Ooh, do you know how many times jargon slips its naughty way into press releases? I tried hard to keep it away. Honest.

But almost as bad as jargon are those redundant little adjectives that seem to worm their way into press releases the world over. Sometimes it’s hard to avoid.

I read a great post today by Robin Wauters writing on TechCrunch: 10 words I would love to see banned from press releases.

My personal favourite is ‘strategic partnership.’

Ouch.

It got hacked so badly that my host company advised I delete my blog and start over.

So for the last eight days or thereabouts I’ve been literally re-building my blog bit by bit, piece by piece.

Yes. I had a back up file but it refused to upload without errors so I ate a slice of humble pie and decided it was probably best to start from scratch anyway.

I have no idea how the hack happened although I suspect it was via WordPress.

I feel responsible for what happened.

I didn’t protect my blog adequately. And it can happen to anyone at anytime. I’m mad that it happens at all.

Evenings spent republishing posts made me neglect my person duties to my dawg Sadie Shih Tzu.

She got a new hair do on Friday and a Shih Tzu companion for a few days.

But today I decided it was time for some Liz/Sadie portraits to honour the re-publishing of my blog. See the whole portrait series.

How would the navigation work?

How would the content be organised?

So I settled into my favourite spot in front of a computer and began to create my vision based on meetings with colleagues and our design folks.

I used Word. I added text boxes with menu items. I broke down the navigation and content. It was rudimentary.

I’ve used SmartDraw and would use Word again in a heartbeat. If you know how to draw a text box and move it around in Word then don’t bother with anything fancier.

I essentially built what I now know was a wireframe.

Some time later I sat for several hours with our website developer and sketched out our new website based largely on my initial Word diagrams. Another stage in the wireframe process.

Why am I writing about this now?

Randa Clay published a post today about wireframing and I was reminded how important that process was for me and my colleagues in bringing this mythical new website to life. Suddenly ideas had a structure.

It’s one of the most basic steps in planning a new website.

Oh, and PS – developing a website is one job you’ll never finish. There is no end. I’ll write more on this in coming weeks. But eight months after launching our shiny new site, I’m about to redevelop one of its – if not THE – major parts.

I recently joined a group on LinkedIn for folks on Twitter. Watching all the discussions there I noticed one piece of advice lacking: a step-by-step guide to using Twitter. So I’m taking a stab at it.

1. Go to Twitter and sign up for an account (yellow Sign Up button)

2. Complete the sign up form. Use your real name as your user name (unless this is your brand’s Twitter account). No spaces allowed so I am lizhover.

3. Before doing anything else, wait for a confirmation email to be sent to you.

4. Once you click on the link in your confirmation email, you’ll be automatically taken to your Twitter page.

5. Now you’ll see your Twitter home page where, once you start following people, updates – or tweets – will appear (also known as your timeline/Twitter stream). It will look a lot like the image below.

6. In the black bar at the top of your screen click on profile – you’re going to add information about yourself and a profile photo or avatar – the first rule of Twitter. If you don’t add a photo, folks will think your account is fake. The default avatar is an egg.

7. Once you’ve clicked on profile you’ll be taken to your profile! Now you need to click edit your profile shown above the pink arrow in this image.

8. This will take you to your ‘settings’ page where you can change your photo. It’s best to use a square photo of yourself. There are other options on this page which require you to check boxes to activate them. I leave the decision up to you but I’m not a fan of activating the ‘location’ setting which tells other Twitter users where you’re tweeting from. I think this is a security risk.

9. On that same topic of security, you’re also given the option to protect your updates. If you check this box no-one will be able to see anything about you unless you give them permission. For many people this can be a turn off and they will choose not to follow you. My advice is to only use this feature if you’re being stalked. Honestly.

10. Save any changes you make to this page. You’ll be prompted for your password again. Then scroll to the top of the page and on profile. This will take you to a page that will let you change your photo, add a website address and a short bio about yourself.

11. Click the ‘Browse‘ button and choose a photo from your computer that you would like to use as your avatar. Use a square photo of yourself. Try to use a real picture of you or your company logo.

12. Fill in your location.

13. Add your website if you have one. Please don’t put your Twitter URL or your Facebook profile. People want to find out more about you. This should be your blog or company website.

14. In the Bio field add a straight forward, clear description of yourself. What not to write: ‘I’m the world’s best marketer’; ‘I’m just a guy’; ‘I’m totally awesome.’ Believe me, people write this stuff. This is your one line pitch about yourself or your company. Instead say something interesting. For example: ‘I’m guitar-playing, poetry-writing CEO of Big Bank.’ You’ve got 160 characters to use.

