Man, this has been a crazy week! Crazy-good, but crazy. I just did a behind-the-curtain interview with Dave Navarro that will shed more light on that subject, but let’s just say…I’m running on nothing but love over here.

And it’s a good thing there’s lots of that to go around. A couple of things that are keeping me going:

• David Billings and his hard, honest look at his website. Gave me chills, and also made me super-glad that I put so much time and effort into making this excursion something that people can’t live without. Sparky, you will not be disappointed.
• Getting shout-outs from Danielle LaPorte and Gwen Bell this week. Both of them are people I adore and would drop everything and pay exorbitant amounts of money for a plane ticket to hang with them.
• Finding out that Mark Silver recommends me in his Heart of Business course. Which I need to take (really. Do I need another excuse to go to Portland?)
• My love note from Jessica Gonacha Swift (I love this woman for her illustration work. And she’s for hire! Which is ridiculously good news for me.) And Emma Alvarez Gibson (super-smart copywriter/maven who I completely adore in return).

So…thank you guys for helping me spread the word. And thank you to everyone who’s been sending me pat-on-the-back tweets and emails. Thank you for lifting my spirits and helping me through this month of 14-hour days. It’s going to be totally worth it. (And don’t worry guys, I’m taking weekends off, so I’m not completely destroying my health to make this happen.)

So…Heather Allard and I were joking around that I should have a list of recommended tweets for people who want to help me spread the word. Which I thought — people do this?! What the heck kind of malarkey is that?

So in true Sarah-fashion, I thought I’d make a list of tweets to top ALL recommended tweets lists (which I’m still in amazement that these actually exist). And if you tweet any of these, I might have to hunt you down and feed you the fish-mush that my husband and I accidentally made (but didn’t eat) last night. Turns out that frozen cod sucks for a fish fry.

Sarah’s top 5 (un)recommended tweets:

The gold-digging excursion with @sarahjbray is totally not about picking your nose! (Only Kelly Parkinson and I would find the correlation here.)

Sign up for Sarah’s gold-digging excursion that starts on April 1st! (APRIL FOOLS! *evil cackling*) Note: Not an April Fools joke

You would be a tool not to register for the gold-digging excursion! (A mining tool, that is.) Har har.

Sign up now, and Sarah will pick up all the magnolia leaves in your yard…and will not make fun of you for meticulously mowing your lawn in horizontal stripes!! (You have to read the fourth paragraph to get this. And also check out my under cover photo of my neighbor’s perfectly-striped lawn, magnolia leaf included).

And lastly…

Act now, and Sarah will give you miner’s lung for FREE!

Seriously, if you use any of these, it’s codfish fry mush for you.

It is insane how different our online worlds are. I’ll start talking to someone about a certain launch that “everyone knows about”, and they’ll give me a spacey head nod. I’ll mention an online superstar that “everyone has heard of”, and the person who knows everybody has never heard of them.

Our real-world relationships don’t have this problem. We can have conversations about our relationships because our mom knows who our best friends are. Our best friends know the people who get on our last nerve. It’s a nice little convenience when you don’t have to explain the backstory of every person mentioned in conversation.

This is why I’m excited about Twitter lists. (Never heard of ‘em? They’re basically lists you create of folks of your choice. Right now, I have a rocksmyworld list and a localsauce list. No, I won’t be creating a getsonmylastnerve list. Though I can think of a few right off the bat.)

Yay for organizing. Yay for prioritizing. But BIGGER YAY for being able to share our online worlds in a more contextual way.

A few more things I’m excited about:

• Being able to follow other people’s lists
• Seeing which lists people have included me on (if I start showing up on everybody’s getsonmylastnerve list, then I’ll know I’m doing something wrong)
• Ditching Tweetdeck for good (Sorry Tweetdeck. It was good while it lasted.)
• The possible demise of Follow Friday! (Why do people generally recommend following people who aren’t interesting?)

