Those of us who spend significant percentages of our public time talking about Twitter and social media, often hear the same question voiced over and over again. It my seem redundant to us, but it makes overwhelmingly clear what the barriers are: what reason people have to not use Twitter.
On the short list of these questions is: "How can a message constrained to 140 characters possibly have value?"
It takes more than 140 characters to answer it.
First off, the question often reveals a traditional marketer's mindset: How do I get a message out? How do I get people to buy my goods and services in a measly 140 characters.
The answer is that you don't. Twitter does not work well as a one-directional message-sending tool. It is more like a telephone. One person speaks and another listens. The parties go back and forth. The person who started the conversation often finds greater value in what she or he is told, than in the brief words that initiated the conversation.
Second, Twitter is a business tool that is best used in conjunction with other social media tools. It's advantages are that it is very fast for spreading ideas, information or just interesting thoughts. It is broad and shallow, while other tools such as blogs, podcasts or even wikis go much deeper.
Let's compare Twitter to a hammer. Both are diverse in the ways you can use them. You can use a hammer to build a house or perhaps bludgeon a spouse. In either case using a saw to help you with the job will usually prove useful and productive.
That gets me to the third frequently asked set of questions: "Exactly what do I use the thing for?"
The answer they hate to hear is precisely the one I have to give: Use it for whatever you want to do with it. Twitter is not an application. It is a communications tool or platform. You can use Twitter in as many ways as a telephone or email.
Then there is the dreaded ROI question, the one that makes Twitter and social media champions roll their eyes toward the sky with Pavlovian consistency.
There are somethings that have clear value but are difficult to measure. For example, I have elected to wear pants at every face-to-face business meeting I've ever attended. I cannot think of any way to measure the value, but I know it's there. I know in most cases the pants have greater value than say my wearing a skirt or no pants at all.
But I cannot give you the comparative ROI on the investment.
Nor can I quantify the value of a good telephone conversation; a customer whose problem got painlessly fixed by a support technician; a CEO spending five days of company tie and money to speak at an industry gathering; or a holiday donation to a homeless shelter.
Yes, there is a value to each of these things and somehow it translates to the bottom line. Yes, all things in business need to be measured to be understood and to scale. But more and more, measurement has become more complex.
When you understand what it is you want to do with Twitter, then you can find what it is you need to measure. Their are many tools and people who will help you.
And that brings me to the final and most difficult to answer of my frequently asked questions: "Why should I use Twitter."
My blunt answer is: "Whatever you want." Just like that hammer and phone.
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At the end of the day, after much debate surrounding the use of twitter and trying to justify it and/or defend it, I came to the same blunt conclusion: do it for whatever reason you want to do it. What a breath of fresh air… Thank you!
I whole heartedly agree with what Tony Serve said, the brevity of Twitter is really only surface level, by including links, hashtags, and @replies, there is a slurry of possible destinations from one, compact tweet.
I also don't know if I understand your telephone analogy. As far as I've used Twitter, it's not so much a back-and-forth dialogue as one of absorbing what others have displayed. When I speak on the phone it's an A-B conversation (A says something, B responds, A asks a question, B answers, A yells obscenities, B hangs up, and so on), whereas on Twitter I don't necessarily expect a response. Moreover, if I were to get a response to every single tweet (there are days it feels like that), I certainly couldn't be bothered to reply to all of them, because by then we're not talking about my original content.
Just thought I'd put my two cents in, keep up the great work!
Nice article.
Another aspect to twitter is that u r never restricted to 140 chars- shortened links mean easy inclusion of rich media and multiple links.
Saying twitter doesn't offer depth is like saying how can a small thing like an iPhone do any real work. :-)
cheers
tony
@perthtones
tonyserve.wordpress.com
Seth, I have often used a similar analogy about blades on a deserted island.
If you only have one, you'd probably want a machete. All-purpose. Durable. Hefty. Up to the big jobs.
If you have a whole knife drawer to fill, then you will want carving knives and butcher knives and saws, even exactos and scalpels.
The right tool for the right job.
People who whine about Tweets being too brief to be of value need to rethink the necessity of motorcycles, shot glasses, or anyone who performs surgery with anything less than a chainsaw.
You just made my DAY! I think I love you, Shel!!! :) (That's in response to ROI) ;o)
The value in 140 characters is more than most people understand. After all, how many of us still remember old ad logos like: If you don't look good, we don't look good? or: It's the real thing.
The first 140 characters are the impetus to a conversation. Sentences frequently don't have more than 140 characters, so the volley of back and forth 140 character sentences is not nearly as difficult to follow as is assumed. (I really despise the word assume. I can NOT say it without thinking about my 6th grade teacher telling us it makes an ass/u/me GRR)
Anyway, I love this article, Shel and your description is pretty right on. You just gave the world a way to accept the ROI is palpable without knowing why. Go patent that or something. Someone else surely will.
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