Are blog services overrating Twitter

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Twitter has become an important part of any blog services strategy. If you you are using a blog writing service, are they helping you grow and build your Twitter following?

Twitter isn’t in the Oxford English Dictionary yet, but more than 175 million people have added it to their vocabularies and use its 140 character posts to answer the question “What are you doing?”

Inventing new words may be part of the game with Twitter, as people have adopted a whole new language. Twitter people are Tweeple. A Twitter meetup is a Tweetup. And on and on.

InTwigued? To put Twitter’s 4 million users in perspective, when Facebook was getting similar attention, its ranks numbered 24 million. So is Twitter overrated or as valuable as its fans claim? And will it be around long enough to make it worth our time?

Time is one feature that Twitter boasts. It offers users real time connection, an instant, short glimpse into all the moments between emails and blog posts. Friends could find these momentary updates useful when we’re looking to join the party or running late for lunch, and businesses are beginning to employ Twitter marketing to announce short-term specials, like the deal of the day. Twitter even scooped more traditional media with first news and instant updates of recent earthquakes,rocket attacks, and plane crashes. We all hope catastrophes are few are far between. So do the many people or businesses who have news that’s noteworthy enough to fill the moments between blog posts and e-blasts.

For many, Twitter is truly like a micro-blog, like using only the status section of Facebook. Fans say this feature inspires conversation and connections. It can also provide the curious spark that drives “followers” to blog posts, Facebook pages, and more in-depth web presences. When Barack Obama used Twitter during his presidential campaign, some argued that his tweets got followers to visit more than just web sites. Either way, the voters visited the polls.

And while Twitter users may number just a fraction of other online social networks’ crowds, Facebook did float a $500 million stock offer to bring Twitter into its realm. That’s 500 million reasons that Facebook thinks Twitter will stay and grow.

Several Twitterers we know admit to feeling like they were in their own foggy Twitter bubble (Twubble?) when they first joined the network. John H. suggested new users should be warned with a disclaimer, something like, “Warning: During your first 30 days of using Twitter, you will have no idea what the heck is going on. Only after 30 days will you begin to understand its value.”

Several other users confessed to giving up within those first 30 days after tiring of the useless updates and the time wasted. It seems most of us are Twittering and following tweets to be part of the experiment, to learn to tailor the Twitterers we follow to accomplish our own information goals and to enjoy the simplicity of short, quick updates.

So is Twitter overrated? Our opinion is no, it’s got nowhere to go but up. But maybe you think differently. Is Twitter is an endangered species under the pressure of larger social networks? Leave your comments (even with more than 140 characters).

It matters what you say in business blogging and social media

Business blogging and social media are becoming an important part of marketing today. Blog writing services can help you navigate the dangerous waters of trouble with experience in online communication that helps your brand. Sometimes people make mistakes in social media and get in trouble for it.

It’s interesting how many people think that what they say in the big conversation either is or should be exempt from consideration when big decisions are being made – like the decision to hire you or contract your firm. Setting aside politics for a moment, simple emotional outbursts like this have great impact:

Cisco just offered me a job! Now I have to weigh the utility of a fatty paycheck against the daily commute to San Jose and hating the work.

To see what happened to this poor twitterer, there’s more to the story here:How to Tweet Your Way Out of a Job « I’m Not Actually a Geek

Or take what happened to this poor FedEx employee from Ketchum who decided to trash Memphis on Twitter when he got to town. This poor guy got crucified and he didn’t even say the word Memphis:

True confession but I’m in one of those towns where I scratch my head and say “I would die if I had to live here!”

The result was everyone in this poor guy’s chain of command was told about the incident and how little they appreciated it. (there’s so much more to the story – Be Careful What You Post)

So, if people are that fickle about fairly harmless statements, what happens when you say something a little more emotionally charged?  Ask this 19-year-old resident of Athens Tennessee who found himself charged with inciting to riot for an emotional outburst on MySpace (Top Stories: MySpace.Com Death Threats – www.newschannel9.com).

The moral of the story is that you have to remember that no matter if it’s Facebook, Twitter, MySpace or a local Ning group that what you say is recorded forever and very public. That freedom of speech thing does not protect others from using what you say to make decisions, especially the ones that affect you personally the most.