15. Save everything. Don’t be put off if you get an error or the message that ‘Twitter is over capacity.’ You’ll see the ‘fail whale’ a lot. Just keep hitting your back button and uploading your photo until it works. If you get fed up, move on to the next step.

16. Now you’re gonna look for people to follow. That’s what makes Twitter so useful. Once you follow people, your Twitter stream that looked a bit naked under point 5 above will start filling up with tweets.

Finding people on Twitter can be very time consuming. But it’s worth the time investment.

Canadian, US, UK, Irish and New Zealand folks can use the local search feature on a website called Twellow which lists folks on Twitter – provided they’ve registered with Twellow.

Clicking on any location on the map will zoom you in to that place.

You’ll see a list of cities which are clickable. When you click on a city you’ll see a long list of folks on Twitter from that area.

To see their Twitter profile, look for this line in brackets at the top of each listing (lizhover on Twitter). Hit the highlighted word and you’ll see their Twitter page. Read through some of their tweets and if they interest you, hit ‘follow.’

When you follow someone on Twitter every time they post something in the what’s happening box it will show up in your timeline/Twitter stream.

You can also use the Find people search function on Twitter. Since the redesign of Twitter in October 2010, finding the find people feature has become a bit convoluted. You need to click on profile > edit my profile and then look at the top of your screen for the find people function.

You can type a person’s name here or a keyword such as ‘Marketing’ or ‘Filmmaking.’ There is also a feature which lets you browse interests.

Once your results are displayed you’ll see the most recent tweet from that account. If you like it, follow them. Use the + button on the right to follow that user.

You can opt to see more tweets from an account by hitting the account name shown in black.

17. The first method I used to find great people to follow is to find people you like and see who they follow. When I first joined Twitter I spent hours searching through the list of folks that others follow. I actually found that the best way to unearth some amazing people on Twitter.

18. You’ll notice some folks will start following you back which means your tweets will show up in their timeline.

19. Once you’ve got a few people to follow, it’s a good idea to add an update – or a tweet. Try not to write about how your meeting went over, what you had for lunch or how you were stuck in traffic. Try to find meaningful information to share with others. That is the value of Twitter.

Introduce yourself (and remember your tweets are limited to 140 characters). Take a look at other people’s tweets and see what sort of stuff they’re posting. Or check out this post for ideas.

20. One of the most popular uses of Twitter is link sharing. I find something cool and I share it with my followers – a video, a photo, a great article. Because posts/tweets are limited to 140 characters, you’ll need to use a URL shortener to compress that original long website address. There are lots of providers to choose from. bit.ly is popular. I use goo.gl

21. Links are kind of the life blood of Twitter. If you post a particularly good link (with a short description) it may get re-tweeted. This means that someone following you liked your tweet and forwarded it to their followers. If you do that you must credit the original source and include ‘RT.’ For example ‘Twitter SMS will come with a huge price tag for Canadian users http://ping.fm/GDgeo (RT via @mashable).

Twitter also has a built in retweet button.

22. When you refer to any other user on Twitter you should use the following format @username – don’t worry about any other bits of the address. Don’t put any spaces between the @ and username.

I’ve written a part two newbies guide to Twitter. Read more about using Twitter including customising your Twitter background.

Still Twitter-curious?

The excellent website Webdesigner Depot has trumped my effort above with a thorough and easy to read ultimate guide to everything Twitter. I highly recommend you head on over and check out their alphabetized glossary, a list of popular Twitter applications and instructions for incorporating Twitter into your website and blogs. UPDATE: July 21, 2009 – Webdesigner Depot has just published part two of the ultimate guide to everything Twitter.

It’s a super busy time and inevitably things get missed.

I’m entirely self-taught when it comes to website development and had only myself to rely upon – we worked with a brilliant bunch at Tactica but even they can only do so much.

So when I heard about the ultimate website checklist the first thing that went through my head was, ‘Crap, I could have done with that 12 months ago.’

Which is why I’m writing about it here to help anyone else that’s in the web development and launch process.

The list was created by Box UK – web consultants based in London and Cardiff.

Download the website launch checklist and find out more about Box UK.

I’ve already had hiccups. The audio videos all sound like chipmunks – well they didn’t when I tested them ALL. SOS email already sent.

I pretended to be an innocent visitor tonight and treated myself to a short film posted to our site and loved it – even though it was 20 minutes long. I think I paused once to refill the wine glass. And I have the shortest attention span. I’m terribly impatient. A small personal achievement then.

Our beta test group is around 500. I’m prepared for the feedback. Some will love it, some will feel mediocre and others will hate it. I’m not in love with it – it’s not MINE per se so I’m feeling a sense of neutrality. Which doesn’t mean I don’t care. Far from it. I just know that you can’t please everyone all of the time. And I also know that this site was built after feedback from many so some of the better ideas (IMO) may have fallen by the wayside because others thought they knew better and they had bigger swords than me.

