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A good friend of mine who publishes a blog on supply chain management, economics, and innovation entitled The Global Rail asked me for some tips on promoting his blog. These were top of mind, and I thought I would share them in hopes of hearing your suggestions too! Here goes:

Question: How else besides linkedin and facebook do I drive traffic to my blog?   … I feel a little limited through linkedin and facebook because I am only advertising within my contact circle.

Here are some things you can do, I’ll be paraphrasing Trust Agents (a great book! Just buy it!) a bit …

• Visit, read and add comments to other blogs that discuss your topic of interest – in my friends case, Supply Chain Management (and related topics). Add your contact information (including blog link) but definitely do not promote the blog itself, just get in the conversation. It will take a while to see results but this one is important. Be part of the conversation!
• Join Twitter and use tools like Mr. Tweet to find people with similar interests and follow them. Its a common courtesy to follow those who follow you, so you will soon have some new people to share ideas (ie posts) with. How great is that? Use this platform to share other information about your topic of intersest (in this case, Supply Chain Mgt and related topics), and share something about yourself too! For instance, lots of people are out there right now discussing Supply Chain Management, just look at this Twitter Search. Don’t forget to use hashtags to identify your topic (eg., #supplychain) which is enormously helpful for people looking for the very information you are sharing.
• Use a URL shortener like Bit.ly to shorten your URLs and get tracking for free. This is essential. Otherwise, how will you know which channel is having the most impact?

OK, that’s what popped into my head, of course there’s much more you can do. What has worked for you? What would you recommend NOT doing?

Today, Friday October 16^th is National Bosses Day in the U.S. As I was thinking about the card I got for my boss and the lovely card I received from my team, it struck me: I have been a very lucky guy when it comes to having bosses who have guided and provided me with opportunities to progress in my career. I don’t have any “bad boss stories”, quite the opposite – I’m batting a thousand.

So this post is intended to say thank you to my current and former bosses, you know who you are. When I worked in government you supported me as I built a program for our teams to work more efficiently. When I worked at an agency you gave me the opportunity to grow into my position, take chances with new ideas, build expertise and lead our teams. When I worked at a mid-sized corporation you gave me full support as I became a people manager, and as I began thinking strategically you gave me free reign to explore and lead. When I decided to change domains you gave me the room to adapt and access to people who could help make my ideas happen. I hope I can someday be half the boss that you have all been. I have learned so much from all of you that thank you hardly seems enough.

How has your boss supported you? How have they allowed you to grow and develop? What insights have they given you that you can share?

This is technically my first post on the subject of web. There will be many more. There is much to say, and frankly there’s a lot of other people saying a lot of good stuff. But I have a few points I’d like to make.