Hello. I'm a Saggitarius and I Tweet (Why Twitter)

Image by Matt Hamm via Flickr

In June of this year, I had a pleasure of attending Word Camp 2009 in Raleigh, NC. Being fairly new to Twitter at the time, I was amazed at the amount of people who I encountered that actually tweets. As I approached people at the convention I introduced myself with general conversation and then asked, "Do you tweet?" As I left the convention, I left with Twitter handles like phone numbers (Fellas try asking a potential date for her Twitter handle in lieu of her number. I kid, I kid).

I tell that story to bring an importance of tweeting and networking. While many non-tweeters call people that do tweet "tweetaholics," they can't seem to grasp the potential that using Twitter may have.

Everyone is not on Twitter, but EVERYONE is on Twitter
Minu what are you talking about? Allow me to explain: You may not be on Twitter, but everyone else may be. Yes, you don't want to go with the "status quo," but in this case it may be behoove you to do so. From Pastors to Entertainers to Professors to even Neo-Soul singer's Dwele's pet puggle Rockstar, everyone is on Twitter. It's interesting to read how these people (or animals) spend their time daily.

Tweeting is a major business booster
Yeah, you can have a website. You can do FaceBook. You can even attempt to use Myspace, though I wouldn't advise you to. But you'd be surprised at the amount of traffic your business could encounter if you tweeted. Everyday, people are looking for the who's who on Twitter. What if you have a great restaurant and someone (like me) tweets on how great it is. Someone is going to want to go on your Twitter page to see what you're all about and any key announcements that you may have. With people using mobile apps to tweet these days, they can use their device to read what's going on with your business if their not close to a computer.

Man!!! I didn't know Larry King had another baby!!!
You would've easily heard about this if you tweeted. Either Larry King would've announced it himself, or you'd read about it in the Trending Topics section. Twitter is known for the "what's hot, what's not." You want to know what's people are saying about a TV show you're watching, or what's the big deal with Google Voice? Try twitter and you'll easily get your answer.

Personally, I use Twitter for the sole purpose of networking, but it's always cool to goof off every once in a while. Especially now that I have a blog, it's a great tool to announce a new post so folks can go and quickly and deeply read what else is on my mind. Go on meet new people and don't be scared to ask for their twitter handle, trust me, they'd want to keep up with you if they don't have the time to pick up the phone to call you.

Do you or do you not Tweet? What do you think about it? I would love to hear from you.