SOPA is a bill currently being discussed in the House of Representatives. It's aimed at providing law enforcement and judicial officials with tools to fight and punish piracy and copyright infringement.

While the agenda may be altruistic, the language of the bill and the restrictions it places on website operators pose some significant hurdles that could end up censoring the Internet in many ways.

As Google, Facebook, Twitter and other Internet giants said in a joint letter to the Senate, “the bills as drafted would expose law-abiding U.S. Internet and technology companies to new uncertain liabilities, private rights of action, and technology mandates that would require monitoring of web sites.”

How will this affect you as a business owner or professional?

Think about your blog or social media channels. If you share an article from an industry resource, you could be guilty of violating SOPA and your website could be blocked. There are many other implications. Mashable’s Chris Heald wrote a piece analyzing the language of the bill, translating it into simple context.

Read the bill in its entirety and decide how it might affect you as a marketer and as a consumer of online content.

As the producer of the BusinessVoice News Network, it’s my job to write the stories for this daily telephone-based service. I also promote the BVNN through the BusinessVoice Twitter feed by sharing the headlines in a daily tweet. And that has helped me to become a better writer.

A Twitter post can be no more than 140 characters. The daily BVNN tweet includes an introduction phrase and a link, leaving about 100 characters to write three teaser headlines. That’s three complete thoughts squeezed into a space about the same length as this sentence.

Twitter is a strict disciplinarian for brevity, and as the available characters count down toward zero with each keystroke, it becomes a great tool to improve my ability to say more with fewer words.

Try this the next time you’re writing: open your Twitter page and paste a longer sentence into the “new tweet” box. If it’s over 140 characters, rewrite it so it fits and still makes your point.

Short sentences are easier to read, and a mix of short, medium and longer sentences makes for good flow in your copy. Take the Twitter test to see if you can trim that long sentence and say it in a tweet.

Though Twitter and Facebook have been staples of the social media scene for several years now, many small businesses haven’t yet figured out how to leverage these platforms to communicate with their audience, develop their brand and, ultimately, drive sales.

But research shows that more and more people are making purchasing decisions based on things they read in social media. So, what’s a business to do?

Think about how you use Facebook. You may put up with the random ramblings of your friends, but when it comes to companies that post nonsense or information that’s irrelevant to you, you’re probably more likely to reach for the hide button.

On Twitter, the relevance and accuracy of your information is what makes your audience want to share your content. And, as with most other marketing tools, it takes time and consistency of message - not a hard sales pitch - to make it effective for your business.

Take a note from Gary Vaynerchuk (@garyvee). This is an excerpt from his book The Thank You Economy:

“When I first started Tweeting, I had no brand recognition; no one knew who I was. To build my brand, I started creating conversations around what I cared passionately about: wine.

I used Search.Twitter.com…to find mentions of Chardonnay. I saw that people had questions, and I answered them. I didn’t post a link to WineLibrary.com and point out that I sold Chardonnay. If people mentioned that they were drinking Merlot, I gave them my Merlot recommendation, but I didn’t mention that they could buy Merlot on my website.

I didn’t try to close too early, like a nineteen-year-old guy; I made sure to invest in the relationship first. Eventually, people started to see my comments and think, “Oh, hey, it’s that Vaynerchuk guy; he knows Chardonnay. Oh cool, he does a wine show - let’s take a look. Hey, he’s funny. I like him; I trust him. And check it out: he sells wine, too. Free shipping? Let’s try a bottle of that…” That’s what caring first, not selling first, looks like, and that’s how I built my brand.”

And that’s how social media works.
 

Just a day after the horrific tsunami hit Japan, comedian and long-time spokesman for Aflac Insurance Gilbert Gottfried was tastelessly tweeting jokes to his personal account about the event. Gottfried didn’t tweet his comments as a representative of the insurance company, but Aflac fired him in order to deflect any association with the comedian’s comments.

This certainly isn’t the first time – or the last time – something like this will happen.

On March 9th, 2011, an employee from a web marketing firm hired by Chrysler to manage social media strategies posted an inappropriate tweet to the ChryslerAutos account cursing Detroit drivers for their incompetence on the roads. At the time, the Chrysler account had more than 8,000 followers, so although the tweet was deleted minutes after it was posted, the comment was re-tweeted over 100 times within three hours. The employee was fired and Chrysler issued an apology.

And in February 2011, an employee of the American Red Cross accidentally used the organization’s account to tweet about drinking. The Red Cross chose to handle the incident with its funny bone and, while the mistake gave the organization an awareness boost, it could have been very embarrassing.

It’s easy to point the finger at these faux pas, but the fact is that social media programs, like Twitter and Facebook, walk a very fine line between business tools and opinion platforms. Users are encouraged to keep things casual, fun and personal, and the buzzword is “share.” Yes, there’s professional networking going on, but there’s also gossip, journaling, and entertainment involved. Advertising Age author Bob Garfield has an interesting take on posting the truth in social media…even if it stings a little.

Do you participate in your company’s social media marketing? If so, how do you manage to be personal, conversational, truthful AND professional at all times?