I’m less than two hours into Twitter lists, so I’m sure I’m missing a whole bunch of other wonderful nuggets of goodness. Share! Please! (It’s nearly 4:30am, and I’m still on here thanks to these lists, so I’m going to dredge up all possible pleasure out of them.)

So, Twitter’s down today. (Everybody say booooo…) I feel a little lost, honestly. But my feed reader is getting major action, so that’s exciting.

I’ve seen talk recently about companies not needing their own websites. That instead, they just need to use all of the new media out there and be involved in “The Great Conversation” (capitals and snarkiness mine). Let the social web decide your brand. Be awesome enough that you don’t need to say anything about yourself.

I have a feeling this is one of those “let’s say something really different so that we’ll get a lot of traffic and be seen as innovative and controversial!” Because really. Come on.

Just a few reasons why the “all spokes, no wheel” method is crap

• You’re limiting your substance. Maybe you really love working within the boundaries of 140 characters. If that is your medium, go for it. But don’t let anyone else decide on the format for your work. YOU decide that.
• You have no glue to hold the other pieces together. There isn’t one cohesive “why” to all the “what” that you’re producing. Your story is scattered in fragments all over the place.
• You don’t have your own stage. Instead, you’re sharing one. Your website allows you to have a stage that you have some control over. It’s where you put your flag in the ground and say “This is me. This is what I stand for.”
• You’ve got to follow the pack. If Twitter dies or if everyone else decides that it’s time to move on to Bigger Better Things, then you’ve got to go where the people are. You may even have to start over.
• You’ve got to be omnipresent. If you don’t have a wheel, you better have a ton of spokes to support your work. Mainly so you don’t suffer huge losses if your platform of choice goes belly up. And so you can figure out where the pack is moving when it’s time to migrate.
• You’re putting yourself at the mercy of everyone. Am I the only one who’s noticed that there are weirdos out there? Spammers, hackers, and people who are just plain strange. Yeah, I realllllly want to give them something fun to do on their boring Tuesday afternoon. “Woohoo!!! Let’s mess up Sarah’s life. That would be fun!”

I’m sure I could come up with a list of 50 other reasons. I’m sort of baffled this conversation even exists, frankly. I’m really proud of the social web for becoming so mainstream, but even I have my limits.

This summer, I broke one of my Rules. Not the kind of rules that were meant to be broken. Nuh uh. One of the cardinal rules of Sarah Bray Staying Sane and Not Losing the House, Dog, and Whatever Else Can Be Pawned.

My crime was ignoring the Rule of Lag. Which goes like this:

Never EVER forget your inevitable client lag times. Lag time 1: The time it takes between the launch of a new marketing initiative and your resulting client inquiries. Lag time 2: The time it takes from inquiry to sale.

Lag time 1: The time between getting your marketing freak on and seeing the results of your efforts.

In an ideal world, we could press “on” and our client inquiries would start coming in. Then we’d press “off” and they’d stop. On, off, on, off, on, off. We wouldn’t have to worry about overbooking or underbooking, because we could just flip the switch and in our clients would come.

Alas, this isn’t the way it works. I have to commit to my marketing plan for 30 to 45 days before I start seeing any measurable results. Your mileage may vary, so test it. Notice patterns. Figure out that lag time and never forget it. Use it to figure out when you need to be hitting hard and when you can lighten up (I don’t recommend that you ever quit marketing completely, but there are times when a lighter touch will do if you’re super busy.).

Lag time 2: The time between your client asking about your service and the two of you signing on the dotted line

Sweet, sweet relief: your clients are asking about what you do and you’re feeling each other out for a good fit. What a great feeling. You can pay your mortgage! Apply for health insurance! Might as well start uncorking the champagne, because life is now a whole lot easier.

Except…it’s not. People are taking kind of a while to get back to you. You’re starting to get nervous. What is wrong with these people?! Don’t they know you’ve got bills to pay? What is wrong with you?

