Heck, we can’t even keep up. But as Paul Boutin pointed out in a recent “New York Times” article, none of us should feel like losers. Getting pressure from LinkedIn and Google+, the brains behind Facebook continue to roll out features most of its 750 million users don’t know exist. “Some don’t know how to find them, some don’t go hunting for them in Facebook’s ever-growing interface of controls and many don’t even think of them in the first place,” Boutin wrote.

Included in his list of “12 Things You Didn’t Know Facebook Could Do” are:

EDIT LINK NAMES AND DESCRIPTIONS: If you want to post a link to your Facebook page but don’t like the title or description that Facebook automatically pulls from that page, just change it. Before you click the Share button, click on the title or description in your pending post. Those areas will change into editing boxes, like those to rename a file on your computer desktop. When you’re done editing, press Enter to save your changes.

TAG FRIENDS IN UPDATES AND COMMENTS: If you type the name of a Facebook friend while editing a status update or comment, Facebook will automatically create a link to the friend’s page. In fact, it will pop up a list of possible completions for names like “John.” Once you’ve entered a name, you can backspace over it to erase the last name for informality’s sake or click in the middle to edit the first, turning “Kenneth Smith” into “Kenneth” or “Smith.” If Facebook doesn’t beginning tagging the name when you type, use the @ symbol before typing the friend’s name.

MAKE A PHOTO YOUR PROFILE PICTURE: Any photo on Facebook that has been tagged with your name includes an extra blue link at the lower-left corner of its page labeled Make Profile Picture. Click that, and Facebook pops up an editing page that lets you crop the photo fit your profile.

CREATE A POLL: Hiding in plain sight above the box to enter status updates is a Question button. Posting a question looks just like posting an update, except that it takes the first three answers from your friends and turns them into a poll to keep the discussion focused. You can also set up the poll with your own answers, or add more to those Facebook creates.

INVITE NON-FACEBOOKERS TO AN EVENT: When you create an event on Facebook, the Select Guests menu shows your existing friends, but it also lets you enter email addresses of people who aren’t on Facebook. Type one or more email address, separated by commas, into the Invite by Email Address box. Your invitees will receive a message with a link to your event page that, unfortunately, prompts them to sign up for Facebook before they can veiw it.

GET THE TICKER OUT OF YOUR WAY: Facebook added a constantly scrolling window on the right side of the screen that shows your friends’ updates as they come in. Fun for some, annoying for others. You can’t turn it off entirely, but you can make it as small as possible. Using your cursor, grab the bar that separates the Ticker from your Facebook Chat window. Drag it upward until the Ticker is as small as possible.

ADD A CALENDAR TO YOUR PAGE: If you’re a business owner, a team coach or a performer who wants to inform people of future goings-on, creating separate Facebook events for each one can be time consuming. Besides, they sometimes get lost in the stream of events posted by everyone else. Consider using the Social Calendar app, instead. Go to facebook.com/SocialCalendar and click the Add to My Page link in the lower left corner. That will pop up a menu of pages you manage. Click Add to Page next to one or more pages, then click Close. Those pages will now include a Calendar link in their upper left corner, just below Wall, Info and Photos. Social Calendar is pretty smart — it will autocomplete the names of events you’ve already created, and if you type in an Address field, it will add a map link to the location on the calendar. But for maximum attendance, you should still post status updates announcing an event.

BLOCK ANNOYING COMMENTERS: Do some friends post inappropriate comments on your updates but you can’t bring yourself to unfriend them? In the uppermost right corner of Facebook, click Account and choose Privacy Settings. That takes you to Choose Your Privacy Settings. Near the bottom Sharing on Facebook. Hiding at the bottom of that section is a Customize Settings link. Scroll down to Things Others Share. There’s a setting for “Permission to comment on your posts.” It works like the filter for sharing status updates: Click Customize, and enter John Doe’s name so that he can’t comment.

Check in next week when Dirt Road Media tells you about features that didn’t make Boutin’s list, including Facebook Notes. Smart Lists the meaning behind the Subscribed button.

It’s true that consumers are being blasted by email like never before. They’re also pickier about the mail they open. But sending messages directly to inboxes remains the most effective way to reach customers.

Checking email, it turns out, is a more common mobile activity than Facebook or Twitter.

According to the Subscribers, Fans and Followers report, 58 percent of consumers surveyed check their inboxes before doing anything else on the web. Another 83 percent read through all of their email. Plus,  email messages stand a greater chance at reaching mobile users than other forms of marketing because people with smartphones check their email at least three times daily.

Still not convinced that email marketing works? Well, chew on this: For every $1 spent creating an eBlast campaign, the average return is $43. Not to mention:

Email Marketing is Fast

Need to boost revenue lickety-split? Email marketing allows you to reach customers at lightening speeds. Initial campaign response generally occurs within 48 hours of launch.

