What is Twitter, and Why Should I Care?

Twitter is stupid simple. So why doesn’t anyone seem to “get it”? The problem centers around what it was ostensibly designed for, and how gurus and businesses figured out how to exploit it.

Twitter was “supposed to be” a way for you to keep up with the friends in your clique. You and your friends would all create accounts for yourselves, and then you’d post “tweets”—a 160 character or less message—whenever you did something you thought was interesting, and everyone of your friends would receive your tweet. They could even get the tweet on their cell, for those over-connected folks.



This quickly degraded from, “Hey everybody, let’s all meet at Joes Bar and Grill at 6:30 tonight,” to “I’ve been working in my garden today,” to “I just gave my cat a bath.” Ouch.

In true social networking fashion, Twitter let’s you see who is following whom. Of course, that means you can enlarge your circle of connections by following (and being followed by) your friends’ friends. Now things are totally out of control, or heading exactly in the right direction—depending on what you’re trying to accomplish.

Frankly even your friends aren’t that interested in your garden or your self inflicted pet-bathing wounds. A good way to get “un-followed” is to post self-indulgent garbage when you’re being followed by people several circles out from your inner circle of friends.

However, what if you’re “somebody,” or are at least trying to be somebody? For instance, you’re a musician and you want to use Twitter. If someone is following you, they probably are interested in your latest work! Show schedules or blog links about the creative process could be nice, too. Collaborations could be pretty cool.

If you’re in business you probably want to be seen as a “guru” or key information broker. PLEEEEEEZE don’t say anything about your cat unless you tie directly into a business point—and with 140 characters, it’s unlikely that you can. However, those of us following you might be interested in knowing where you’re spending today, tomorrow, etc. We’d like to know if you’re attending a business conference that you think we should attend, too. Hey, while you’re there, maybe you could use Twitter to become our reporter on the scene—Twitter pithy quotes out from other speakers. You’ll be a hot topic in business meetings around the country for days, and the “go to” guy or gal when you get back.

Once you get more creative there are probably dozens of ways to use Twitter. Just make sure you think of the people following you. They won’t all “get” you, but if you kep sending out news they can use, your opportunity to build and keep a following increases dramatically.

Definition of Terms

Okay, this is for the new kids. If you know social networking, skip this one.

But if you’re new, you might want to understand some basic terminology.

Social networking – This is a verb, an activity that describes the use of websites and social media to find and connect with individuals who may share your interests. These interests could include professions, hobbies, health, entertainment, likes, dislikes, politics, charities, sports—just about anything that you’d talk about with others at a networking event or the water cooler. The range of interests goes from the super-serious to the downright frivolous.

Social media – This is a plural noun, and it is the over-arching term for online mechanisms that facilitate social networking. The core of these mechanisms—blogging, video posting, audio posting, virtual world gaming, etc.—are important, but not the key definition of social media. For it to truly be social, the medium in question must provide a way for people to connect. For instance, if you can write a blog, but there is no mechanism to leave comments or interact with the author—or other readers, for that matter—you can challenge whether it is a social medium at all. The “medium” is there, but the “social” is not.

Web 2.0 – This is the so-called “state of the art” of social media. It refers to the advanced capabilities of the media, and we’ll discuss some of those later. Sure, you can think of things like video—now a rather simple capability—but it refers more to things like mashups (combining data sources to provide something new altogether), Short Messaging Service (SMS), texting and virtual worlds.

Adapting to the New Social Change

The telephone became widely available in the US in the early 20th century. I suspect you were too young to remember, but have you ever read about it? At first, only a few segments of the population adopted it, and then only in limited ways. The wealthy had telephones, perhaps one per household. Businesses only had one or two lines, because having a phone on everyone’s desk would tempt them to waste their time on phone calls! Watch any old Cary Grant movies—like His Girl Friday from 1940—and you’ll see the telephone positioned as a glamorous accessory. Eventually, the device showed up everywhere, on everyone’s desk, in the kitchen, the bedroom, even some bathrooms. This luxurious, potentially time-wasting item is now considered absolutely essential. A similar arc of acceptance happened with the personal computer, the cell phone, the Internet and email. If you shun them these days, you’re probably considered a dinosaur.

We’re well into the new century, and you might be feeling a little lumbering and cold-blooded, yourself, by now. With all the new gadgets, applications and Internet fads it’s hard to know what’s an important tool and what’s trivial pursuit. Gee whiz features abound, and it’s very easy to categorize them as “fun but worthless.” In some cases you’d be right.

In fact, online social networking is not a new phenomenon, nor a fad. In a technological sense, it has been around since 1969. The Internet, in its earliest form as the ARPAnet, utilized significant social aspects. It originally provided scientists an easy way to share ideas, data, and writings. In short, it facilitated collaboration—a social networking activity by its very definition. Now, thousands—if not hundreds of thousands—of social networking websites, applications, and tactics litter the landscape. Your kids probably know how to “work” them better than you do. Still, few people really know how to truly “employ” them.

Stay tuned, because that’s what I’ll be talking about here.

Warning: Social Networking is Dangerous

Now that I have your attention, I can tell you that it’s not that dangerous. Do you drive a car to work? Do you sometimes walk down city streets? Ever had a successful conversation with a stranger that didn’t end up with you badly hurt or robbed?

All of these just require a little common sense to do them with an acceptable degree of risk. Participating in social networking is the same. You learn the rules, play well, and learn how to protect yourself. You’ll be fine.

So, a few things to consider:

• Don’t rant. A comment on someone’s post should be interesting, analytical, friendly, courteous, kind, etc.—but never off the hook angry. It will stay around for a lot longer than you are mad, and it may come back to bite you.

• Stay “a little bit anonymous.” Don’t publish your phone number on the Internet unless you’re really ready for it. Offering a product or service personally? Give them an email address and a PO Box—but not your street address. If you need to indicate your location, be general (Boston, instead of Wellesley). Use a professional name, pen name or stage name if it makes sense.

• Don’t stay in a fight. If you get attacked, walk away. Block the troll commenter from your blog site, stop reacting to a personal attack. It will just go on and on, and there is no point. And you end up looking as bad as the troll if you’re not careful.

• Your boss is looking at you. Remember that when you post a waist-up naked pic of yourself, or drunken shots of the next party—or let your friends do it. It was on a site for just your friends? You’re just a “right-click/copy picture” away from someone who has had a falling out with you broadcasting it to the world.

When you’re on the Internet, just remember that when you post something, comment, or generally make a fool of yourself it is in front of an audience of millions, or at least could be. If that is what you’re planning, that might be okay. If it’s an accident, watch that first step—it’s a doozy.

So, You Want to Play in Social Networking?

It may seem a little silly to use a social medium to help educate people about social media. But a blog (weblog) like this is one of the simplest and effective ways to get the word out quick, even if you’re not much of a social network user.

Has your company started pondering the use of social networking to help market its products and services? Is your organization considering using social networking to shore up its product support with users, customers and clients? Are you playing catch up with more savvy colleagues or find there are few around you who understand social networking, including yourself?

I’m here to help you fill in the gaps, assess the benefits, and get you rolling, IN addition to this blog, you can completely jumpstart our social networking knowledge by reading my short primer on the subject—What is Social Networking and How Will it Help My Bottom Line?

Do you need to get your executive team up to speed fast? You can certainly send them her or to my book for fast-start information. You many also want to invitee me in for a full or half-day work shop. Your head may be spinning with all the new ideas and terms, but we’ll get you grounded fast, and you’ll be up and running!