Last week, I sat on an emerging technologies panel at the South Carolina PRSA conference. This was a great opportunity to introduce a tool like twitter to a room full of professional communicators. It doesn't matter if you work for a 500-donor nonprofit or a publicly traded behemoth like Google, tools that facilitate disintermediation are becoming more and more relevant to marketing, and Twitter is no exception.
So since I know some of you are out there tech evangelizing everyday, I thought a few of my Twitter-related slides might prove useful to you. I've uploaded a PowerPoint file with 10 graphical slides that you can use to your heart's content. It's not much, but hey - if it saves you a few minutes while working on a presentation, that's just more time for you to tweet. Enjoy!
Have you checked out Woopra yet? Woopra is a web
analytics tool that not only delivers revolutionary real-time data, but does so
with stunning beauty. The day trader vibe of the user interface makes me
think all webmasters using this tool will soon be channeling their inner Jim Cramer,
with a touch of Jason Calacanis thrown in.
Check out this video for a great tour.
Most of the base
features you would find in any analytics tool are there, but then
Woopra takes it to a whole new level by adding rich visitor
interactivity. Here are some things that stood out to me:
- Live web tracking - Yeah, the real time stuff looks incredible.
- Visitor and member tagging - By tapping into membership
data in tools like Wordpress and vBulletin, known visitors can be tagged and
monitored as they navigate your site.
- Visitor chatting - The ability to open a chat session with
a visitor you are monitoring, or vice versa (WHAT?!?!) I'll have to see
this to believe it, but it sound pretty amazing.
- Real-time notifications - Woopra can send you alerts when
specific actions take place (user X views product page, user Y is
starting a new discussion, etc.)
So, if you can get over the stalker-esque nature of this app, sign up for the beta to get your hands on it. If you want to learn more, check out Cali Lewis' coverage of the tool at GeekBrief.tv.
As with most webby-types, I'm becoming hopelessly addicted to Twitter. That
said, I have a lot of trouble explaining to skeptics how tiny updates
about what people are doing can actually be useful. They don't see that
while Twitter appears to be about nothing, it is really about everything
(I'm starting to understand how Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David must
have felt pitching their show "about nothing" to NBC.)
CommonCraft
said it best: real life is what happens between blog posts and emails, and now there's a way to share. Watch the video and see for
yourself...their explanation is right on the money. To me, following the right person on Twitter is like shadowing a mentor - the content comes from in the field, is timely, and can be extremely useful. Following someone on Facebook feels like I'm reading their yearbook or dorm room door - the content is planned, often stale, and typically unhelpful (groups, causes, and apps aside...but stay with me). If you don't believe me, check out these updates from my Twitter and Facebook feeds:
Twitter feed:
- CaliLewis: Shooting live on www.GBTVlive.com now. Will give away eight Woopra invites randomly. Must log into geekbrief.tv & have left a comment.
- ntenhross: very concise, easy outline to ensure email delivery for orgs newer to all this: http://snurl.com/23h6r-snit
- WilHarris: WT? New Kids on the Block are back??
- bwjacobs: Thundercats are GO for Cocoa Infinity build!
- JasonCalacanis: Google Analytics now supports hourly/weekly/monthly reports! Thank you Google Gods!!! I love you!!! kiss kiss: http://tinyurl.com/392ct8
Facebook feed:
- Rachel Hutchisson and Colleen Troy are now friends.
- Rich Conte added the Dogbook application.
- Erin Watson is attending SCPRSA Spring Conference.
- Meg Trott, Suzann Wolfe, Violet Meyer and Seth Greathouse changed their profile pictures.
- Get Blockbuster By Mail for only $3.99 a month.
It's not even a contest. Facebook is telling me about updated profile photos, installed applications, and products I may want to buy - this is not real life. Twitter is telling me about updates to Google Analytics, how to get Woopra invites, Blackbaud product information, and new tech tools for nonprofits - this is real life. This is useful. Don't get me wrong - there are plenty of "I just ate a hamburger" posts on Twitter, but the useful content tends to stand out.
I think Veronica Belmont described it well: Twitter is great for keeping tabs on internet friends (professionals, peers, partners, etc), while Facebook is great at keeping track of brick and mortar friends (family, classmates, neighbors, etc). That's a great way to look at it, and makes sense. Web-savvy types want to connect directly with followers via mobile phones, IM, and laptops in order to push the industry forward. My cousin just wants to find his old girlfriend from high school or post photos of his frat party - that's a different need, and it requires a different tool.
In the end, it's the concept of Twitter that is useful and historic. This is the first truly mobile platform providing busy professionals, celebrities, and other notables with an easy and safe way to directly communicate with their followers (and it works for the rest of us as well). When you've got a full calender, it's hard to blog or make phone calls...especially to your fans. But at 140 characters or less, there is always time to tweet...and thanks to Twitter, someone just might be listening.
Follow me!