Technically it's called a 'micro-blog'. If you know anything about the history of blogging you'll know that blogs started out as an online journal - people used them to talk about what they were doing and share their thoughts with whoever was reading.
When Twitter came along it limited people's rambling to 140 characters. That's a challenge that has taught millions of people to be succinct! It means you can't write a long piece, you have to get your thought over in just a few words (typically about 20).
The challenge, with so few characters, is to write something that other people will find interesting - and, hopefully, respond to and/or share.
In the early days of Twitter (back in 2006) there were a lot of people 'having a cheese sandwich for lunch' and 'just off to take the dog for a walk' (and there are still plenty of tweets that aren't very interesting). The people who really got Twitter used it to 'join up the dots'.
What do I mean by that?
Twitter is great to use for finding interesting content so if you follow people who post it, you'll be able to keep up with your chosen areas of interest easily. For instance, if you follow the thought-leaders in your area of interest you'll get to see all their blogs and stay right up-to-date with the latest information in that area.
You can also get followers by sharing (Retweeting) posts that lead to great blogs, articles and websites and gain a reputation for being up there at the leading edge. It's called 'curating content' - in other words being someone who is 'in the know'.
Some people see Twitter as a numbers game - the more followers the better, but I see it as a connecting tool - the right followers who get benefit from what I post will share my content with their followers and spread the word.
You can start conversations by responding to comments that interest you - but Twitter isn't like Facebook, it's unlikely that you're going to have an in depth conversation on Twitter, but it's a great place to start the conversation. If someone is interesting then take the conversation into a convenient coffee shop (if geography allows) or onto Skype for a proper chat.
For people to find you worth following you need to forget about cheese sandwiches and step away from the 'what am I doing right now' concept that started it. The secret of success is to post things that add value for the people reading your Tweets. This means:
- Tips - your posts
- Advice - in response to other people's questions
- Interesting facts - that are relevant to your areas of expertise
- Quirky info - anything you think might capture people's attention
- Asking questions - people on Twitter are really helpful and will usually respond if you ask good questions
- Links to your blogs
- Links to other people's blogs that you've found valuable
If you usually post good quality material you can get away with a bit of promotion if you've got a new products or service about to launch.
Never ONLY post a link though - always tell people what the link is about; there's so much phishing online that a link with no explanation can be seen as dangerous.
Make sure you review your feed at least once a day - I use Hootsuite to manage my Twitter as it makes it really easy to see when people have commented and enables me to respond promptly.
Twitter is a means of making connections that you can then explore further if you think there's value in that.
