Twitter: Looking beyond the stupid stuff
So it finally happened. I read a "tweet" this week about someone having a bowel movement.
It was just like any other day. I was perusing social networking site Twitter when I came across this clear example of too much information.
A lot of people think Twitter is all about inane stuff like this, but in reality bowel-movement notifications are a rarity among the great comments you find on this Web site. Basically, Twitter is a place where people share a sentence or two about something great they read, or an interesting blog post they wrote.
It's also an ideal place to get the word out about your service or product -- for free.
At a time when the economy seems to be squeezing almost every small business, Twitter is increasingly making economic sense for entrepreneurs who don't have money to burn on marketing.
Take Stephanie E. Estrin, president and founder of CurlyQ Cuties, a company that makes handmade monster dolls.
Her company, based in Cedar Park, Texas, is about a year old and she's been on Twitter since October. She already has about 2,800 followers. (You can find them at: http://twitter.com/CurlyQCuties.)
Basically, Twitter is a service that allows individuals to post comments of 140 characters or less on any topic imaginable. The idea is to write interesting short comments, called "tweets," and get people (friends or strangers) to follow you.
"We use it to get the word out about who we are; to get people to notice us," Estrin says about Twitter. "It has generated several sales for sure."
The key for a small business is not hitting people over the head when you advertise on Twitter -- that's a sure way to get followers to stop following you. There's nothing I hate more than being constantly barraged by a company hawking their product. Subtle hawking, even funny hawking, is fine though.
Estrin seems to have it down when it comes to promoting her business.
"I don't bombard people with tweet after tweet saying: 'Come look at my site.'" she explained.
Here's one of her recent tweets:
We're still here pumping out Monsters ... just very busy and haven't had a spare moment to tweet. Have you hugged your Monster today?
Twitter can also be used as a research tool. Estrin recently asked her large pool of Twitter followers if they'd be willing to pay more for shipping if she switched to a different carrier. The answer was a unanimous no.
She also got some feedback from the Twitter community regarding where she could buy certain labels for her printer.
"We use it a lot," she admits.
So what do you have to lose? Head over to Twitter and give it a whirl. You can even follow me: http://twitter.com/careerdiva. I promise I'll follow you back.
If you do decide to advertise on Twitter, just don't use it like a press release. You'll get a lot of twitt-a-holics like me tweeting about how much that bugs us … it's almost as bad as potty humor.
