Twitter Seduction

It wasn’t love at first site. Not at all. The first time we hooked up, it was through my old buddy Linkedin. There was an emptiness [in my profile] that needed to be filled. So I submitted. Did some stalking, got stalked a bit and after 3 weeks I got bored. Came across Facebook, Liked it a lot and it was bye bye birdie.

Fast forward, one year later. I hit the blogging scene, again after a 5 year absence. This time around I’m hanging with the mom bloggers (completely different from my old crew – the pissed off ex-wives of cheating bastards). Not only do these women share passionate tales from their lives and helpful tips that’s got me hooked, they offer ways to engage other than the comments section. I’m seduced back to Twitter, where I can find instant gratification from tweeting with people who’ve made an impression on me. Moms that I’m interested in chatting with. Through their tweets and retweets, I’ve found other interesting people to follow, with blogs that I can’t stay away from. And yes, I swing both ways now. Following the dads too.

Scott Stratten, the president of Un-Marketing and author of “UnMarketing: Stop Marketing. Start Engaging” (great book on social media and marketing, btw), describes Twitter as being “a current chat”. I have to agree. Am I saying it’s one big chat room like the ones found on AIM or Yahoo? Not necessarily, at least not based on my experience.

My very early years in chat rooms taught me not everyone is what they seem. True, I came across a lot of cool chatters, debated about music and movies and soccer. These were conversations that came and went. I knew nothing about this people. I didn’t know if we could relate, if they could make me laugh past the present moment  or if there was something I could learn from them or help them with. And I didn’t really care. They were one night stands. But times have changed, I’ve changed, and I’m looking for more.

What Twitter Is For Me

For me, Twitter is so much more than a chat room because the people I choose to follow, that I choose to chat with are those that offer content that I can enjoy, relate to and learn from. And for me, personally, it’s a prerequisite to me following you. If you follow me first, you can bet your ass, before I follow back, I’ll check out your profile, look for your URL and check out your site first. I wanna know that we can click.

• A place to engage with people that I find interesting.
• A place to share what I know and what others know that you may find interesting because I did.
• A place to build relationships with colleagues (parent, blogger).
• A place to gain valuable advice from experts.

What Twitter isn’t for me.

• A numbers game (though I find my Klout score encouraging), played by posting quotes all they long and never actually chatting with anyone.
• A place to shove me and my posts down your throats every single moment of the day.
• A place to shove advertisements down your throat every single moment of the day, for money.
• A place to promote posts I’ve never read or haven’t found interesting or helpful, for money.

So, I’ve been bitten by the Twitter Bug. Have you? Or are you just not feeling it? My facebook page is actually suffering now because of it. Are you able to maintain both?

Illustration Credit: Svetlana Gajic via PhotoXpress

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