Twitter D and Twitter Dumb!

Twitter?

I have a group of friends that are NOT technologically savvy. They don’t know a hard drive from a long drive. They do know sales and how to run a business, so how and why would they want to take the time to learn about social networking and Twitter specifically?

Well let’s first take a look at what is Twitter? Twitter is a micro blogging platform designed to let users answer the question: “What are you doing right now?” It allows friends (followers) to hear and answer that question in real time via SMS, IM and webpages.

Purpose

How you use Twitter really depends on your purpose. Is it for personal use or for business or both? Depending on how you answer that question will define your parameters of: what you tweet about, how often you tweet, the language you use and the people that follow.

Since you are a reader of this blog I’m going to assume that you are using Twitter for mostly business use.

Here are some different ways to use Twitter:

Opinions-You can share your opinion on a certain subject, current event.

Research-Asking your followers their opinion on a product idea, what they like/dislike, what they are currently using?

Live news/Updates-With Twitter you can hear/tell about industry news while it happens. If you are at a conference and Bill gates announces that he is going to give all his money to me. You can let me know. (that would be very appreciated)

Sharing/Broadcasting- If you find an interesting article or blog post that is relevant to your followers, you can share it with a link (twitter automatically inserts it using tinyurl.com). If the articles are of interest this will build followers that are interested in the same type of information as you. I use a twitterfeed.com to broadcast any new blog post to my twitter followers automatically.

Branding/Microblogging-When the above strategies are used correctly one of the benefits is branding. You will become a credible resource a trusted resource. We teach the definition of marketing as getting someone with a need to know, like and trust you. Twittering is perfect to help enforce all of those criteria.

Answer Questions-If you see a tweet asking for advice or guidance on your topic, you can answer it. This will do two things. It will further establish you as an industry expert and if your answer is compelling others will begin to follow you.

Tips for effective Twittering

When Twitter remember every tweet counts!! You are either moving your brand and reputation forward or backward that is why is very important that you really consider what is the purpose of your Tweet and ask yourself if your followers really care?

Followers are no good to you and your circle of influence if they don’t care. So take caution and only Tweet on subjects that your ideal client would be interested in. It does no good to have 10,000 followers if they are following you because you did a massive ‘followers’ campaign-if they aren’t in your target audience. Getting followers for a followers sake just isn’t valuable.

Monitor your Tweets vs. reply. If you Tweet too often you may start to dilute your effectiveness. It is the law of scarcity. In addition, if you have too many reply’s and no tweets you may confuse your follower (remember they only see half the conversation). I usually answer a question publically three times and then take it to a direct response.

Use technology to help you. I use twitter feed, friend feed and a facebook application. The possibilities are endless. I’ll write on this in an upcoming blog.

Remember that Twitter is a conversation tool. Pretend that your are in front of a room full of your potential prospects what kinds of Tweets “conversations” would you like to have with them?