July 28, 2009
I recently signed up for Twitter. I intended to check it out, confirm that it was nothing more than a time dump and close my account.
A few weeks later I stand corrected. Based on media coverage I expected to find inane “tweets” (messages) proclaiming trivial personal news like what someone had for breakfast. Instead, I found a community of business people exchanging tweets with links to interesting articles, workshops, seminars, late breaking business news, business tips, famous business quotes and even job openings.
Every tweet is a broadcast by the tweeter to everyone following him/her. The tweets you see are only from those people you choose to follow. You follow someone by clicking on a button. From then on, anything that person tweets will show up in your “stream” (flow of tweets). If someone turns out to be a dud, you can unfollow them with another click.
Finding my business community was an easy process. Over the first couple of weeks I found my share of inane tweeters and spammers but I also found plenty of tweeters who shared my professional interests. I “followed” them and they “followed” me. Through their profiles I could see who they followed. Checking out who they followed was an effective way to find other people for me to follow.
As my list of follows and followers expanded, I outgrew the basic Twitter platform. Twitter itself is the base for sending and receiving tweets but it doesn’t have tools to help manage the steady flow of tweets throughout the day. Fortunately, there are numerous third party applications like Tweetdeck and Seesmic that allow you to sort tweets into groupings.
I use Tweetdeck. I have an “A” List group which includes those I want to follow closely, a “B” List which includes those I want to follow as time permits, and a general list that includes everyone else. I don’t often get to the general list but from time to time I will look it over and find people that look interesting and promote them to the higher ranked groups. I also have a “mentions” group where any responses to my tweets pop up.
The only cost to Twitter is time and an internet connection. All the software is free and most of the add-ons are free. I’ve not come across any need to purchase anything. You can do quite well with the hundreds of free apps available online.
I’m doubtful that there is profit to be made from using Twitter. The value I see is in the personal network it allows users to create. I have made several valuable connections that would not likely have been made otherwise. Twitter may not become a direct source of profit but it can be a great resource of useful connections and information.
If you would like to check out Twitter for yourself, go to http://twitter.com.
Doug Edgar is president of Compass Strategies, an executive coaching and business advisory firm and can be reached at doug@compass-strategies.ca, www.compass-strategies.ca.
