1 – Feedback & Reviews

One of the great things about Twitter is that you don’t have to wait for someone to find your business to give it feedback.  If you have a Twitter account for your business, people can comment at any time on your site without creating an account on your site.

People are comfortable making comments on others via Twitter.  This can be as good or bad as you make it.  They will comment on you even if you are not on Twitter.  It’s better for you to be there and active than to sit back and ignore them.

As a business, you can benefit from good and bad feedback by promptly responding to critiques.  If people have a negative comment, listen to what they are saying.  Respond to them with ways to resolve problems.

When someone gives you a compliment or good review, thank them by retweeting their comment.

2 – Special Deals

Hardly anyone is going to “follow” you on twitter if you are just a business posting business news.  People obviously follow news and large corporations, but most small businesses would just annoy people.  However, if you offer exclusive Twitter deals, you are likely to get many people retweeting your ads.

I follow people who run businesses.  They tweet news and blog postings and occasionally post a special Twitter only ad.

These people mix business with pleasure and their business benefits from it, because I like their other content enough to put up with a couple ad posts now and then.

I retweet these ads if they sound good to me and I think other’s would be interested.  This is free advertising! Give those special deals, even if you are losing money on the deal, and count the losses as advertising costs.

3 – Build Relationships

On Twitter, you will notice that some people are big fans of your business and products.  Build relationships with these people.  Engage them to give you suggestions for improving your business.  Use Twitter as a free market research tool.

If you want to try something, tweet about it and gather the feedback.  Do customers like your shipping options?  Do they like your response times?  Are there days they’d like extended phone support hours?

4 – Competition

You may not want to “follow” your competition with your professional account, but you may want to create an anonymous account and follow the streams of your competition.  You can watch their deals and responses to their customers, and adjust your business strategy accordingly.

Respond to competitor deals with your own.  Directly respond if another business presents something negative about you.  Avoid getting into a “flame war” with anyone, be it a customer or business.  Online arguments are all public.  But make sure you stand up for yourself, or people will only hear one side.

5 – News

Use your professional account to retweet and comment on news items that relate to your business.  Remember, though, that this is a public feed.  For instance, if you are a baby items eBay seller, retweet baby item recall news and explain what steps you have taken to safeguard your customers.

If there are news items in your area, you can be a news outlet to your customers.  If there is a large fire near your store, tell your customers to avoid routes to your business that would take them near danger. Let your customers know if you are open or closed on holidays and snow days.

This will show your customers that you care more about them than just their money.

6 – Collaboration

Find businesses in the area that you work with and use Twitter to help promote each other.  Maybe you repair computers and another business sells Internet access or web hosting.  You can tweet for their services, and they can tweet for yours.

Collaboration of related businesses can overlap common services and products, but overall will benefit you both. Collaboration creates buzz.

7 – Direct Sales

Do you have an established customer base?  Do you have a customer who messages you on Twitter?  Conduct direct sales!  If you are a plumber and a customer messages “My sink is leaking, argh!” then give them a call and ask if they would like you to come out.  This is a business responding to their customers’ needs.

Be careful, and don’t spam people!  Don’t contact random people by doing keyword searches. This is spam, and people will publicly trash your image if you annoy them.  Stick to customers you have, and move the customer service to a phone call, email, or your website as quickly as possible.  You don’t want your customers trying to post their credit card numbers to you over Twitter.

8 – Charity

If your business does charitable work or donations, advertise it on Twitter.  On Twitter, you have to toot your own horn.  This good press will give your customers and critics a chance to see that supporting your business also supports charities that they may care about.

9 – Contests

If you want to take your business to the next level, you could try a Twitter contest.  An online car retailer, @CarMax, decided to give a free car away on Twitter.  All you had to do is “follow” them, and retweet (RT) their contest ad.  They allowed users to enter once a day for every time they sent the retweet.

This is a brilliant use of Twitter.  It gains the company many followers, each of whom are giving the company free advertisement.  Make sure you follow all local and state laws for any contest.

10 – Don’t Over Do It

Don’t send dozens of tweets a day unless they are substantial.  Successful businesses don’t tweet their customers and users more than once or twice a week.  If you post a lot of news and blogs, keep your ads to less than 5-10% of your tweets.  Even one advertisement per day will seem like overkill.

If you use Twitter responsibly, listen to what people are saying to you, and engage your customers in positive ways, you will find that Twitter can be an effective tool for all small, medium, large, local, national, and online businesses.

