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Image by Dom Dada via Flickr
I witnessed Twitter go from a mostly Silicon Valley “techy” type audience to it’s marketer inundation to it’s rise to fame and widespread celebrity adoption to well known internet marketers like Perry Belcher, Frank Kern, and just recently John Reese, calling Twitter quits.
I pretty much saw it all and tried or tested much of it. At least what I felt didn’t conflict with my own ethical judgements of marketing online.
Such an easy little idea whose 140 character limit was to simplify the way we communicate became a limitless array of information bringing along with it a slew of supporting tools and websites. For marketers it became an excellent testing ground for social persuasion and response experiments.
As more and more people used it, its uses and misuses also became apparent.
There were the debates on auto-following or not, wether auto-posting was disingenuous or efficient, wether google search could keep up with real-time searching, contests, a myriad of ebooks and courses on how to profit from it (of which I only endorsed one by the way), dealing with DM spam, and of course the occasional “I’ll retweet yours if you retweet mine” requests.
I for one can tell you that I certainly benefitted from the traffic, branding, and list-getting advantages of using Twitter. And boy was it convenient. Since Twitter was so widely adopted, it became a central hub of sorts where you could make one tweet and like Emeril would say, Bam! it’s propagated and syndicated to hundreds of other sites. Ah, the beauty of RSS.
Not to mention the fake ego boost having lots of social followers can give. (Hey, I’m not perfect. Even I fell for that one. 
)
And though I have seen a decline in response, interaction and real conversation, I don’t think we’re asking the right question.
It’s not about the death of Twitter, or the next Facebook, or will Buzz be a buzz kill for all.
If history has taught us anything, especially online, is that the only thing you can count on is change.
There will always be something better, something cooler, or a new fad and flavor of the week.
To me the question should not be wether Twitter is dead or not.
The question should be wether YOU should be using it for your business.
Actually the question should be wether ANY social website or tool is right for YOU?
And that’s going to depend on two things:
1. Know WHY you are using any social media site and be very clear about what you want to accomplish. Get specific.
Investors set ROI goals to determine if an investment is worth holding onto or not. EVEN if it is profitable, IF it doesn’t meet the criteria specified in the beginning, it’s discarded. Why? Because they understand the value of our most important resource – time. So, what’s the minimum number of sales acceptable to justify your time? How many opt-ins? You’ll have to know that. What numbers are worth your investment of time in social media?
2. Will this site move me closer to and directly support my current business goals?
If not, then ax it. Obviously, this question implies that you know exactly what you want out of your business in the first place. If you do, then this one question will help you eliminate so many distractions. I know it’s helped me tremendously. From who you give your time to, to what phone calls you take, what meetings you attend, what emails you read and respond to, which sites you spend time on, if you ask that one question through out the day you’ll be able to make split decisions on wether to pursue something or not.
I’ll leave you with some advice that I learned some time ago. If you master the fundamentals, you can take those skills and apply them to ANY venue.
Look at the people making a killing on Facebook. They honed their skills on Google PPC and when Facebook’s ad network was born, they
just applied what they had already mastered, adjusted to the new platform and bada bing bada boom! They were rocking and rolling again.
And like John Reese said on the topic:
“But when it comes to business, and for
making money, it’s about the FUNDAMENTAL
things that make business (especially
online) work…- Serving a target market.
- Providing value to that market to
solve their problems.
- Lead generation.
- Building a list of prospects and
customers in that market so you can
follow-up, strengthen your relationship
with them, and also make offers that
generate revenue for you.That’s it. That’s what generates
millions of dollars.”
Couldn’t have said it better myself.
It’s not the hammer that matters, it’s the skill of the person using it.
The hammer is Twitter today, Buzz tomorrow, and it will be something else after that.
The point is that if you know your outcome and plan accordingly you just might find out that you didn’t even need a hammer at all. What you needed was a saw.
If you are clear on what you want to accomplish and master the fundamentals, you’ll always know where to spend your time and why.
Leave me your thoughts. Why do you use Twitter and other popular social media sites in your business?
Which have give you the best ROI?
