Twitter has become not only a great site for connecting with people around the world, it’s become a favorite tool of internet marketers because:

• They can offer tidbits of valuable information to a huge audience.
• They can connect with prospects and customers on a personal level
• They can glean market and industry information from tweets

The trick is to know if your tweets are having a direct effect on your profits. The trick, is to track your tweets. Fortunately, because developers know how important Twitter is to marketers, they’ve developed several tools to track tweets. Here are just a few ways to track your tweets:

#1 A standard calendar and an analytics program. The most basic way to track tweets is to record when and what you tweet on a calendar. You can of course use a print calendar however, you can also track them on a calendar like Outlook or Google. Once a week, compare your tweets to your analytics data to see which tweets generated traffic. This way you can determine to a reasonable degree, which tweets make the biggest impact and what days or times of the day are more effective. You can also link to unique web pages in your tweets to make sure you’re evaluating the right information.

#2 Twistory – Puts your twitter feed into a calendar so you can see your twitter history. It essentially automates what you’re doing in #1.

#3 TweetEffect tracks what tweets gain followers for you and what tweets essentially cost you followers.

#4 Tweetie is an iPhone application that lets you track your tweets. You can view and respond to the tweets you follow, post your own tweets, and search for tweets by keyword just like you would from your computer only better because you can do it on the go.

#5 Twitoaster is a service that monitors twitter conversations. It works by simply aggregating the conversations and publishing relevant statistics.

#6 Viralheat. Viralheat is a paid service with membership levels based on your needs. Starting at $9.99 a month,“Viralheat allows you to monitor, analyze and glean insights at blazing speeds.”

#7 Of course there are dozens of other twitter tracking services including sites like TweetLater and HootSuite that let you schedule posts and track mentions and followers.

Finding the service or software that’s right for you may take a little trial and error. Of course, if you’re looking to simply track your tweets and the positive effect they have on your business, the five mentioned above are a good place to start.

Website traffic is good; in fact for many business owners, driving traffic to their website is their primary business-building traffic. And while traffic may be all well and good, what you really want is targeted website traffic. You want the people visiting your website to be potential prospects. You want them to be future customers, not tire kickers or looky loos.

Here are seven effective strategies to guarantee targeted website traffic.

#1 PPC ads. Of course, not all PPC ad campaigns generate targeted traffic. You have to study your prospects and design keyword-specific ads that send traffic to a web page related to the ad. For a website about dog training where they have to dig to find your potty training information, you’re not sending the right kind of targeted website traffic to the right place. Send them directly to your potty training product page.

#2 Classified advertisements. Use the same advice and strategy as with PPC ads above.

#3 A squeeze page, opt-in list and targeted email messages. A squeeze page is essentially a way to capture the email addresses of people who are actually interested in receiving your information. True, they may be after your giveaway but that’s okay – they’re still a qualified prospect. Once you have their email address, you can begin sending them informative, entertaining and slightly promotional messages, all of which are designed to send them directly to your website – targeted website traffic.

#4 Article marketing. Article marketing is one of the most effective ways to generate targeted website traffic. When you publish quality content, and it gets published online on article directories and republished on other websites, you’re reaching a wider audience. The link(s) in your article and in your bio box can all send targeted traffic right back to your website. The more articles you publish, the more targeted traffic you generate. It’s a simple equation.

#5 Blog and guest blog. Use the same advice and strategy as with article marketing above.

#6 Social networking. Social networking can send tons of traffic to your website simply because people are curious about you and your business. However, if you’re strategic about your social networking strategy you will occasionally include links to your website with attention-grabbing posts or headlines. The result: targeted traffic.

#7 Comment on blogs and forums. On most forums and blogs when you participate and comment you can post a link to your website in your signature. This does generate curious folks who just want to know “who said that?!” However, when you participate in forums and blogs that are relevant to your website and industry niche, you’re sending targeted traffic to your website.

You can also try unique approaches like posting reviews on websites and directories for products related to your industry and include a link to your website in your review profile, for example reviewing on Amazon.com. You can post answers on Yahoo! Answers and you can post videos or Podcasts on directories and drive traffic to your site much like you would with article marketing.

There are a number of creative ways to drive targeted traffic to your website. Targeted traffic is where the money is. Analyze your traffic-generating strategies and tactics to ensure you’re sending the right kind of traffic to your website.

If you’re looking to build an online business, you can’t go wrong with affiliate marketing. It’s a great way to build an online income and work from home. It’s extremely low risk and it’s easy to learn. Here are a few tips to get you started.

#1 Choose an affiliate niche topic you’re interested in. You’re going to be writing, thinking about, planning and talking your topic for as long as you own your business, so it helps if you enjoy your topic.

#2 Choose affiliate programs that have a solid reputation for:

• Paying on time
• Converting visitors into sales (you’re sending them the visitors, it’s their job to make the sale)
• Providing excellent customer service
• Providing a superior product or service (one you can feel proud to represent)
• Making sure their affiliates have all they need to succeed

#3 Spend time researching your audience, researching keywords and building a solid content foundation. Content is what is going to drive traffic to your website; it’s what is going to increase your search engine page ranking, and it’s what is going to bring visitors back time and time again. The better your content foundation, the more affiliate sales you’re going to make. Content will be in the form of:

• Reviews
• Articles
• Reports
• Case studies
• Interviews
• Courses
• Audio and video content too!

#4 Make sure you have a marketing strategy that is based on realistic goals, a sound budget, and has testing and tracking strategies in place to measure success. Your marketing strategy will change and grow as your business changes and grows, so you also want to create a plan to regularly assess and fine-tune your marketing strategy. Tactics you may want to consider include:

• PPC
• Banner and text advertising
• Social networking
• Article marketing
• Newsletter/ezine marketing
• Joint venture partnerships

#5 Create profit goals and a plan to make them happen. Planning is one of your most important responsibilities as an affiliate marketer and internet entrepreneur. Plans include goals, steps to make them happen, and a system of measuring success. Plan to plan – it’s essential for success.

#6 Never stop learning; just make sure you take action too. Continue to learn about affiliate marketing because internet marketing is a continually changing field. There will be new strategies to try, new products to represent and new forms of content and content topics to create. Your audience may even change as you grow.

#7 Be patient. The internet is full of get rich quick schemes and they’re just not true. Affiliate marketing is a great way to build a business and make good money. However, it takes time, work and patience. Follow the advice of legitimate affiliate marketing experts, plan and take action. You can do it!

If you’ve chosen to start an affiliate marketing business, you’ve chosen well. This is a powerful business model with the potential to attain good profits. Take your time, follow your plan and you’ll succeed!