Tag: Twitter

How to Get Value from Twitter

I’ve been enjoying Twitter more and more over the past two months, once I made the resolution to participate and understand it. Here’s my recommendation for getting value from Twitter:

  • Use TweetDeck or a similar tool to participate
  • Add searches in TweetDeck,  or use search.twitter.com, to monitor your company name, product names, community issues, etc as well as follow people that are talking about things you care about
  • Don’t try to read everything everyone says that you follow — jump in and join the conversation when you have time
  • Think of Twitter as an asynchronous instant messaging conversation with the world (never default to making all tweets private)

Good luck with Twitter and try it for a full month to fully appreciate it.

Tools for Meeting Preparation

As part of a local intiative I’m working on I’ve had the chance to meet a number of entrepreneurs over the past couple weeks. Historically, I would have Googled their name to see what blurbs I can find out about them. Now, in addition to the standard Google search, I always check their LinkedIn profile, their blog (if any), and their Twitter account (if any). While it might take a few minutes, it is invaluable to learn as much about the person as possible and to read what they’ve been writing (even more important!). With this at hand, the conversations can get much more interesting in a shorter amount of time and shared experiences can be discussed to establish rapport.

I recommend taking advantage of the different online tools as part of your meeting preparation routine.