I read a very interesting article tonight on the Advertising Age website.

Website tweaks and fiddles have consumed my time. And when I wasn’t doing that I was sipping chilled white wine, spending time with the husband or sleeping. Oh, and possibly shopping.

I’ve spent much time trying to upload video to YouTube and Yahoo! Video. Turns out my files were just too darn big. That’s what you get for being new to a lot of this. I almost broke out the champagne when it finally worked.

We’ve got a great bunch of video and audio interviews under our belts and will continue to gather more.

There is a tendency to just gather new content at break neck speed without giving much thought to what we’re getting or whether it’s worth it. My philosophy has always been (and will continue to be until my visitors tell me otherwise) that quality of content over quantity and frequency of renewal wins out.

So, most things are in place and we’re very close to soft-launching the site which will be the real test and will probably drive me to drink copious amounts of wine – heck, what’s new?

As I’ve mentioned before, we’re launching to a select group – around 500 people. Who knows what will be revealed during that all-important phase? It’s all a learning process.

I’m off to a conference in early June to learn more about all this jazz. Wonder if there’s anyone else out there dreaming the same weird dreams as me and dwelling on stuff that most people don’t?

We’re due to soft-launch our new website in just a few days. Gulp.

The test site is looking good with still a few tweaks to be made. I’ve been busy trouble-shooting a bunch of things in anticipation of said launch.

Today I worked out how to record voicemail messages on to my computer using Skype and Pamela. The Pamela files get saved as MP3s into a folder on my hard drive so I can open the file and edit it. Horrah! And all for the cost of a cheap phone call on Skype. The only limitation with the Pamela basic application I downloaded is that I’m limited to 15 minutes of recording per call. Fingers cross no silly bugger leaves us an extra long message cos we’ll be screwed.

And as a result of this, I also set up our podcast hotline which allows listeners to record a comment about the podcast. I hope to use some of these in future podcasts.

My editor and reporter are working on some of the video interviews tonight.

We’ve more or less finished the audio interviews. I’m just waiting for the final few from my editor. I ended up recording the general intro and outro for all podcasts myself. I had asked my husband but he’s up to his eye-balls in his own work chaos so to save time I did it. As I previously mentioned, I’m no silky-voiced diva but I think it will work out just fine for now. The intro and outro top and tail all the audio interviews that appear on our website.

Our website folks have been working on the never-ending report that I lovingly prepared for them. There have been design changes and revisions to the way the CMS works. It’s a long road but I believe we close to the end of this part.

I’ve also been preparing information my bloggers. I’ve put together a kind of ‘Promoting your blog 101′ document which will help them get the word out about their blog on our website.

Tomorrow I should be testing the test site again! I’ve also got to move a bunch of content across to the new site. And then we’re just days away from our soft-launch. I’ve written a – heck, I don’t know what you’d call it – it’s not a news release but more of an info bulletin for our soft-launch audience telling them what we’ve been doing with the website and what we’d like them to do now they have their eyeballs exclusively on the site.

It’s all about feedback.

There’s still lots of polishing and fixing to be done but I’m keen to hear about staff experiences with the system. I gave them the user manual, a spreadsheet on which to report any problems and a mini-test (for wimps who can’t face the big mother).

I’ve already had some feedback to which I’ve been replying, ‘Write it all in your report.’

I’ve heard mutterings from my neighbouring colleague as she wrestles with this entirely new ‘thing.’ ‘Refer to the manual,’ I shout across the office. And if it doesn’t make sense, write it in your report.’

Oh what fun this is.

Yesterday I handed over a bunch of video for editing to the journalist we’ve hired and got the first version of our opening video intro that will appear on all our online video. With a few tweaks we’ll be good to go.

Can’t remember if I mentioned we’ve ordered a professional microphone for our podcasts. It arrived. (Horrah!) But we couldn’t open it because the case was locked. And guess where the keys were? Inside the locked case. So we’re waiting for additional keys. Jeez.

1. Excessive drinking
2. Excessive smoking
3. Excessive blogging as a form of escapism
4. Excessive reading of other blogs as a form of escapism.

I also looked at how this condition can be treated. The most effective treatment methods are:

1. Excessive drinking
2. Excessive smoking
3. Excessive blogging as a form of escapism
4. Excessive reading of other blogs as a form of escapism.

While on my escapist journey, I did stumble across a full Flickr gallery from Betsy Jean 79. I now know who Blythe is. I now understand what Blythe Knits are. All was revealed to me here.

I’m off to read up on internet advertising. After Mr Nielsen told us it was all a waste of time back in 1997, I still have to advise others on the matter. And I don’t think it’s dead in the water just yet.