About a year ago, a friend of mine convinced me to try out this website called Twitter. At the time, I was convinced it would be a waste of my time. I had heard the news talking about this new social media platform where people “tweet,” and how it was estimated to grow exponentially in popularity. Still, the idea of constantly telling people what I was doing by updating a status, called tweeting, seemed ridiculous. Regardless of my hesitations, I gave it a try. Within a week I was tweeting, retweeting, following people, and most importantly seeing the benefits of twitter.
The Basics
First, it’s most important to explain the basics of twitter. Twitter is a social media platform made available to the public in 2006. A “Tweet” is a post of 140 characters or less, including spaces, made by a user of twitter. Users of twitter may follow other users allowing them to choose whose posts will show up in a feed displaying, with the most recent tweet first, all of the tweets by those they follow. Users are also capable of seeing who follows them. There does not need to be a mutual relationship between two members in order for one to follow the other. In other words, just because one user follows the other, doesn’t mean the other must follow them. Each user may choose a username that will represent posts he or she creates by placing an “@” followed by the username in front of each post. Other users may also “tag” another person in their post by using the format @username within the tweet. For example, let’s assume @JohnTwitter wants to talk about @SaraTweet:
@JohnTwitter: I really enjoyed the presentation by @SaraTweet
In this example, @JohnTwitter is the person tweeting while @SaraTweet is being referred to in the tweet. Multiple people may be tagged, or referred to, in a post.
You may also stumble across an “RT” in the front or contained in the tweet. This stands for “retweet.” Retweeting is used to publish a tweet you found interesting for your followers to see while giving credit to the original author. Think of it as the equivalent of forwarding an email. It may also be used to respond to another tweet. Using the example from earlier, let’s assume @SaraTweet wants to thank @JohnTwitter for his comment:
@SaraTweet: Thank you! RT JohnTwitter: I really enjoyed the presentation by @SaraTweet.
This is an important concept to understand, for on Twitter it makes conversation less confusing when you make clear what you are referring to in your response to a post. Keep in mind some users may even update their twitter every few minutes. If you respond to a post from an hour ago and they have tweeted over twenty times since then, without designating what you are responding to, the user may get confused.
How to utilize Twitter
So what’s the point in tweeting? To those who see twitter as a means of purely telling people every single move you make throughout the day, there is much to be learned. Did you know that you could stay up to current events using twitter? Did you know that recruiters and companies post job openings on twitter?
Twitter Cofounder Dom Sagolla said in his book, 140 Characters: A Style Guide for the Short Form, “We defined a mere 1 percent of what Twitter is today. The remaining 99 percent has been, and will continue to be, created by the millions of people who make this medium their own, tweet by tweet.” Twitter is a user-generated portal of information. From links to news articles, scores for a sports game, beauty tips, product reviews, and company news to the simple day-to-day activities of an individual user, Twitter can be a powerful tool. Relationships may be built using twitter as it allows a user to really get to know a person they follow. Networking, a vital tool in the business world today, is made easy thanks to this social media platform. Twitter enables users to build and maintain brand image. Many stars use twitter to create, or at least attempt to create, positive publicity. Companies are seeing the benefits of using twitter as well. It allows them to interact with consumers and quickly respond to any questions or negative publicity on twitter. When used correctly, twitter can deliver unbelievable results.
If this evidence isn’t enough to convince you to try out twitter, consider this. A coworker of mine told me a story of how she once tweeted that she was leaving the city of Chicago to head out to a concert that night. The performer saw this tweet and asked her to purchase some specialty popcorn made in the city and bring it to the side of the stage before the concert started. Because of twitter, my coworker was able to meet the performer!
Social media is becoming a prominent feature in the Web 2.0 era. When used appropriately, Twitter can be a great communication tool for people of all backgrounds.
-Denise J. Hibbard
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