The Serious Tweep (Part 3)

First the links to Part 1 and Part 2.

Now (drum roll) Part 3 of how to be a Serious Tweep.

Twitter is a communication tool.
It usually works best as a conversation tool.

There are a few exceptions and I'll mention them in a future article.

Let's begin with real life. Face to face relationships.

The best conversations involve two or more people talking back and forth.

Each takes turns speaking and listening.

Twitter has limits of 140 characters per tweet. Similar to Text Messaging which usually has a 160 character limit.

So Twitter is by design a conversational platform.

Here's an example from yesterday, I asked my friend Kevin a question:

@ScLoHo: @kmullett I want to find a tweet I sent on Feb 26th... Is there a quick way to find it?

Kevin responded:

@kmullett: @ScLoHo if you know a phrase in it you can try tweetreach or you can use tweetreports


Two minutes later, I sent Kevin a message:

@ScLoHo: @kmullett Thanks, Tweetreach found it. I called someone the wrong name. Oops!

Now, you may be asking, why don't you just send a text message?

Because if Kevin was not available to answer my question, maybe someone else would. And they did:

@kristofcreative: @ScLoHo Can also do conversation search like this http://bit.ly/elERgD /@kmullett

Now I had not met Kristof before, but he saw my question and chimed in with another answer which I also checked out.

(I also decided to check Kristof 's Twitter Profile and discovered he is friends with others I know, and I added him to the people I follow on Twitter.)

Twitter has an additional feature called ReTweet or RT.

RT allows you to send a tweet to your followers and gives credit to the source.

I RT'd to my 1500 followers:

@ScLoHo: RT @kristofcreative: @ScLoHo Can also do conversation search like this http://bit.ly/elERgD /@kmullett

And Alan, I just met a few days ago on Twitter, retweeted it to his 2000 followers:

@aknecht: RT @kristofcreative: @ScLoHo Can also do conversation search like this http://bit.ly/elERgD /@kmullett

And Kevin also retweeted to his 2900 followers:

@kmullett: RT @kristofcreative: @ScLoHo Can also do conversation search like this http://bit.ly/elERgD /@kmullett

One question was asked, two people answered and the message reached potentially:

Kristof: 2900 followers
Alan: 2000 followers
Kevin: 2900 followers
Me: 1500 followers

Add it up and that's 9300 people. Now there is some overlap, and not everyone who is following is paying attention, but what if just 10% saw that. That would be 930 people.

930 people learned something, not just me.

More tomorrow. Your questions and comments are always welcome