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Start by figuring out how big you want your pentagram to be. This is figured as the distance between opposite points. For our example, we’ll be making a pentagram with a line length of 100mm. We use millimeters to measure as this will produce the most accurate drawing.

One horizontal line at the bottom.

First, draw a straight line at the bottom of the paper using your ruler and pen. This will act as the base that the pentagram will sit on. Make sure the line is dark enough to see through the back side of the paper.

Now fold the paper so that the ends of the line touch. Smooth the fold down with your fingernail. Now unfold the paper and draw a line on the fold.

Two perpendicular lines.

You should have two perpendicular lines.

Now it’s time for a little math.

We’re using what’s called the Golden Ratio. It occurs naturally in biology, anatomy, architecture, art, and physics. Read here for more info on the Golden Ratio.

The ratio is roughly rounded as 1.618034… Since we started with 100mm we will divide 100 by the Golden Ratio. We end up with 62mm after rounding to the nearest millimeter. We now divide 62 by the Golden Ratio and end up with 38mm after rounding down to the nearest millimeter.

We now have 3 numbers: 100, 62, and 38.

Take the second number and divide it in half, which is 31. Set your ruler on the base line and line up the 31mm mark at the point where the perpendicular line meets the base line.

Now mark the 0mm and 62mm points of the ruler on the baseline

Add two points to the base line.

Three points forming a triangle.

Now move the ruler so that the 0mm point remains where it is, and the 100mm mark touches the perpendicular line. Mark the spot of the 100mm mark on the perpendicular line.

If you measure between the top point and the bottom right point, it should also measure 100mm.

Using your ruler, draw a straight line from the bottom left to the top point. Draw another line from the bottom right point to the top point.

You should now have a triangle of the three points.

The two midway points aren't "halfway" points. Make sure you use your third Golden Ratio number and measure along the line from the bottom.

Now we are going to mark midway points.

Using the third number, which is 38 in this case, measure from the bottom left point along the left line, and mark 38mm from the bottom point.

Repeat and mark 38mm from the bottom right point along the right line.

You now have two midway points on each line. They should both be 38mm from the nearest bottom point.

Now we are going to place the ruler with 0mm on the bottom left point. Lay it so that it crosses the right side midway point.

Make a point at the 100mm mark. This point will not be touching any line.

The finished pentagram and all points.

Repeat the other way by putting the 0mm mark on the bottom right point and laying it so that it crosses the left side midway point

Make a point at the 100mm mark. This point will not be touching any line.

Now using your ruler, draw a line from the bottom left point to the top right point

Draw another line from the bottom right point to the top left point.

Finally, draw a line from the top left point to the top right point.

Now you should be seeing a perfectly drawn pentagram!

For a clean drawing without the base and perpendicular lines, place a clean sheet of paper over your drawing. Mark the five points, and reconnect them using your ruler.

Inside the pentagram is a perfectly shaped pentagon that you can trace too, or transfer the points and make a shrunken copy of your pentagram.

Draw a circle around the pentagram, and you’ve created a pentacle.

You can now use your drawing as a sewing pattern, a wood carving or wood burning stencel, a paint stencel, or a metal cutting stencel for making decorative Americana decorations.  If you are a Wiccan, you can use this template to make your own jewelry or altar pieces.

Check out this video on how to make a pentagram with Gimp:

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How to Make a 007

Ingredients
Ice Cube Tray
Orange or Mango Punch Mix or Kool-Aid
1 Bottle Vodka, Preferrably Orange Flavored
2 Liter 7-Up
1 Carton of Orange Juice
8oz Clear Glasses

The basic 007 recipe is 1 shot orange juice, 1 shot of vodka, 1 shot of 7-Up poured in a glass of ice cubes and shaken, not stirred. Add an extra shot of O.J. if the vodka isn’t flavored.

That’s a fine drink unless you are a swave, slow sipping drinker like James Bond. In the hot summer months, the ice will melt and water down the drink. Nothing kills a party faster than watered down drinks.

To fix the problem of watered down drinks. You need to prepare ahead of time.

Place all juice, liquor, and soda in refridgerator the day before
the party.

Place all glasses in the freezer at least 3 hours before the
party.

Finally, fill your ice cube trays with orange punch or cool aid
the night before the party.

If you don’t have ice trays or you have a large party, put 1 shot of refridgerated punch per every 3 cubes of ice in a blender and jog until you have crushed ice.

Don’t over blend, or you will wind up with an orange smoothie.

Use tall thin glasses and add a sprig of mint for a drink as dressed up and dapper as 007 himself.

Serve and enjoy!

For a quick video lesson, check this out:

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