After lecturing last quarter, the host professor asked me; “How do you keep up with all that’s going on?”. I told him that I’d setup a personalized RSS feed via Twitter and because of this, I’d found numerous posts, articles, white papers, case studies and other resources that have proven to be invaluable. I don’t tweet much but am an avid Twitter user. That sounds contradictory, but it isn’t. Twitter, like other forms of social media is what you make it.
At the beginning of every quarter I have my students get set up on a personalized Twitter feed. The recipe for that is as follows:
- Create Twitter account on Twitter.com ( . . . as opposed to creating a Twitter account on eBay?!?!!?)
- Download Tweekdeck and install. (You may have to upgrade Adobe’s AIR and you don’t have to join Tweetdeck to use the tool.)
- Setup Tweetdeck with your Twitter account information.
- Got to twitter.com/michaelmyers and follow the list entitled ‘itec-4700′ (if your interested in social media & mobile marketing)
- Go to WeFollow.com and search on any subject matter you’re interested in.
The end result will be updates that pop-up on your computer screen with tweets from people that share your passion(s). (Yes. The pop-up can be a little; “LOOK!! SOMETHING SHINY!!!!” But at the very least, you have the opportunity to sift through the information. Also, Twitter is a business/personal channel and you will get some; “I’m picking up @timm from the airport”. But have no fear. The noise to signal ratio is very good.
Now. Please don’t go out and follow the world without having followers. You don’t want to look like a spam account following 4000 people with only 3 followers! There are rules for building a robust Twitter account and those rules can be found here; (1-10 at the bottom of the post).