You are doing absolutely nothing wrong. Every industry/niche has built-in lag times that you need to notice, respect, and work in to your plan. I’m lucky. My 2 lag times are exactly the same: 30-45 days. Many people will have a shorter lag between inquiry and sale, and a few could have longer. Measuring and never losing sight of your client lag times is going to help you plan your finances accordingly. And ward off panic attacks, which is always good.

Blogging…Now with part two!

I’m changing up the format around here a smidge. Moving to a Tuesday/Thursday ritual, since Fridays need to be for chilling. And instead of having my Friday round-up, I’ll be adding random interestingness at the end of every post. Hurrah!

Back from Nashville, and I just have to share our nightmare of a car trip with you. Because you know…nobody’s ever had a nightmare car trip with a sick baby.

Our trip was supposed to take roughly 12 hours from Nashville to Virginia Beach. We were ready to go home. It’d been a fantastic week and a half, but you know…ready. We got a little over half way, when our two year old daughter starting scaring us. She’d already thrown up twice (once ALL OVER me) and she was running a fever of 103. But then her breathing started becoming faster and more labored, and her heartbeat seemed to pick up speed. We were in the middle of nowhere, and I was starting to get in mom freak-out mode.

I called the nurse on call and accidentally hung up on her when she called back an hour later. DRAT! (You know when you think you’ve mistakenly called someone because you were fooling around on your phone? And then you quickly hang up? That was what happened.)

So what did I do? I tweeted about it. Right away, my wonderful friend Mark (@markheartofbiz) started asking me questions about what was going on. Turns out, he is a former paramedic. Then he called to walk us through the danger signs for respiratory distress and recommended some things we could do. He also recommended that we wait in civilization until the nurse called us back.

In the end, we got her home safely at around 2am. We put the kids to bed and started to bring stuff in the house when we noticed we were being attacked by fleas. I could not make this up. Apparently, some flea eggs decided to get into our house, wait until we were gone to hatch, and then have a huge blow-out party. And then jump us when we walked in the door.

So, we stripped off the flea-attacked clothes, put on some new ones, woke the kids up, and ran out of the door. After two attempts, we found a hotel that had a room open and got into bed around 4 in the morning. Then woke up at 8 for Lilah’s doctors appointment and discovered that she has some sort of atypical pneumonia.

So yeah…I don’t normally share the day-to-day of life with the Brays in this space, but so many people have been concerned after my panicked tweeting that I thought I’d fill you in. Even after all of that though, it’s good to be back.

And moral of the story: @markheartofbiz is amazing. (Speaking of momentum, he has about 20 spots left in his upcoming course. I know a few people who are taking it, and it sounds awesome, especially since momentum is a particular point of pain for most rockstars I know.)

Moral number two: Twitter is super-useful and will not stop being useful until relationships cease to be useful.

Image by @gwenbell

This past weekend John and I took a trip to Boulder, Colorado to hang with Gwen, Joel, Liz, and Glenn. While we were there, Gwen, Liz, and I hosted a clothing swap benefit at Restaurant 4580. It was a blast. We rocked hard. And…I learned a few things.

1. Colorado ladies have mega style and know how to rock a party

Image by @melsidwell

What an incredible turnout for our coast-to-coast fashion swap. Here’s a quick-n-dirty rundown of the tweeps who came out to play:

