Twitip

We’re in a new age now. As social media networks, particularly Twitter, become adopted by the mainstream media and corporate marketing firms, we’re seeing an evolution in the way that products are launched. Some might say that this is nothing new, that marketing has always been about capturing the current buzz machines and playing them to your needs, but I disagree.

The difference between marketing methods of old and social media marketing is that customers have a say. The success of a social media campaign is dependent not upon how much money is spent, but upon the people being marketed to. If the message works and they like the product, the masses will Tweet it to the rest of the masses. If it doesn’t, the campaign might not even get past the initial push, and will likely spiral into oblivion. (more…)

Back in October, my wife’s Grandfather, Lou Roth, passed away at the age of 97. During funeral preparations, someone rather clueless and ignorant asked if I was going to tweet during the funeral. By the way, did I mention this was my wife’s grandfather? I knew Lou for twenty years. He was a great guy and I loved him a lot. So, I looked the offender in the eye and said, “Of course, I’ll tweet; wouldn’t miss it for the world. Which one should I start with…?”

“Damn, they’re burying him with that watch we got him for his birthday.”

Or…

“They’re lowering him into the ground now, I hope the winches don’t jam.”

Or, maybe…

“Cousin Jan looks HOT in black.”

How about…

“You’re a %#@&$ idiot for asking if I’m going to tweet during Lou’s funeral.”

Certainly there are times when it’s not only proper to tweet, but also encouraged. For example; tweeting during your child’s school play is not cool (well, maybe just one tweet for friends if you attach a picture of your kid on stage). On the other hand, tweeting during a TweetUp at NASA Headquarters is cool.

Regardless of the circumstance, one would hope that common sense would prevail. However, for those of you who are uncertain, I offer the following guide of common circumstances when it would not be appropriate to tweet.
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by LisaMarieDias – follow her @LisaMarieDias

For all the hoopla that surrounds Twitter and the myriad of apps (applications) that have sprung up to help people manage and make sense of it, I haven’t seen a single article singing the praises of Twitter’s basic search tool. And sing they should! The basic search tool that resides in the sidebar of everyone’s Twitter page is one of the quickest and easiest ways to find people, answers, trends and, if used wisely, customers and clients the world over. Here is a brief explanation of how it works and some suggestions for how it can work for you! (more…)

By James Mallinson – Follow him @jmallinson

As useful and fun as Twitter can be, it can also be both addictive and a major distraction. Many times in the past I’ve tried to write a blog post or work on some other big project and I’d lose my focus because I had Twitter open and kept getting drawn to it, wanting to tweet something, see what others were tweeting or just reply to somebody. Of course, this is a common and well documented problem with most social media sites, but I’ve found Twitter to be particularly bad, if for no other reason that it’s so simple and quick to use.

It’s now increasingly documented that multi-tasking, and just generally allowing distractions into your life is a poor way of getting things done. If you’re tweeting while trying to do your work, that work will take much longer and require more effort to do. If you don’t want to waste your time like that, try implementing these four tips when using Twitter:

Set limits

The first, and perhaps most effective measure is to set limits. That could involve having particular days on when to tweet, setting time limits or even tweet limits (how many tweets you will make per day). Rather than dipping in and out of Twitter when it calls to you, putting aside perhaps an hour a day or choosing Saturday to use it when you know you’re going to be least busy, means you can really give your tweeting the attention it deserves, and thus shut it out of your mind the rest of the time. (more…)

I know we’ve seen this topic covered in the past (How To Handle Multiple Users Within Your Company and When One Twitter Account Is Not Enough), but I just received another email from a reader asking about using Twitter in a business setting:

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Adrianos is an Internet Defamation attorney in Los Angeles and authors the California Defamation Law Blog. Follow him @adrianos.

Let me cut to the chase. You DO NOT want to be sued on Twitter.

Being sued already stinks enough. Trust me. I know all about this because I’m a lawyer and I sue people for a living (don’t hold it against me).

But being sued for a tweet is even worse.

First off, think of what your friends will say.  “Hi John, have you seen Bill lately?” “No, he was drunk-tweeting so he got sued.”  Imagine the harassment you’d experience at the hands of your buddies.  I shudder to even think about it!

