Twitter? I'm still not sure I get it. It seems to me that the only people following me are people that have something I might want to buy, or subscribe to, so it seems that every time I'm informed I have a new follower I click on them to see who they are and blam! sales pitch. Is that what it's being used for or does it have some deeper meaning I'm yet to discover?
Twitter is just a place to go to for shit n giggles, for something different to do. I did it for a couple of weeks, lost the interest, and moved on. From experience, and talking to so many on this, I'm willing to bet that most who go there, lose interest after awhile too. Most, if not practically all who follow one another don't even bother to read one anothers' pages. That's the hilarious part. They follow one another to bring their "followers" numbers up. lol it's like, these people really need to get a life. There is no deeper meaning behind it. In fact, there is no deep meaning, period.
I can see what you are saying, the same happens to me. However, even if there is that one big customer, it is worth it. It is a good rule of thumb to create an account and tryout any social networking site you come across. There are numerous success stories about people using Twitter. Try getting your personal friends to create accounts and follow you and ask them to tell their friends to follow you.
Give the, LEGITIMATE, sources. And I'm all for trying new things also, and I will agree that just that one big customer can make it worth it, but, but, if one is working far more hours and making far less than the one working a minimum-paid job, that is something else.
They make it sound like it's this big huge deal...I did it for a day and stopped. Don't waste your time unless your name is already well known LOL
Basically there are three main purposes for twitter currently: 1. Bs'ing with people, actually having conversations via twitter, etc. 2. Following big organizations such as Obama's campaign or CNN to find out information in a concise manner 3. Getting spammed or spamming others
My favorite part of Twitter is using the search feature to conduct market research - try searching for "ringtone" or "acai" and see what people are currently saying about the subject. But yeah, "following" people so they can tell you what they ate for lunch? Not my idea of a good time.
Twitter can be used as a marketing tool (obviously), and yes everyone and their mother is trying to leverage it for leads and website traffic. It can be effective if you do it right. I have a couple of experiments going right now with affiliate sites that use Twitter exclusively as a means to generate traffic and sales. So far the results are mediocre. It has been a good source of information for me, and has generated some traffic, and an increase in some sales on another blog. It's not a magic button...it's best to learn the community and see what the people respond to, and also target your followers and you can see a significant increase in traffic and it can become a top traffic referrer.
Well I started using it because of all the hype but got bored because obviously never had many followers and never got any clicks from my links. However I started getting more and more followers. I only got about 1000 now but I've been seeing some results from it. I got about 50 hits yesterday from only posting on there about 10 times. And I try to say hello to everyone that follows me and give my blog links so that helps a little. I think it is overated though. There is a salespage going around with 2 blokes sitting on a sofa one has a bald head and a cheesy face that you wanna smack and talkin about how he made 20k from twitter wat a load of BS! However if you have 10k followers and only 2% click your links thats still like what? 400 visitors.
You are right there are alot of people that are using twitter for spamming, very few for actuall marketing though. I try to actually get to know the people that are following me since they are from either my website, forum, or one of my blogs. It is a good way to stay in touch with my readers and also make some contacts with other site owners or bloggers. Only newbies to online marketing use twitter incorrectly (spam their home page making anyone that looks at instantly click away).
I feel the same reason. I still confuse what twitter use for. All I have my twitter now, full of promotion and sales letter. Is that the way that twitter to do? But maybe see something positive, use them for networking, that is all...
They probably did. I am sure who ever was the first to come up with the "Wanna know how to get 16k followers in 2 weeks?" thing..made some bank. It's just like everything else, if you can exploit it first, you will capitalize...but everyone is pretty hip to that one now. Twitter is just like anything else...slow and steady win the race. I don't have thousands of followers either, but I have a good number for my niches....and that is what it is all about. If there are 1000 model train enthusiast on Twitter, and you have a site that sells model trains, you only need those 1000 followers...not 10,000 people that are only looking to build up followers.
Not if just about all of them aren't really reading your page. Which, by the way, is a pretty safe bet they are not. Just about all "follow" one another, JUST to "follow" one another. Like brainless cattle.
Yup boring ... it's like celebrities have found an easy way to blog, celebrities like it because it's one big competition to see who gets the most followers, and the majority of members join twetter to follow the celebrities. The only thing that makes twitter so popular is because celebrities wont shut up about it and are Twitter this and Twitter that - to make them feel young, up to date and non-tech' retarded. Little do they realize that if they had their own blog or website they would and could achieve more ... The average person has to be funny, highly entertaining or a complete wanker to become successful or famous from Twitter ... the web master trying to sell an eBook or promote SEO techniques wont achieve shit.
blackstuff - I get the feeling - many of my followers are in the internet marketing field and I doubt they read the page for my site. However, through Twitter, I've found amazing sites and amazing people (just in the internet/entrepreneur industry) just by jumping around and looking at the followers or ppl being followed by my followers. So in the same way, even if you doubt the sincerity of your followers, it doesn't matter b/c by merely following you they are promoting your site. Assuming you are using it for your website lol..but even if you are using it just for personal use, it's a good channel to discover ppl/sites.