Have you seen Monnitter yet?  Well, it is the first thing that I have seen that makes Twitter useful.  That’s right, it might surprise you, but I don’t like Twitter.  Why?  Well, I just don’t find it very useful.

However, I might have just found a way to use Twitter.  That is where the new website Monnitter comes into play.  Monnitter allows you to type in up to three keywords to monitor on Twitter.  In realtime, Monnitter will bring to your attention any Twitter tweets mentioning your chosen keyword.

For me, I love to read about mont blanc fountain pens and buffalo gold coins.   Monnitter allows you to follow the online conversation that is occuring on Twitter regarding topics that are important to you.  I know that you wake up every morning wondering what your favorite make money online guru is having for breakfast.

Sure, sometime you can learn about something new on Twitter, but there are much more efficient ways to get your information.  Twitter is for narcissists, not for normal people.   Twitter can be a cool tool to talk to people you really care about, but not socializing with 100 followers.  So, make Twitter useful and try Monniter.

Here is a quick video that I created at Animoto.

Being that it is January 1, I thought that I would write about a new Facebook application from one of the best social networking sites for dieters, Fatsecret.com.  Fatsecret.com has launched the My Diet Application for Facebook.  I am sure that most of us would like to lose weight in 2008.  Maybe if we combine our love for the Internet, social networking sites and dieting, this will be the magic combination for this year’s resolution to be different from 2007’s resolution to lose weight.

The My Diet Facebook Application is a great facebook application.  My Diet allows you to:

• track the food you are eating
• record the number of calories that you burned
• compare your dieting to you My Diet friends
• track you weight loss (I know I am being presumptuous)
• journal you progress
• calorie counter
• and more….

If you haven’t tried fatsecret.com, I highly recommend that you check out that website too.  It is a pretty cool community for dieters.  I think that dieting is a natural fit for social sites.  People like to diet with others.  Dieting becomes an all consuming hobby, and people like to talk about it with other dieters.

Well, I won’t lose any weight sitting here at my keyboard so I am going to wrap this up.

Happy New Year!!

As I discussed in yesterday’s article regarding BloggingZoom, you need to be using BloggingZoom to promote your blog. BloggingZoom’s audience is highly influential for you to attract. They are your peers. They can become loyal readers of you blog, promote your articles by linking to you, and help you network with other bloggers.

Here are 10 steps to jump start your blog with bloggingzoom.

1. Join BloggingZoom.

2. Create a recognizable avatar that promotes your blog. Check mine out. I use a variation of my blog’s logo. I use this same avatar on every site that allows me to use an avatar. This helps me to build the Newest on the Net brand.

3. Create an interesting profile. Too often we forget to do this. Just as every blog giving blogging tips will tell you to focus on your blog’s about page, make sure that you focus on your social media profile pages. Tell people about yourself and your blog.

4. Place the BloggingZoom bookmarklet onto your browsers toolbar. This bookmarklet makes it very easy for your to submit blog articles to BloggingZoom.

5. Add me as a friend. I promise to add you as a friend back. Also, once you have added me as a friend, please send me a message saying hello. I love getting to know my readers and social media sites are a great way to get to know each other. I want to know what interests you. By seeing what blog articles you Zoom, I hope that I can create better articles for Newest on the Net.

6. Submit great articles. If you want to promote your blog using social media, you have to participate. The great thing about BloggingZoom is that you don’t have to feel guilty for submitting your own articles. That’s right, don’t shy. I want to read you work. Like most bloggers, I love blog articles. I think that you will find that most of the bloggingzoom users feel the same way.

7. Write catchy titles. A lot of social media users filter articles based on their titles. It is important for you to use this to your advantage. Make sure your title is interesting. Remember it does not have to be the exact title you use in your article.

8. Don’t forget about your article description. Unlike most social media sites, BloggingZoom requires that your description of your article contain at least 4 sentences and 350 characters. This is to help the search engines index your posts. Vic, one of the founders of BloggingZoom, has written a great article on how to increase search engine traffic to your blog by focusing on you article description.

9. Don’t forget your older posts. One nice thing about a new social media site coming onto the seen is that it gives you the ability to re-promote some of your older articles. Go back through your archives and submit some of your best articles. This will help you to start building your credibility with the community. However, make sure that you have completed steps 2 and 3 first. You want to be able to capitalize on the attention and traffic you will get.

10. Check out and zoom my bloggingzoom articles. It’s worth a try

• Mahalo Social
• Build Blog With StumbleUpon
• Use Social Media To Increase Blog Traffic
• Increase RSS Subscribers

This is the third article in my Build Your Blog Through Social Media Series. In the introductory article, I described how I was able jump start my blog from zero pageviews in September to over 190,000 pageviews by November. The second article described how to use stumbleupon to promote your blog. This article focuses on BloggingZoom.

On November 1, the launch of BloggingZoom gave bloggers the perfect social media site to promote their blogs and articles. Bloggers writing on every niche are gathering at BloggingZoom to share the best articles around the blogosphere. I am glad that I joined BloggingZoom right from the start.

Please add me as a friend on bloggingzoom.

BloggingZoom was created by Courtney and Vic to allow bloggers to promote their own works and gain the attention of other bloggers. This culture of open access is what makes BloggingZoom different from social voting sites like Digg, Reddit and Propeller.

This tolerance is a breathe of fresh air and has made BloggingZoom my favorite social media site to read quality original blog content.

Who should be using BloggingZoom?

EVERY blogger should be using BloggingZoom. That’s right. If you are not using it, you are missing out on getting your writing in front of thousands of bloggers.

While making the front page of BloggingZoom will not bring you the traffic that a Digg front page will bring you, gaining traffic is not my goal with BloggingZoom. Instead, I want other bloggers to know about my blog.

For a site like mine focused on blogging tips, BloggingZoom is a match made in heaven. This social media site allows me to attract bloggers looking for blogging help. Additionally, since this site’s core audience is bloggers who must be pretty savvy with computers, Newest on the Net’s focus on discussing the latest Internet news is a perfect fit.

Bloggers are great readers for you to attract. Bloggers like blogs. They write blogs, they read blogs and they like to participate by leaving comments. These readers will help you develop a community for your blog.

Since I started using BloggingZoom, I have networked with lots of great bloggers. I have also increased my RSS subscribers with many people who first learned about NOTN through BloggingZoom. I have also gained friends in other social media sites like StumbleUpon from people who have found me on BloggingZoom.

Blogging Zoom Spreads the Wealth

Getting an article on Digg can bring lots of benefits to your site; traffic, links and more traffic. However, the chances of getting on the frontpage of Digg are very slim. You need to tailor your articles to topics that are popular with Digg users and you need a strong network of supporters to help you along. This is not the case with BloggingZoom.

At the present time you only need 5 zooms (votes) to make it to BloggingZoom’s front page. Of the 34 articles that I have submitted to BloggingZoom, 27 have gone hot and made it to the front page.

I am happy to note that my article on how to increase RSS subscribers is on the top 10 list of zoomed articles.

Do you want to read more about BloggingZoom? Well, here are some other great articles about this new social media site,

• BloggingZoom Review By Jason Clark
• Do You Zoom? – BloggingZoom Review
• BloggingZoom Accelerates the Blogging Business

Are you using BloggingZoom? Please share your experience.