• @sabsavvy – Uber sophisticated higher-ed professor with awesome boots.
• @melsidwell – Firecracker bombshell of adoreableness.
• @jennfields – Mountain climbing phenom with the loveliest of curly locks!
• @amberwidom – Super artsy style icon (with an artist-hubby who rocks).
• @lovelylildove – 100% fresh gorgeousness, with the most wonderful warm smile.
• @siona – Striking beauty with rivers of depth and lovely conversation.
• @staceytabor – New media evangelist/proponent of eco-friendly products and practices.
• @srslyliz – Up-and-coming designer and cupcake nazi.
• @gwenbell – Her middle name should be Lolita or something equally bold and ravishing; her passion and fire are permanent.
• @mistymontano – Rogue wordsmith/news-hound with a penchant for the social web.
• @yosoykia – Yoga/photog/environment buff with a sparkly, grapefruit-loving personality.
• @abigator – Super fabulous woman of many talents (including seam ripping and rocking the vintage).
• @moneymanagement (aka: Kim) – Financial guru with a huge heart and love for Denver.
• @fabindenver – Ferociously stunning queen of Denver style.
• @sarahjbray (me) – Woo!
• @caligater – Almost made it to the swap, but not quite. An absolute doll with a passion for service education and the social web.
• @4580 – Restaurant 4580 equals yum yum.
• @pangeaorganics – Co-sponsors who gave out samples and freebies.
• academichic – Co-sponsors providing event coverage.

You should definitely follow every one of these riveting chicks. Supremely interesting, fun, and high style. Also? Their presence and clothes swappage is supporting two women’s co-ops with an abundance of clothes and the cash from the event. One teeny example of a bunch of people using their social media super powers for good.

2. Thank God for the internet

If I weren’t so connected with the world at large, Boulder’s ultra-hip, eco-conscious lifestyle could have been a freak-out experience. A good one, but still. Freaking out. Let’s just say, my neighborhood is 5-10 years behind the times. I knew this in my head, but to experience it was another thing. For example:

My house: Vanilla 50’s era rancher on half an acre of standard issue grass. Oh yeah…and some bushes.
Boulder houses: Architecture! Frank Lloyd Wright! Lines and curves and color in all the right (and unexpected) places!

My neighbors: Mostly elderly people who may or may not have heard of the internet. Or computers.
Boulder neighbors: Fun, stylish, friendly people who have this great sense of community and eco-responsibility. And tech-y! So tech-y!

My landscape: A few parks, the largest of which is built on (and named after) a mountain of trash. A beautiful beach that we often take for granted.
Boulder landscape: Native plants and grasses EVERYWHERE. Houses and developments that are built around the environment rather than instead of it. A stunning mountain range that several people admitted to taking for granted.

3. If you haven’t heard of a tri-tip sandwich, you’re pretty much not alive

Image by @gwenbell

Liz and Glenn were shocked that the rest of us hadn’t heard of these delicacies. They then proceeded to ask every person we met if they knew what tri-tip sandwiches were. Liz was so astounded at our ignorance that she even questioned if we’d heard of Craigslist. (To this moment, I’m convinced that she, Glenn, and the server at Old Chicago are the only ones who have heard of this sandwich. Have you?)

4. It’s true. Gwen is a karaoke fiend. And Liz is the sexiest Mexican country singer EVAH.

I wish you guys had been there to watch these two ladies perform. Definitely the highlights of the karaoke scene that night. Other memorable moments: The dj’s performance of the raunchiest, most ear-raping song ever heard in the greater 48 states (make it stop!). Also, some guy’s brilliant rendition of 99 Red Balloons…in German. Clearly, incredibly tough acts to follow. But Gwen and Liz? No comparison.

5. My super-secret project is just as great of an idea as I thought

My peeps served as impromptu guinea pigs in my pre-pre-beta test, and it was a rousing success. Gwen and Glenn tweeted about it a teeny bit if you’re dying for a hint. I’m fairly certain I’m going to explode with excitement in the near future.

So basically, I’m moving to Colorado

Well, not actually. But in my head, I’m all packed. Come to think of it, I’m literally packed, too. I’m spending my work-week in Nashville. It’s amazing how inspiring (and tax-deductible!) a business trip can be.

After this week, I’m staying put until the Image and Media Academy [pdf] on November 12th-14th (Yep, that’s me in the teeny print on the right-hand side. Squint. You’ll see it.). You should really come. Danielle LaPorte is going to be speaking, so you can experience up close how astounding she is.

If you read all the way through this entirely too-long post, ring the bell (like this…DING!). I’ll give you a virtual cupcake.

