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15 Innovative Uses for Twitter (That You Probably Haven't Thought Of)
By Kalena Jordan (c) 2008
Those of us who are daily Twitter (http://www.twitter.com/
kalena) users already grok the power of the application and
it's potential. But there are still a lot of Twitter critics
out there, as well as those people who just don't understand
how to use it.
I recently saw this comment on a blog: "I've been tweeting
but... from what I've seen in the last couple of weeks, it's
either a 'look at me' or a 'look at this' arena."
Sure Twitter is a great communication channel and as such, you
do find a lot of self-promotion and name dropping. But there is
so much more to Twitter. The comment got me thinking, would the
critics feel the same if they could see more innovative ways to
use it?
So I decided to put together a list of some of the more unique
and inventive uses for Twitter. Some already exist while others
are my own ideas. Here goes:
1) Community Help Desk - I've already used Twitter several
times to investigate an issue I've been having with my
computer, or a problem one of my clients has come across. Just
yesterday I was able to pinpoint the source of a domain redirect
issue because my followers in other countries could reach the
site even though I was being redirected.
2) Write a Collaborative Book - you and a bunch of your favorite
Tweeps could write a novel, one sentence (tweet) at a time. The
results could range from hilarious to Shakespearean. I thought
of this while reading about the popularity of Japanese novels
composed via mobile text messages, but it turns out that some
attempts have been made at this already e.g. 140 Novel
(http://twitter.com/140novel) and Good Captain
(http://twitter.com/goodcaptain). You could do a similar thing
with song lyrics.
3) Live Webinars/Tutorials - you could create a new Twitter
account with protected updates and ask invitation-only
participants to follow you. Then you could hold a *closed*
webinar at a pre-arranged time using Twitter for delivery
instead of expensive webinar solutions. Twitter allows you to
live chat, post links, photos, videos, audio files and text so
there is no need for any plug-ins. You could even use a Twitter
buffer like Twuffer (http://twuffer.com/) to space out the
content of the webinar via tweets over a specific timeframe.
4) Free Market Research - Who needs to pay expensive market
research companies to learn stuff about your latest product?
Just send a link, a free sample or a short survey to your
followers and watch the feedback flow in.
5) Online Reputation Management - Twitter is ideal for tracking
what people are saying about you, your company or your product.
You can use Twitter Search (http://search.twitter.com/) to enter
keywords or hash tags. Or you can use purpose-built widgets such
as TweetBeep (http://tweetbeep.com/) which work just like Google
Alerts and send you regular emails containing any discussions
involving your chosen Twitter accounts or hash tags. These work
well for competitor tracking too.
6) Laugh a Day / Therapy - I'm consistently amazed how many
long-term Twitter users fail to use the favorites option to
bookmark tweets that they like. Whenever I read a tweet that
makes me laugh out loud, I favorite it immediately. Then,
whenever I am feeling a bit flat, stressed or sense a bad mood
coming on, I turn to my favorites list knowing I will be
giggling in no time. You can also rely on your followers to
sense when you're down and cheer you up.
7) Competitions - Companies like Zappos (http://twitter.com/
zappos) and Hand Bag Heaven (http://twitter.com/handbagheaven)
have been holding competitions on Twitter for a while now. You
basically elicit a response from your followers in exchange for
the chance to win something. You could ask a question about one
of your products or ask followers to find something on your site
to win a gift certificate. But with a bit of ingenuity, you can
be even more inventive.
DVDQuotes (http://twitter.com/dvdquotes) posts questions
starting with WMITF, (which stands for Which Movie Is This From?)
and gives away random DVDs to the Twitter user with the first
correct tweet. Actor and Comedian Stephen Fry
(http://twitter.com/stephenfry) declared December 1 to be Oscar
Wilde Day and asked his 30,000 plus followers to post Wildesque
tweets using the hash tag #oscarwildeday for a chance to win
downloads of his audio book. The competition took on a viral
quality (http://www.stephenfry.com/blog/2008/12/06/
oscarwildeday-in-the-twitterscape/) and earned the comedian at
least 2,000 new followers within 48 hours.
8) Virtual Alarm Clock - Did you know you can use Twitter to set
appointment reminders for yourself or others? You can use tools
such as the Retweet Timer (http://retweet.com/timer) and
Twittercal (http://twittercal.com/) to tweet events from your
Google Calendar as @replies to your Twitter profile at pre-set
dates and times.
9) Idea Sharing / Community Mind Mapping - So this amazing
business idea comes to you in the shower and you are busting to
make it happen. But you want to be sure that your stroke of
brilliance is fabulous and not folly. This is where your Twitter
followers come in. Whether you tweet publicly or DM only your
most trusted followers to keep it under wraps, you'll get
unbiased and practically instantaneous feedback on your big
plans. Would you use it? Could it work? How much would you pay
for it? What features should it have? Tapping into the combined
brain power of your Twitter community is a great way to flesh
out a business plan.
10) Competitor Tracking - You can use Twitter to monitor the
activities of your enemi... er competitors without alerting
them. Simply create an anonymous Twitter account and start
following them. If they bad-mouth your company, or tweet about
a product that may threaten your market share, you'll know
immediately.
11) Bug Testing - Along the same lines as 4), you can use your
Twitter followers as live BETA testers when you roll out a new
product or software version. Your followers will often report
bugs faster than paid customers because they *know* you and want
you to succeed.
12) Become Your Favorite Character - Ever idolize a particular
movie star or TV character? Why not create an account for them
and tweet in character? A few tweeps have done this already,
with hilarious results e.g. Laura Ingalls (http://twitter.com/
HalfPintIngalls) from Little House on the Prairie and
wheelchair-bound Andy from Little Britain (http://twitter.com/
andypipkin). Just make sure you don't step on the toes of the
official sites representing the character in question.
13) Sport / Treasure Hunt Aid - With it's 140 character limit,
Twitter is the perfect medium to deliver clues for online and
offline scavenger hunts and popular sports such as geocaching
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geocaching).
14) Live Presentation Aid - Presenting at a conference or other
event with Internet access from your laptop? You can tweet on
the big screen to a) make a point b) elicit a response from
Tweeps in the audience c) conduct live research d) gain instant
feedback on a topic or question. I've used Twitter this way in
the past and not only is it entertaining for the audience, but
it's also a great way to overcome stage fright.
15) Build a Twitter Application - Despite not being monetized
yet, Twitter's phenomenal growth has spurred the development of
hundreds of applications (http://twitter.com/downloads) that
make money from Twitter either via advertising or donations.
Why not build your own application around Twitter and make your
fortune?
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Article by Kalena Jordan, one of the first search engine
optimization experts in Australia, who is well known and
respected in the industry, particularly in the U.S. As well as
running a daily Search Engine Advice Column
(http://www.ask-kalena.com/), Kalena manages
Search Engine College (http://www.searchenginecollege.com/) - an
online training institution offering instructor-led short courses
and downloadable self-study courses in Search Engine Optimization
and other Search Engine Marketing subjects.
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