* The words Blog and Podcast entered the lexicon and generated reams of pixel space and column inches.

* Bloggers were named People of the Year got book deals and got dooced.

* RSS became the new email - at least to those who understood what it meant.

* Google took over the world and became another Microsoft.

* Adsense spawned millionaires and click fraud.

* Yahoo and MSN launched their own search engines and gave Google some much-needed competition.

* Spam websites and splogs became a menace - and just as rapidly dropped out of sight.

* Broadband, Multimedia, Rich Media, Behavioural Targeting and Wikis came into their own and will be around through 2006 and beyond.

Personally for me, 2005 has been a year of momentous change - loss, grief, peace, success. I’ve been through it all.

I’ve grown as a person in ways that only life and experience teaches.

I’ve learnt a lot about happiness and love.

I’ve learnt to value what matters most.

I found peace and contentment in unexpected places.

And learned that they were within my reach all the time.

As 2005 draws to a close, and I get back to the task of running an SEO and online PR firm, I thought I would pen a few lines for you wonderful people.

Read them on the New Year Greeting card we designed.

And now for my final article of 2005. Feel free to reprint it on your blog or newsletter.

I’m posting this late because I have a sick child to go back to right now. I’m not really having a very Merry Christmas, but I do hope yours is wonderful.

Merry Christmas to all of you great folks who read this blog.

I don’t have any fancy cards or freebies for you this year, but I do have something very personal. A little piece I recorded (yes, I play the guitar) - one of my favourite carols of all time.

The audio quality isn’t good. Its one of my first recordings, but do click on the icon below and allow me to bring some Christmas spirit into your life.

As you know, Wordpress is my blogging software of choice. It is also recommended by a lot of blogging experts.

But the learning curve to get used to this software has been pretty steep for a lot of blogging newbies.

Until now…

A guy called Sherman Hu has created a bunch of great videos to show you exactly how to get started blogging with Wordpress.

So if you’ve been trying to use Wordpress but feel intimidated by the learning curve, check out his no-cost video preview of the first 22 videos in the series, that will help you with blogging using Wordpress.

Check out Sherman’s Audio and Video Tutorials for Wordpress here.

Remember how I tom-tommed the fact that we got a new domain from PR0 to a very healthy PR5 in under two months? Actually it was less than two months because we didn’t get started on the linking till a month after we bought it. But never mind that.

The fact is that we used very sound techniques to make that happen. And it was no fluke. We can keep doing it again and again and again… for all the clients who entrust their SEO to us.

Among the most effective techniques that helped us build QUALITY links to our website was the use of press releases. In fact, using an optimized press release is such a powerful method of building links that I now recommend it to all our clients.

Just a single press release helped us build links from not only high-PR press release sites, but also from competitor sites where our news was syndicated.

Competitor sites? How did we do that?

Well here’s the secret (if you want to call it that). One of the best sites to submit your press release is on PRweb. Using the $80 option, you can get your release syndicated through Yahoo! News so that it gets picked up and syndicated on a lot of competitor sites.

Imagine having your competitors working to build links to you. What better SEO tactic could there possibly be!!

Of course, once your link on Yahoo! News vanishes, your link popularity (and PageRank) could drop. But that didn’t happen to us, because I always ensure that we build enough redundancy into our link campaigns, which is why we simultaneously carry out article marketing and directory submissions to build links.

I have people working for me who do the actual work of press release submission, but if you’re a solo entrepreneur and want a tool that can automate that task for you, take a look at Jeff Alderson’s Press Equalizer. I just got a copy for myself, because anything that helps me save time is worth the money.

So are press releases really the new “blog and ping” alternative to getting indexed? I wouldn’t call them that. But if you want to build quality links, create publicity, and boost your reach and influence, press releases may be just the tool you need.

More online publicity tips and resources

Do you know which technology is currently sweeping the internet? No its not blogging, but an offshoot of it called Podcasting.

Wikipedia defines Podcasting as a term used to describe a collection of technologies for automatically distributing audio programmes over the Internet using a publisher/subscriber model.

It differs from earlier online collections of audio works because it automatically transfers the files to the user’s computer for later use; it is one example of push technology.

Podcasting enables independent producers to create self-published, syndicated “radio shows,” and gives broadcast radio or television programs a new distribution method.

There are already loads of people creating podcast shows which can be downloaded to their computers or mp3 media players (like Apple’s Ipod). Its sort of like having your own radio show available to anyone, anywhere, on-demand.

So how can podcasting help you market your products online? This article by Jeff Mills, author of a “Podcast Secrets Revealed,” a brand new ebook on podcasting, has some excellent suggestions on using podcasts with tips on creating a podcast show in hours.

Can Podcasting help you expand your message to a massive audience? Jeff’s podcast teaching tool on how to Podcast and how to listen to podcasts on your computers and mp3 players may have the answers.

Is Blogger deleting blogs at random? A few people on my Blogging For Business network reported that they couldn’t access their blogs. And then James Joyner reported that his blogs on Blogspot.com had been deleted altogether.

Is Blogger going overboard in its war against splogs, I wonder? Doesn’t look good for them if they can’t tell the difference between splogs and genuine blogs. Was your blog one of those affected?

Joyner makes a good point that you should NEVER use a free blog host if you really care about your blog. Your blog could be deleted any time on a whim.

As a true professional, getting a domain (as low as $2.99 a year on Yahoo) and professional hosting with Fantastico is really the best way to go. Or use a paid blog hosting service like Typepad.

Free is not really worth the bother.