I've been introduced to a new 'net gimmick that threatens to be very dangerous to my time. Reading John Jantsch's Duct Tape Marketing Blog, there was a post about new Web 2.0 goodies, and how they pop up all over the place, and many seem ridiculous on the surface.
John recounted how he thought Twitter was in this category, and was promptly set straight by his 16-year-old daughter.
So I took a look...on the surface, it does in fact seem like some silly timewaster for kids to send shoutouts to their friends. But wait! I started reading the profiles...there are GROWNUPS there. And many of them seem to know each other in some sense, as many appear to be congregating at various conferences and festivals. AND...
People who are apparently far ahead of me on the curve are using it for specific, productive purposes:
- Conference attendees are posting snips about the event and giving heads-up as to where they can be found by whoever is interested.
- News channels are posting headlines.
- John Edwards is sending play-by-plays of his travels and appearances
- Personal profiles give a quick snip of what we are about, and have a spot to link to our website, MySpace page, or blog.
Lessons learned?
- I need to get my head out of my MBA and pay more attention to what's going on out here.
- There are SO many small, free ways to promote ourselves...it's on us to get creative and smart about it.
- Listen to your kids. They may be seeing things more clearly than you are.
So, I've got Twitter in my contact list on my phone so I can text anytime, anyplace, and downloaded a little app that allows me to feed my pending addiction to posting updates and reading the public timeline without actually going ot the site....
