social networking and micro-blogging service
I've recently been playing around with twitter, downloading a pile of applications for it - both for my mobile phone and computer, trying to find what works best and what doesn't work well at all!
So What is Twitter, and why the fuss? In a nutshell you set-up your own account and update your profile just like you would facebook or Bebo, however that's all there is to it, there's no photo galleries, games to play or silly quizzes to pass around, just updates! - Oh yes I forgot to mention, there aren't any "friends" either, so you don't swap profiles with your friends like some of the other social networking sites you'll find. What you do though is subscribe to other peoples update by "following" them, so you could follow Barack Obama, or Ashton Kutcher (who was the first person to get more than 1 million followers on Twitter), if you subscribe to the right people or companies you'll find that you have all your favourite news stories as they happen on your phone or desktop. If you don't mind not having any "followers" then you don't need to update your profile, or you could start updating your profile for friends and family who also use Twitter.
You've also only got 140 characters to write your update - that can be a challenge!
Why use Twitter?
If you're a business person or a team leader it's a fantastic way to keep your people up-to-date with all that's going on, sometimes it's good to keep updates going as you remember them or inspiration is there! You can place a link in your update - most clients have a shortening service included (you just type the link and hit the shorten button, saving you update space).
Sending pictures is a breeze with most clients as you use a service like Mobypicture or twitpic the link to the picture is then included in your update for anyone who is following your updates to click on and check out.
Due to the ease of use and the simplicity of the system, you can install applications onto your phone, take snaps, and share them where ever you are for your friends and family to see.
Applications and clients
So what's best?
Firstly you don't need a specific application to use twitter as you've got full access to everything from the website - www.twitter.com but there are some great applications that run outside your browser, keeping you up-to-date as things happen. There are a whole host out there and the list is no doubt going to keep growing as more are developed. The most popular pc applications are Twhirl,Tweetdeck, Twibble and Destroytwitter - these all use Adobe AIR to install. You can also get various browser plugins for twitter (I recommend using Firefox or Opera as your main browser - not Internet Explorer) Just do a search for twitter under Tools > Addons for Firefox and Widgets > Add Widgets for Opera.
If you love social networking sites in general and want a browser that really fits the bill, then check out Flock it integrates facebook, bebo, twitter, youtube, myspace, flickr, truveo and delicious all into sidebars which you can configure on or off as you please - it's also based on Firefox, so all the extensions which you would use in it can also be used with Flock.
While we're talking about extensions and websites Hootsuite, is a brilliant website which has a "hootlet" that pops up allowing you to update one or any number of twitter accounts straight from your browser.
If you want to use twitter on your phone you have to find the right application which runs on your phone first!
Fortunately there are some websites that use your built in browser to perform your twitter requirements:
So if you've got an iphone try for free:
Or non-free:
There are more and again the list is growing, but these are probably the best.
If you have a Nokia, then the chances are that you're using Symbian operating system S60, you could try these for free:
Some paid for applications are:
For those of you using Blackberrys you could try using:
In fact Tiny Twitter can be used on any java enabled handset, so that includes Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Blackberry and Windows Mobile handsets! Here's a list of java applications:
There are a load more but hopefully that gives you a good taste and a start where to go with twitter on your phone or desktop.
If you wish to follow me on Twitter then you can follow either of these two usernames:
- Davidsaitken - this is my personal account
- dwebdesign - this is my business account
Making money with Twitter
Is this possible?
Yes is the simple, answer.
Will you make millions, probably not unless you have an absolutely awesome product to sell!
But you can get started making some money using twitter pretty quickly.
Firstly you need some followers, so get your name out there, start following some famous people and it's amazing, but there are marketers who will see your name and start following you, so add them as someone you are following too.
Then there are specific "viral" (not contagious) web-sites too:
Then there's the ability to send adverts - PayPerClick adverts, where you get paid a certain amount for every click on an advert that is posted in your twitter account, the only rule is that you have to put genuine posts without any links in the post for at least 5 posts between adverts:
You do need to be careful with advertising, and the adverts need to be at a minimum and to be effective you want a strong following of people who genuinely love the content of your tweets.
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