I can’t believe how quickly Wednesday has arrived. Today we’re going to focus on getting connected.

Social networking isn’t a joke. If you’re doing anything worthwhile online, it almost certainly involves social media. One of the most important things you can do as a blogger (or so I hear) is getting connected to these networks and making sure other people can find you there.

Let’s take a look at three big ones:

Twitter just might be the granddaddy of all social networking. While Facebook is more popular for keeping tabs on your personal life, Twitter seems to be the means of choice for keeping up with the business side of things. Twitter currently boasts approximately 100 million active users. Most smartphones have built in Twitter integration, and lots of the popular sharing apps (Instagram, for instance) rely heavily on the network.

The advantages of being active on Twitter are innumerable.  Many people use it as a “relaxed” newsfeed; that is, rather than following an RSS feed, they’ll read your blog when you tweet about it. Lots of Twitter users aren’t tweeting; they’re simply following to keep tabs on the world. Twitter makes it easy to get in touch with someone quickly, and in many cases, get a response back nearly instantly. Additionally, you yourself can keep tabs on your network.

Facebook is more widely used than Twitter, by far, with approximately 845 million users. Even my mom has Facebook.

While I personally like to think of my blog as an entity apart from myself, and thus try to avoid linking my blog to my personal Facebook profile, I do have a page specifically for my blog.

The advantages to having an “official” Facebook page for your blog are similar to the advantages of using Twitter. You can easily update your page and your followers will automatically see what’s new on their newsfeed. Your followers can even post their own photos and start discussions if they wish.

You can manage multiple pages from your Facebook profile, and you can even interact on Facebook as that “page”. In other words, your blog can comment on and “like” things, rather than you, yourself.

Pinterest is a *must* for any creative blogger. Not only an invaluable resource, but a fantastic way to get your work seen by other like-minded people. Your Pinterest boards tell the world “Hey, this is what I’m about!” and give people a whole new reason to check out your blog.

The other facet of Pinterest is giving your followers a convenient way to file away your photos and posts. You can easily include a “Pin It” button on each blog post through the use of plug-ins or apps (the one I use in WordPress is Pinterest Pin It Button), or by using the one Pinterest itself provides, available here.

Interestingly, I pinned an image I created the day after I started this challenge, and that act alone brought over 300 more visitors to my blog than usual.

Obviously, there are more networks out there. These are just the ones that are important to me.

Today’s challenge is to get serious about your networking. If you’re already registered on some of these sits, get active! Seek out new people to follow and comment on what they’re doing. Pin more stuff. Tweet about it. But, most importantly, connect it all back to your blog. Make sure that anyone who sees you on another network can easily find your website.

To help you out, download some free social networking icons, like the ones I created here. Install them on the sidebar of your blog and encourage people to join you elsewhere on the web.

Tell me how you already use social media to enhance your blog! And if you haven’t joined the challenge yet, there’s no time like the present! Remember, everyone who joins is entered in a giveaway!