Image by @melsidwell

For more fun pics from the event, check out @melsidwell’s twitpics, @gwenbell’s flickr stream, @sabsavvy’s twitpics, and my twitpics.

More posts about this event:
Want a free fashion update? Set up a swap. (by @moneymanagement)
Fab in Denver. Who knew? (by @fabindenver)
PCP, Tri-Tip & Fashion (by @srslyliz)

I got kind of antsy today and made a quick (sort of) video for you guys. (Yay! Another person with a webcam!)

Also. I blame Pam Slim for the “I’m sitting in my room right now” brand of quality. She’s lowered the bar a couple of notches (and I love her for it).

One more note: for every time I say “face of the company”, mentally replace it with “face of the RELATIONSHIP side of the company”. Because that’s what I meant in my head. Quality, folks!

This article has been circulating on Twitter, and I finally clicked on it. Totally unprepared for the seething irritation it would bring to my do-nothing Sunday afternoon.

It’s not just about how future employers look at our Twitter and Facebook pages…it’s about it becoming a job requirement. And not only for self-professed “social media” people. For clerical workers, accounts payable employees, and finance specialists. The article compared social media networks to Microsoft Word, people (as in…it’s one of those things that everybody needs to perform their job adequately). The worst quote of the entire article:

“Now when companies hire you, they know you’re going to be an ambassador for the company,” said social media and career counselor Nance Rosen. “Who you have as your friends and how many people you have influence over have become a part of the vetting process.”

The use of our “online presence” as a job asset makes me sick to my stomach. But I also wonder if it’s going to last. People who significantly participate online don’t need to work for Corporate America. Combine your online prowess with a smidge of knowledge and a chunk of risk, and you’re successfully self-employed. Meaning: YOU are getting all of the benefit from your awesomeness.

Endless agenda gets old after a while

The caricature of corporate culture is this giant vulture whose profit-seeking talons obliterate anyone else’s needs or desires. I love what one commenter said: “Corporate America sure knows how to kick the fun out of everything.” Yep.

We can learn from this. The cliche of the corporate tragedy isn’t based on size; it’s based on mindset. It’s based on heart. That’s the thing I love about social media. We get to meet, share, and grow together in a place that — although coming at us through wires and space — is very, very real. Physical proximity isn’t necessary. Being honest is.

(I took down an article a week or two ago because I was afraid I was becoming ranty. But I think honesty sometimes means ranty-ness for me. Maybe this will get it out of my system for a while.)

I was so shy in high school. Worse, I was also paranoid about my shyness. Sometimes I would try to be not shy, and then some seriously awful loud guffaw would come out of my mouth inappropriately, resulting in increasing shyness and a junior year in which I missed 38 days of school. Not exaggerating.

Suffice it to say, I was not the epitome of social-ness. To me, life was so deep and important. Everyone else was having fun…and I didn’t know how.

Sure I had friends (thankfully, I wasn’t that kid), but I always felt outside of whatever they were talking about. I wished that someone would just take me under their wing and let me in on the secret to being on the inside. Still, somehow I doubt it would have worked. I was me, high school is the most intense social situation possible, and no amount of “how-to’s” would have made a difference.

Not everyone can be on the inside

I’m figuring out that you can’t teach social networking to everyone. I’ve actually been trying to invent a social-networking-teachableness detector. Ideally, it would measure brain function, work ethic, and above all…adaptability.

I would pay richly for a machine like that. A green halo would appear around their head if they passed. Red horns would show up if not. Because spending four weeks teaching someone everything that has made you successful only for them to fail because they can’t get it…that sucks. Feeling bad for taking their money, even though you have poured gold into their laps…that sucks, too.

These social networking pariahs may or may not know that they’re outcasts. They wear the “I’m corporate and professional!” t-shirt or the “Traditional marketing is the same as online marketing!” t-shirt, or the “Oooh…this is shiny, and people say it will make me money!” t-shirt. But it’s all the same. They either: a.) commit huge faux pas and bring about distrust or disinterest, or b.) can’t get their initiatives off the ground, so they decide that online networking is a huge waste of time.

