• Set up an account on your computer that’s not rated as an administrative account and run your day-to-day operations it. This holds true for both Windows and Mac users. That way you won’t “accidentally” install something you shouldn’t while busy with a dozen daily tasks.
• Reduce your median annoyance level, do yourself a favor, and get some good spam protection. On a Mac, I recommend SpamSieve.
• Whatever you do, if (when) you get spam, don’t click on the “remove me” link. (I’m not talking about a legitimate emailing here — like if you signed up for Macy’s or Outdoor Life emailings and now you’re tired of them. I’m talking about real spam.) If you click that link, your request goes nowhere, but you’ve just done the spammers a huge favor by telling them that they reached a real live person. Guess what. You’re going to get a lot more spam now.