I keep thinking about the idea that “Twitter is killing RSS,” and it makes me uncomfortable.

I’ll leave it to the technologists to debate the merits of using Twitter vs. RSS from a network standpoint — my own misgivings are cultural. It goes back to my nightmare scenario of a wasteland of marketers blasting tweets at each other — people who’ve dropped all pretense of using Twitter as a conversation tool (save as the means by which they grow their follower count)  and just use it for full bore marketing blasts.

If you’ve got anywhere over a few thousand followers, or are otherwise following few while being followed by many, you’ve pretty much given up on Twitter as a two-way communication tool. Throw in things like scheduled tweets (at least until they can find a way to also pre-schedule @replies to your scheduled Tweets), or RSS-to-Twitter. Automatically porting your RSS feed into your Twitter stream just seems so… indiscriminate.

In some ways, I guess I’m a hypocrite — I regularly use Twitter to harass my friends with silly links, whereas I would previously bother them individually via IM. However, when I send an IM or e-mail to someone to stick an earworm in their head, or give them a silly link, I am fairly selective — I won’t blast it out to my entire address book. However, in return for that selectiveness, I’m expecting they’ll see it, and maybe give a response (perhaps even a particular response).

Of course, if you’re working on the assumption that only a small minority of your followers will even see, and fewer even care, about any given one of your Twitter posts, then it’s in your interest to keep pumping out updates. It’s a shotgun approach. And with the implied reciprocal nature of Twitter following, it’s like you’re basically asking, “If you give me permission to spam you, I will give you permission to spam me.”

There isn’t really a wrong way to use Twitter, I suppose, but it just feels icky. To torture metaphors, it’s like with analog telephone landlines — we used them for person to person communication, until we started tying up the lines for our dialup modems. Sure, you can use a single phoneline for both. Until you can’t.

Ultimately, it’s not about the protocol — we can RSS-to-Twitter and pull the Twitter RSS feed back and round and round again — it’s what kind of interaction we expect when we pick up the line. Conversation, or people just blasting URLs at each other.

There’s still going to be a role — just like RSS readers didn’t kill the traditional Web site main page, Twitter (and Twitter-like things like Friendfeed, Facebook, whatever — social status updaters / social linksharing services) won’t kill RSS.

Am I missing the point? It’s possible. Leave a comment and let me know the real deal.

Around last week, a Bacon Explosion hit the Internet in a big way. The explosive consists of 2 pounds of Italian sausage and 2 pounds of bacon, woven together with BBQ sauce and stuck in a smoker for a few hours. When detonated, it releases at least 5,000 calories and 500 grams of fat, and serves at least 10 potential heart attack victims.

The New York Times article about its creation and promotion, “Take Bacon. Add Sausage. Blog,” offers some insight in how the story propagated across the Web, so I wanted to see what kind of lessons we can take away for promoting your own small business endeavors.

The Chronology

The proprietors of BBQ Addicts wanted to drive traffic to their Web site to increase advertising revenue. Coincidentally, in December, a Twitter user challenged them to do something barbecue with bacon. They came up with their particular spin on a smoked bacon and sausage log, and posted it on their site 2 days before Christmas. They then saw a traffic spike on Christmas Day, and at some point it went viral.

The Tools

* One of the guys, Aaron Chronister, is an Internet marketer/search engine optimization guy. He also has 1,200 followers on his Twitter account.

* They (and others) posted links to the Bacon Explosion on social networking and social linksharing sites. (StumbleUpon is specifically mentioned.) Likewise, as seen on many sites, they have links so their visitors can also easily submit the page to linksharing sites (Digg, Twitter, and Delicious).

The Lessons

How can we make this relevant to your small business?

* People really like bacon. Seriously. Whether it’s bacon bras or bacon on cats, there’s something about bacon that people really, really like. Not only do Internet people like bacon, they like talking about bacon, and they’ll send bacon links to their friends. Bacon has a built-in audience, and one that’s ready-made to go viral.

Not many things have this kind of appeal. If your business doesn’t involve bacon, it still helps if you have a sense of what people have an affinity for. One thing you don’t want to do is indiscriminate spam everything you do to every social linksharing site out there. If you expect any sort of effective response, think about what people who aren’t you might find interesting or useful

* Use the tools at your disposal. Take advantage of social media tools like Twitter, StumbleUpon, Delicious, etc. Most of them are even free. And make it easy for your visitors to use these tools to share what you’re doing.

* Be an Internet marketer. And have lots of friends who are Internet marketers. All this means is that the Internet is a valuable tool for getting the word out, and there are people who know this. Connect with these people, understand what they’re talking about, talk to them, and be a contributing part of the community. People are not tools, but when you form real relationships with connected people, they will help you get your own word out (when you have something interesting or useful to say).

* You can try, but you never can tell. There is no secret formula for guaranteed viral success. And you don’t have to hit as big as the Bacon Explosion to be a success — getting known in your local or regional market can work just fine.

For some additional food for thought, check out 5 steps on going viral on Twitter and Go Beyond Blogging – Multi-Channel Marketing via Online Media.

Remember, the lesson here is not “Incorporate bacon into your business,” but instead, recognize when you’re doing something interesting or useful, then use the social media tools available to you to help get the word out among your expanding circle of connected friends.

If you’ve got thoughts specific to the success of the Bacon Explosion (is it a one-off, an outlier that we shouldn’t draw conclusions from?), or promoting your small business using social media tools in general, please leave a comment.

Some people figure that you when you start a web site that getting your domain and throwing a template up is all that is needed to start their own online gold rush. Oh, how I wish that were true. Before you even think about looking for a customer there are six things every small business web site needs to have in place. Let’s get started:

Brand Logo

Many people when they are starting a company don’t think they really need a logo, could afford one or think a generic icon will do on their business cards. People coming to your web site most likely don’t know you and if they are ordering products online may never ever meet you. What they do need to feel confident about is that your company is an established entity and is not fly by night. A quality logo is really something that is not that expensive and worth every penny. It sets the image and tone of your company. It establishes typeset and colors you will use throughout your print and web materials.

Web Site Design Concept

This one sounds a bit out there if you are not used to marketing jargon. It is known as the web site design composition and is usually presented in the form of a ‘visual presentation’ and is supported by written draft ‘copy’. It also leverages the color and tone of your logo which is incorporated into your web site.

Core Marketing Message

You know what you do and what your company provides, but have you ever tried to say it in 30 seconds? This is what many know as the “elevator pitch” and it works. This is who and what your company is distilled into 2-3 sentences that are easy to say, easy to repeat and easy for your customers to remember. It is also the core statement(s) that keep your web site content grounded and centered.

Product and/or Service descriptions

Once you have your core marketing message you must carefully work on your product and/or service descriptions. These are the descriptions that are on each web page and in some way should support your core marketing message.

Management Bios

An important part of your web site that many overlook are the management bios on your team. In service companies people are really buying from you and if they are new to your company and are thinking about contacting you this is where they go right after they see the need to find out more or buy your product/service. For consumer e-commerce and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) sites, the management team is usually hidden deeper but for many people it is a part of the web site they check to see if the people running and managing the site have the experience to make this successful for the long haul.

Promotion Strategy

So the brand, message and content is ready to go. The web site is greenlit for launch. So you flip the switch and nothing happens. What did you forget? You forgot that you need to someone, lots of someones. This means promotion using multiple channels. This includes traditional promotion strategies, linking strategies, fresh content strategies and search engine strategies. For a more detailed and extensive look into promotion strategies take a look at our “Marketer’s Corner” article “Web Site Promotion Strategies for a Small Business Web Site”.