Second, imagine what your customers will say when they read about it online and the headline reads, “Drunk Twit Gets Sued For Tweets.” Think they’re going to hire you again? Probably not.

Worst of all, you could lose your privilege to Tweet under Twitter’s Terms of Service. And that would mean the end of world undoubtedly.

So how do you avoid this?  I’m going to show you 10 basic ways to avoid being sued on Twitter. (more…)

By Mark Hayward – Follow him @mark_hayward.

Do you own a small business? Are you having a hard time understanding Twitter?

As a small business owner and social media user going on two years now, I can honestly say that initially I did not really see the point or power of Twitter at all.

However, after sticking it out passed the learning curve, picking up a couple of followers, and following really intelligent people, thanks to Twitter, I get to make connections and learn something new every day. In fact, at this point I feel like Twitter is a tool that all small business owners should use as part of their overall efforts to build a distributed social media footprint.

Nevertheless, if you are like many in the small business community who have tried Twitter without success, then you might be fond of saying, “I just don’t get it.” (more…)

By CR Cataunya Ransom of Mosnar Communications. Follow @Mosnarcomm.

Twitter and Tweets are the most fascinating creation on the planet. At present there is no other place on earth to engage and reach tons of millions to draw brand credibility more powerful than Twitter. Luxury is a perception and for luxury brands Twitter presents an opportunity to target niche audiences.

Within the Twitter universe it is easier to target and find those who like $1,000 Prada Tessuto Baby Bags or searching for Christian Louboutin luxury French shoes. This is why top luxury retailers such as Net-A-Porter, Louis Vuitton, and many others are all actively using Twitter! (more…)

Since new Twitter tools are popping up what seems like every day, I figured I’d give a list of some of the latest ones I’ve seen people discussing. There are the standards that most people use, like TwitPic and TwitVid.io (which we covered before here) but here are some you may not have seen before.

Photo Sharing

• Twitgoo is probably the most “Twitter-like” one of the bunch. You can tweet right from there (after logging in) and include an image right from the section where you post your Tweet.
• Pikchur Use your computer, cell phone, or any other mobile device to post your pics, and Pikchur takes care of distributing them all over the social web for you! Offers a paid “PRO” package to track stats too, which is different.
• yfrog 1. Upload an image or video from your desktop or from an URL 2. Enter your message 3. Enter your credentials to Twitter 4. Click post it. VERY simple interface. From the same people who created ImageShack.
• TweetPhoto offers a lot of the advanced options you might enjoy for free: Stats, geo-tagging, favoriting/retweeting, etc.

Video Sharing

• TwitLENS Simply login with your Twitter credentials and you are ready to start sharing media on Twitter. Uses OAuth.
• 12seconds Create short video clips that you record with your webcam, mobile phone, or upload. Show people where you are and what’s going on. Uses OAuth.
• Twiddeo Upload from the web, your cameraphone and record from your webcam.
• TwitC Use Twitc to organize, search, view, comment, share, embed, batch download, collect, favorite, rate uploads, view timelines and profiles, post links to or embed files, and send updates to your profile on Twitter, MySpace, Facebook and 35 other sites.

Are there any others that I may have missed? Have you tried any of the above? Leave your thoughts in the comments!

By Brandon Mendelson (@BJMendelson), Event Organizer for A Million High Fives (a quest to high five one million Twitter followers and volunteer with them at their local homeless shelter this August.)

For the moment, I am one of the most followed non-celebrity / musician, non-media, non-brand, people on Twitter. I follow over 300,000 of my 620,000 Twitter friends, and should Twitter lift the 1,000 follower a day cap, I hope to follow everyone back in the future.

Here are ten thoughts and observations about attempting to interact with 600,000 people.

1. The browser remains the best way to manage Twitter.
I need a quick and efficient way to keep track of many tweets. After using all of the alternatives out there, using a web browser is the best way to go. I always see fresh content, and I can hit the back button in case I miss something.

2. It is impossible to see every single tweet from every single user.
I found it difficult to see every tweet at 1,000 followers, and it became a fool’s errand at 10,000.

What I do, is keep track of individual people, not tweets. You CAN keep track of thousands of individual people. I jump into the conversation’s I see on the stream and if I need to catch up or learn more about someone, I visit their profile.

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