A practical example of ongoing paradigm shift

I’ve been on Twitter since November of last year, I think. I’m a huge fan, for a million reasons — not least of all, that it has facilitated incredible opportunities for me.

A couple of months ago, I took a job that I under-estimated. I ended up having to work 12 hour days. I was getting paid for what I thought would be 40 hours of work…it ended up taking about 250. I had to cut back on everything that was non-essential to get the job done.

Twitter was still essential for me, but I had to start being more efficient in how I dealt with following people back. It was taking forever to go through the list every day, and I just didn’t have time. I noticed that several people were using a service called TweetLater to auto-follow people. Then they’d use TweetDeck to put their favorites in a manageable group. Sounded like a good idea to me, so I did it. I tweeted a couple of times a day, I kept up with my favorite people, but overall, I put it on the back burner.

I finished that mammoth job two weeks ago, so I’ve had more time to pay attention again. Being out of the loop for a couple of months showed me that nothing stays the same for long. Here’s what I noticed right off the bat:

• The problem with spam has heightened dramatically.
• People are now more paranoid of accounts that follow large numbers of people.
• We’ve long known that people are wary of accounts that follow significantly more people than are following them. But now, they’re also wary of accounts that have high numbers of followers, and are following around same number (aka: if you have 8,000 followers and you follow 8,000 people). A lot of people will follow anyone who will follow them back — it’s a cheap follow, therefore it does not help (and might be hurting) your credibility.

What started the shift

Recently, someone local started following me after I started following them. But they said “I almost didn’t follow you — you follow so many people, I thought you were a spammer.” Shock. Someone thought I was a spammer. I am the farthest from spam that anyone can possibly get without being invisible.

So I re-evaluated. I started noticing that things had changed — slightly, but significantly enough for me to make a change. I immediately blocked about 500 spammers. My follower count dropped, along with some of my pride. I started unfollowing people who irritated me (blatant self-promoters, cheesy quote spewers, people who sound like they r 12 — u no what i meen?).

I obviously turned off auto-follow. I now only use TweetLater for their “Vet Followers” feature — which is pretty darn cool. It gives you a list of new followers along with their latest tweet, their stats, and the percentage of people who have ignored/blocked them — then you select “Approve”, “Ignore”, “Block”, or “Spam” for each one and submit it — takes a minute or two.

I still follow a bunch of people. I still use TweetDeck to keep track of my favorites. But my regular Twitter stream is so rich now, and just as important, I don’t look like a spammer.

The point: You can’t be successful in social networking if you’re not teachable.

If you’re not succeeding, something isn’t sinking in. Figure out what that something is and make the change. Don’t be oblivious to your social stinkage.

Cultivate the willingness to put aside long-held beliefs for newer, truer ones. Cast off out-dated theories. Change as the online world changes by allowing yourself to simply notice what’s going on.

Image by Matthew Maber

It seems so obvious, doesn’t it? If you use Twitter SMS to receive text messages on your phone, then you’re going to want to be able to see when people directly reply to you. (Aside: If you’re not a Twitter user and I’ve lost you at this point, I’ll see you at the next post. I promise it won’t be about Twitter. Okay, half-promise.)

If you’re following 150 people, you probably don’t want a text message every time one of them updates. Unless you’re committed to nothing else in your life. But you DO want to know when they send you an @reply. Am I right? I thought so. Like I said, it’s obvious.

Currently, you’d have to turn on SMS notification for all 150 people in order receive all of their @replies. With this setup, you still wouldn’t be able to see the @replies of people who you are not following. And you’d be getting a new tweeted text message every 5 seconds. (This could work well if you’re trying to convince a client that you’re in extremely high demand, but for all other purposes, it’s probably not good.)

Twitter used to have a tracking feature that allowed you to send something like “track @sarahjbray” to Twitter, and then they would send you every post that had @sarahjbray in it. But that feature is currently disabled. Bummer for us.