Email Marketing Is Affordable

Industry estimates suggests online campaigns are 20 times more cost-effective than direct mail. Individual emails cost less than 3 cents, making eBlasts a more practical way to communicate more often with customers.

Email Marketing is Measurable

Email is easily tracked. From the moment you send it, you can see how many people opened your message, clicked certain links, forwarded it to others, liked it on Facebook or Tweeted it.

Now what?

A great subject line is a huge factor in determining if the email gets read. Most people decide which emails to read by scanning their subject lines. If the subject line is boring or smells like spam, the email will never get opened.

Build trust. Getting subscribers to opt-in to your list is one thing. Getting them to stay on is another. Keep people excited to be on your list by continually offering them what they want. Examples include valuable tips and tricks or exclusive offers.

Email regularly. If subscribers opt-in to your list but you don’t email them for a month, they probably won’t remember you. They will delete you, however. With regular rapport, subscribers learn to expect your emails and respond to them.

According to research by the Los-Angeles-based Jun Group, which produces online videos for major brands, people are more likely to follow companies that post funny videos. The kind that makes them pee their pants funny — in 15 seconds or less featuring real folks, not celebrities. Here’s a breakdown by the numbers:

• People who watch a funny video are more than three times more likely to join a brand’s Facebook page than those who watch something more serious.
• Celebrity faces drive 12 percent fewer visits than videos that feature everyday people.
• Fifteen-second spots receive the best click-through rates.
• More than half of all video viewers (63 percent) are female, and 60 percent are between 18 and 44.

Click here to see all the stats »

If you’re guilty, no big deal, but it saves copy editors tons of time deleting spaces after every sentence. And time is money. Many of our clients swear by the double-space rule, and really, if their livelihoods don’t depend on it, who am I to judge? But the fact remains. It really is only one space.

The Proof:

Exhibit A: Associated Press Stylebook, which hardcore journalists and copy editors live by, is as direct as possible: “Use a single space after a period at the end of a sentence.”

Exhibit B: Grammar Girl, an electronic, all-knowing woman of punctuation and word choices, says one space after a period. “I know it’s a hard habit to break if you were trained to use two spaces, but if you can, give one space a try.”

Exhibit C: From Wikipedia: “Double spacing stems from the use of the mono-spaced font on typewriters. If the ribbon were too dry the visibility of the period would be reduced significantly. Adding two spaces after the period ensured that the reader would know where the end of the sentence was if the period didn’t strike properly. This historical convention was carried on by tradition until it was replaced by the single space convention in published print and digital media today.”

Wow, I just realized I called some of you old, especially if you wrote college term papers on a typewriter with correction tape. You’re also set it your ways, I imagine. But this is the new rule. Embrace it. It is what its is.

Are you kidding me? You probably wouldn’t ask Joe the plumper to submit your taxes to the IRS. Even if he can, he doesn’t do it for a living. He fixes leaky pipes and clogged toilets. Clearly, the project and its importance are keys in your decision. So why would the virtual home for your business be any different?

Nearly every time I view “someone I know built mine” websites I notice red flags that indicate the person was not a professional. The sales pitch a person uses is another a clue.

What follows is a list compiled by David Walsh, co-founder of MooTools, a web coding application. If any of these things spew from the mouth of your so-called web designer, Walsh says run. I say fast.

Any web guy who calls himself a “webmaster” probably isn’t a master of anything. The term “webmaster” has become geek speak for the word “amateur.” The web has diversified into so many realms that webmaster is no longer meaningful.

Submitting your website to hundreds of search engines would be great — 10 years ago. Relevant search engines index web sites based on content and keywords. Search engine optimization is big business and submitting sites to search engines simply isn’t the way to get to the top of Google.

Your business needs someone who’s been there before. The most common answer to my “Who was he and what business did he work for?” question is “Oh, he did a website for the CEO’s daughter’s [insert lame organization here].” I hear that friend-of-a-friend story all the time. Choose someone with a sizable portfolio that can provide references.

Translation: “I can spend dozens of hours wasting your money to create something that will take too long to load and will be skipped more times than dessert at a bad restaurant.” Consistency and website flow are important to web design, not meaningless animations that waste visitors’ time and your money.

You’ll add an ugly relic of the early Internet on my site so that my competitors have an idea of my web stats? Sweet!
Counters make a website look so yesterday. Don’t use them.

Any real web developer knows that he doesn’t make the rules. Follow standards in the initial build and then fix it in Internet Explorer. That’s the flow. No responsible programmer would place a “best if view in…” message on the front-end of a website.

Bottom Line:

Your website will be competing with hundreds of thousands or millions of websites for the same customer. Ugly, inconvenient and hard to navigate won’t cut it. A bad website will cost you far more money through lost sales than what a professionally designed site would have cost to begin with.

Bottom line: free ain’t cheap.