Thinking Through Twitter

What's the matter here?

I've written a handful of posts about Twitter over the past year, published a syndicated research report, and have been interviewed by traditional and social media on the service.

Despite service outages that grew quite awful at some points, Twitter's site traffic grew 422% from August 2007 - August 2008, according to Mashable/Nielsen Online.  People aren't requesting that Twitter turn into a public alert system anymore, not when it can't even supply content to a web widget.  But with many more people participating, conversations can become much more diverse and interesting.

That's why I changed the way I use Twitter recently.  This year, I've fluctuated from following about 100 people to 400 to 1,000, then down to 200, eventually 90...and last month, I added everyone back...over 1,500 people.

Here's why.

I think paying 100% attention to Twitter for any length of time results in waste.  You may be interested in social media chatter, but what about travel gripes?  Baseball commentary?  Political opinions?  Watching a "raw" twitter stream - even from people who mainly focus on your primary interest - will end up as irrelevant as a typical TV ad break.

But tools help drive relevance by filtering noise.  Here are the ones that I find most helpful:

1. Twitter Search.  I'm reading as many tweets today via RSS to Google Reader as I am at Twitter.com.  How?  By searching for relevant topics and subscribing to the feeds.
2. Tweetdeck.  Useful for segmenting people - and companies - into groups, e.g. Bostonians, Austinites, Personal Friends, etc.
3. Mobile alerts.  Direct messages act like text messages and you can get alerts pushed to you whenever important people update.
4. Twinkle.  Provides proximity search for mobile and crashes less than Twitterific.
5. Twitter Karma.  Only tool I know that lets you manage relationships in bulk.

Other tools like TwitterCounter and Twitter Grader provide statistics, but aren't incredibly helpful...unlike utilities, I see these going the way of Tweeterboard.

By following more people, I'm hearing more chatter, geting answers to the most random questions, and feedback on social media topics.

I'm on Twitter as @peterkim.

Comments

[Dave Fleet]

Great post, Peter. I agree completely with your take on this.

While I don't follow everyone who follows me (I apply a few personal filters), I do find that I can get more out of Twitter by following a broader set of people than just the immediate ones I know. I learn more, I make more connections to others and I'm able to help more people with their own questions.

You're absolutely right, though - with increased quantity comes increased noise. As I followed more people, I found I needed to adapt the way I use Twitter, both through tools (Tweetdeck is an essential part of my toolkit, especially in the office) and in terms of how I approach it.

I no longer hope to read every message my Twitter friends post. Instead, I dip in and out of the river of messages throughout the day, taking a snapshot and looking for interesting trends or discussions. Twitter search and Tweetdeck, meanwhile, let me stay on top of posts from the people that matter most to me.

Cheers!

[Peter Kim]

@Cade - Good to hear from you. I think you should do both. The cadence and content blogs and Twitter are different. But the best thing you can do it produce good content, participate in the ecosystem, and growth will follow.

@Google SEO Blog - you know that Google doesn't index comments, right?

[Cade Krueger]

Second question: Which do you value more RSS followers or Twitter followers and why?

[Cade Krueger]

Hey Peter,

I found your blog through Technorati actually. I just started using twitter. I have done more traditional marketing with link building and social interaction through websites.

One of my main focuses right now is to find other blogs like mine at http://writetoright.com, which is a business blog. Do you think it would be smarter for me to find related blogs and introduce myself to them through twitter or to continue to use Technorati to find blogs and interact directly on the their site and through email.

I want to do what is going to allow for my time to be the most effective and productive. Please feel free to email me. Thanks for your time!

[Google SEO Blog]

I've just started using twitter myself, but I'm still unsure of this "greatness" that everyone talks about for marketing and the such.

[mixtmedia]

Peter-
Interesting to hear about your more is better, less is better, more with filter is better exploration. It's an example of how we can't just default to Web 1.0 assumptions, e.g. we want more pageviews and more followers, now that we have the filtering and search tools of Web 2.0. We constantly need to think critically about our workflow.

[SIGEPJEDI]

You should also check out http://TweepleTwak.com - I think you'll find that its take is slightly different from the other twitter utility apps you have reviewed.

[Doug Haslam]

The question I get a lot is "how can you follow so many people?" the answer is-- I don't. Like you, I follow as many back as i can, and catch conversations as they come in the flow of the stream.

If I am looking for something in particular, it is easy enough to search out the topic or person.

Am I talking to 5,000 people? no, I am talking to a handful at a time. keeping the network large increases the chance I may pick up on something useful as it goes by, and also increases the responses I get when I ask something of the community- very valuable.

Bryan, I get your point on search. But I find following back a matter of courtesy. that's just the way I treat it.

And here I see one more endorsement of Tweetdeck. I hate-hate-hate the real estate it takes up, but I may give it another toss.

[Jim Deitzel]

Peter, I too have changed my habits recently due to the discovery of TweetDeck. I can now follow everyone that follows me on my @rubbermaid account. Then I group people into segments: professional organizers, media, friends, etc.

It makes it so easy.

[Ryan Moede]

Similarly, I've found that the more I'm on Twitter, the less I check my feeds each morning. For me, Twitter is becoming a "best of the web."

[Peter Kim]

Bryan - true, search goes global. On TweetDeck, you can also choose "local" to pull from your following list; my assumption is that these people *may* have more in common with your interests. Moreover, re-following also creates a value exchange (re: game mechanics) that benefits both parties. So when someone adds and immediately drops in order to gain reciprocal followers and game the ratio - that's probably worst case scenario.

[Bryan Person, LiveWorld]

Peter:

I've been weighing whether to return follow all of my followers on Twitter, too, and then make use of parsing tools out there to pay attention to just what I need to.

But here's another thought: Couldn't you use tools like Twitter Search/RSS just as effectively *without* having to add hundreds of new followers? Twitter Search, for example, search's everyone tweets, as long as they haven't set their update status to private.

And are you suggesting that baseball commentary on Twitter is somehow irrelevant? :)

Bryan Person

[Alrady]

Great article. I like twitter but all the additional twitter tools confuse me, so I'll muddle through somehow. THanks for showing me another point of view.