Finding The True Value of Twitter

A number of weeks ago, a good friend turned me on to the social media phenomenon called Twitter. I have to say that I’m not a heavy user of social media and quite honestly don’t see the purpose. At least that’s what I thought prior to my experience. Three months later my thoughts and feeling have changed rather significantly.

Using Twitter starts with getting online and logging in every day. A friend turned me onto an application that allows me to leverage a number of different Twitter functions. By using these tools and having hands on experience, I’m finding that Twitter provides a number of valuable resources for my day to day activities.

On a day-to-day basis, I’m involved with sales, marketing, account management and much more. Using Twitter gives me access to some of the leading authorities in my industry and others who have proficiency in the types of situations I deal with. Online social media tools allow me to connect with a variety of experts and others who have already solved some of my most difficult problems. Twitter provides direct access to many people that I otherwise would never communicate with. Celebrities, gurus, and industry experts are all available at the click of a button. Many celebrities will actually respond to you when approached directly. Truthfully I don’t know whether or not its their mom, personal assistant, or some hourly worker who is replying to my questions, but more often than not, they are filled with pearls of wisdom.

When you find a community of individuals who share your interests, concerns, and are willing to have a discussion around them, it enriches your experience. This is especially true as I have built a small following of people within my area of interest. When I have a question or topic that needs discussion, this group is always willing to share what they know and comment on my messages, also called tweets. Also called retweeting, the act of sending someones post to your follower happens frequently within the Twitter community.

You may be thinking to yourself that having an audience is a good thing, but it can also become a bit overwhelming at times. Twitter has a way to handle this as well. You can easily control who you follow and easily change your notifications. In essence, you can be very selective about who you communicate with and who communicates to you. This is a wonderful feature that helps you manage all of the messaging that happens on a regular basis.

The truth is that I was not an early adopter of social media for a number of reasons. Now that I’ve gotten some experience with Twitter and other social media tools, I better understand my initial reluctance to jump on board. I avoided social media because I simply didn’t understand it. What I didn’t realize at the time was that I’d never be able to fully appreciate it until I actually used it. Now that I have, I clearly see the value.

Michael Fleischner is a marketing expert with more than– years of marketing experience. He is also the President and founder of MarketingScoop.com which offers helpful marketing resources and SEO training.