It doesn't take long to get a grasp on Twitter
Within a few weeks of using Twitter it becomes clear how it works and more to the point how you can make it work for you. However if you are feeling uncomfortable using it and have thoughts in your mind like:
"Why on earth am I exposing myself to this nonsense?"
or
"I really don't have time for this, it isn't working for me."
Then you might be suffering from a mismatch scenario – the platform is mismatched to you. What you need to appreciate is that there are lots of other platforms available that might better suit your skills/personality/whatever.
Don't give up, instead change platforms and give a another go!
Micro-blogging is fun for personal interaction and for business it's a very worthwhile addition to your marketing tools. Please remember though it is not a broadcast medium, people don't want to get the business 'hard sell' all the time. They want to get to know what makes the person or the company tick. It's called 'pull marketing': when you like something well enough you gravitate towards it. So when people on Twitter like your message and begin to understand your ethos, they warm to you and will in all probability want to recommend you to others at the very least, and may even choose your product over another.
Here is a superb screencast production by one of my Twitter contacts Su Butcher who uses the ID @justprofs, she explains the issues very clearly.
She tells us Twitter isn't the best interface for beginners and shows us how it let's us down, and actually I think she's quite right. Sometimes our frustration with a piece of software can deter us from using it right from the word go, other times when we use something that we like from the word go, it often becomes a favourite of ours. I guess it's the same when we meet people for the first time, we know if we will like or dislike them in the first few minutes!
Take a look at the video – see if it changes your mind, let me know how you feel about Twitter, TweetDeck and Hootsuite. Don't forget to follow me too @LadyBizBiz.
So if you give yourself a little time to acclimatise to the whole notion that Twitter is a stream of conversations between you and your followers, who might be your clients and customers, you will soon become accustomed to the method of communicating.
I think that when you are comfortable you will soon feel the need to use a different Twitter client like TweetDeck or Hootesuite. [The three clients are also available for Iphone and Blackberry incidentally, so you can keep in touch when you are on the move].
Using one of the other clients can afford you an element of increased control and management. Whether you choose TweetDeck or Hootesuite, they will both allow you to see a spread of multiple columns across your screen. This makes it much easier to manage your conversations and spot when you are being talked about, directly or indirectly, by your contacts.
There are advanced features too: these two clients that will allow you to do some interesting tracking and monitoring, but I'll save that for another blog.
It is at this stage, when you've settled in nicely, that you probably decide to split from one identity to having more than one – one Twitter account for your business identity and one for your personal identity. I recommend this as soon as possible as.
Thanks to Su Butcher for the use of her screencast.
Su manages an architectural practise in Chelmsford called Barefoot & Gilles.
You can follow her on Twitter at @subutcher and @justprofs.