There is a solution, but it’s not perfect. Its one (pretty major) flaw is that you’ll see the tweet, but you will not be able to see who sent it to you. But still, it’s nice to get the messages. And sometimes you’ll just know who sent it. Or possibly you are clairvoyant, in which case this would be a perfect solution.

So with that caveat, let’s move forward.

1. Go to http://search.twitter.com and submit a search for your twitter username (i.e. @sarahjbray)
2. Below the search bar, there is a column on the right-hand side. The first link listed is called “Feed for this Query.” Right-click on it, and copy and paste it somewhere for later retrieval.
3. Go to notify.me and sign up for an account.
4. You’ll get a verification email in your inbox, which you’ll need to process. It’s not necessary to do this before moving on to the next step.
5. Click “Start account setup” on the lower right of your screen.
6. Fill in the fields under “Add a text message (SMS) destination” with your mobile phone info and click “Add SMS destination”.
7. Wait for the text message that will have your validation code in it. Enter the validation code in the box and submit it.
8. Click “Jump to next step”.
9. Unless you want to receive your tweets via IM as well, click “Jump to next step” again.
10. Under “Add a feed manually,” paste the feed that you copied in step 2. Then click “Add feed”.
11. Click “Jump to next step”.
12. Unless you want to add a bookmarklet to your browser to add more feeds later, click “Jump to next step” again. You should see a page that says that you’re all done. But you’re not.
13. Click the “Account” tab at the top of the page.
14. Click the “Sources” button.
15. Delete the notify.me news feed (so that you won’t receive their updates by text) by clicking “Delete” underneath “notify.me news”.
16. Next to your Twitter search item, there should be several yellow icons indicating IM, SMS, email, etc. Click on the IM icon to de-activate it. It should look greyed out.
17. Click on the SMS icon to activate it. It should now be the only icon that is activated.

That’s it. Now you can receive cryptic @replies on your cell phone without activating SMS for all of your tweeps. The fun part will be guessing who they’re from.

Note: For this use, rssfwd.com does not work reliably. You will receive updates hours later or never. Feed My Inbox and Twilert might possibly work, but it will only send you updates once a day. xFruits.com is a possibility, but I haven’t tried it yet.

By the way, you can use this method to track anything that you can search for using Twitter search.

Image by Darren Barefoot

I’ve had a few questions recently about Twitter badges that I thought I’d try to answer here. If you’re new to Twitter badges – there is nothing special about them. A badge is just a picture — just like those images you put up of your scary cat. You could make your own Twitter badge if you wanted to. Like this one.

(Side note: If you really want people to click on something, make it ugly. Ugly is eye-catching. Kind of like a train wreck.)

Where to get Twitter badges

• If you heart Twitter (or other social media sites), you might like these.
• Try these if you like the tried, true, and trendy.
• These are good if you like glassy texture.
• If you want some animation on your badge, get these.
• If you’re into Web 2.0, these might trot your horse (hey, I’m running out of witty sayings, okay?).
• If you’re looking for something more like a business card, try a Twitter card
• Or seriously, make your own. It seems there’s not many really cool ones. Tell you what. I’ll make you one right now.

Download: Large (shown) | Medium (180px wide) | Small (120px wide)

There. Now that we’ve got that over with…

How to post your Twitter badge

This part is really easy. Or really hard, depending on who you’re talking to.

1. Upload your badge to your server (or SmugMug or wherever you host your images)
2. Copy the badge’s URL (web address where the image is located)
3. If you’re in WordPress or any other blogging or content managing system, make sure you’re in HTML mode and not “Visual” mode.
4. Insert the following code into your HTML:

   <a href=”http://twitter.com/yourtwittername”><img src=”http://www.yourbadgeurl.com” /></a>

That’s it. Easy as pie. Right?

P.S. I’m upgrading to WordPress 2.7 today, so things might be wonky here for a while.