Do you really have a problem of what to talk about on twitter? Judging by the chatter in the meetings I have been part of none of us has a problem actually communicating so why is twitter an issue?
Yes you only have 140 characters… but that does include links, pictures or documents… so where therefore is the problem?
What you are actually saying is you don’t understand how to use it…
So think pub… you wander in and see a few people you knew, listen for a bit… someone may ask you question and you answer it… you may ask someone a question and hopefully they respond… see you’re getting it. Twitter is just about talking. But actually it is also very clever too..
You can find what people are talking about in areas… you can follow a hash tag (#) and see a stream of tweets on a particular subject in something like hootsuite, marketmesuite or even twitterfall and start listening to or following people who are contributing.
So we can all listen… and guess what at some point someone will ask for help… and you may be able to or may know someone who can… so you will pipe up and suggest something or someone…
Or you may need something or someone and you ask the world… someone who knows you may try their friends too and retweet your request… they want to help you, which is nice… and actually before long quite a few people are connected listening and chatting…
By looking for people around you there is much more chance of you actually meeting up and they may even be on your doorstep without you actually realising it. It is amazing that so few people actually talk to the people around them and it constantly amazes me… but actually we are probably all connected to everyone in our town or city by a handful of people we know but we never explore this..
Once you have a few people following or listening to you on twitter it may be worthwhile looking at their profiles and seeing just what they do. Have a look at their twitter stream and see what they are chatting about… you never know you may be able to help them.. even if it takes a little digging.. so why not? Does it really hurt to open a door for someone? No of course not… so why not do it some more??
Image via Wikipedia
By the way size does not matter… don’t worry about not having telephone numbers following, we’ll leave that to the likes of Justin Beiber and Charlie Sheen. It is about quality for a local business.. and interaction… so the old ROI is now Return on Interaction. Making your business more visible and in the right place at the right time… more of the time….
Twitter is also for having fun, in public. So join in some banter and chat about #football, #scd, #cricket, #xfactor because there are large numbers of people for any of those things… and there is every possibility that someone in your area is also chatting about those things and when we have something in common it makes striking up a conversation much easier.
Really all I am saying is find something to chat about… because from where I am standing it is normally a question of how to shut people up not encourage them to say something… Yes it is a new place… but you only have to do something once to take the fear out of it and it isn’t really scary on-line.
Twitter is one of the fastest growing social networks ever and it can’t be that difficult to understand or no one would be using it… Did I mention it is also very addictive…? Sorry about that it is…. So get posting your tweets… little and often is best. I look forward to seeing you on-line…
Let us know what you enjoy talking about…