Looking for Winter Holiday Pet Story Quotes

Waiting for Santa.

Our pets and the holidays -- is there a better recipe for a cute story?  

As a pet blogger, of course I can't think of one! I'm working on a post on that topic right now for CANIDAE's Responsible Pet Ownership blog. While I adore writing about my dogs, this time around I would love to include you and your pet's special winter holiday memories!

So, do you have a hilarious, heartwarming or just special-to-you winter holiday (Christmas, Hanukkah, New Years, etc.) memory to share? 

Maybe your pet reacted over a gift, destroyed the tree, had babies, ate the holiday meal -- there are so many possibilities! 

"Oh, I have a story..."

If so, you can take the survey for the article on Survey Monkey (it's just a few simple questions) or just send me a message on my Facebook page. Be sure to include your pet's name and breed, if you know it.

You can also send me a picture of your pet on Facebook, if you have one, to include with the article.

"I'm all ears!"

   You can find the survey here. 

   And my Facebook page here.

"That's a good one -- tell it again!"

   Feel free to share the survey link      
   (http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/SLC83NP) publicly or with   
   anyone you think might want to take it. Anyone can answer.        

   Taking answers until noon EST on Monday, Dec. 10, 2012. 

Thanks 

and 

Happy Holidays!

Image credits: levork/Flickr.com; AZAdam/Flickr.com; sadiehart/Flickr.com; adrigu/Flickr.com

Yay, Bottlenose! Social media app saves drowning writers from a sea of constant status updates

Using the Bottlenose app feels just like this.

Come up for air and enjoy social networking again!

Looking for real-time results on what your network is talking about, but don't want to spend an hour surfing the feed? Same here.

So I checked out Bottlenose, a social media app that reads your Facebook and Twitter feed and lets you know what topics are popular.

How does it do that? With real-time Sonar, an interactive visual way to see your network's trending topics, people and more. It even shows you how these topics relate to each other and lets you click on each topic to really delve into what people are chatting about. Next to the Sonar graph are the related messages in your social sphere.

How does Bottlenose help writers?

In multiple ways--from social to promotion. Now you don't have to waste time finding someone

Pinning My Writing Inspirations on Pinterest

Pinterest is a magical tool for visually inspiring writers.  I know I said that before in January, but thought it was worth stressing again. The photo pinning social network can be used to create topic boards on all the topics you like to write about, but it's more than that. If you just use the site to pin things you like--and create niche topic boards for these pictures--it hones in on things you really love.

Google Plus: Balancing socializing and promotion

It's hard to tell if my friends are really beginning to use Google+ or if my circles are just growing. Either way, it's been months since my news feed could span days in a few seconds. Which meant I could check in a few times a week and be all caught up.

It has expanded to a social network that I need to be tuning into daily, but at first it was hard to break my less frequent habits. For me, Google+ was just, well, forgettable. 

Which was slightly mystifying, since I enjoy the design, functionality and customization. 

Was it just one too many social networks to handle? Perhaps, but months after joining I added Pinterest and Empire Avenue to my daily routine.

April Fools from Klout

Have you hooked up your MySpace account to your Klout profile? No, I'm not joking...but Klout is. In exchange for pulling our influence-seeking legs, Klout is offering a glitter-rific animated makeover for your score.

To get your--admittedly female-centric--MySpace inspired score:

Promotion Tips to Breathe Life into Older Content

Pin It

Remember that blog post you wrote six months ago that was so popular or the one from when your blog was just a baby that failed to gain traction? Of course you do. Unfortunately, your readers might not or missed it completely.

That's OK. Older content doesn't have to instantly die as soon as you hit 'publish' on another piece. You can promote content year-round, even if you're a busy freelance writer like Lana Bandoim.

Infographic: Top 5 Twitter Mistakes Writers Make

Fail whale moments for freelancers.

Freelancing Fail Whale

What writer doesn't look back on their first few days of tweets and cringe? I sure do. Here's a chance to look back and laugh at the mistakes we made before getting the hang of the Twitterverse. For new tweeps, take this as an opportunity to shorten your learning curve.

*Infographic after the article.

5. Irrelevance & Obscurity

Twitter isn't the social network to go to the artsy outfield. If you aren't tweeting something relevant or current, you aren't going to be relevant to the medium. Attention spans are short and no one is going to follow your storyline 140 characters at a time. There could be 50 tweets in between each one. Who could keep up with that? So save your novel excerpts for your blog or website, where they'll be