Life, Possible 140 Characters At A Time?

What the hell is a tweet and why on earth do we need it?

That simple statement sums up most everybody’s first impressions of Twitter and it’s strict 140 characters or less status’s or updates.  What can I say to all my friends and followers that I don’t already say on Facebook.  And why would anyone want to follow me anyway?  Come to think of it why would I want to follow any of my friends?

Unless you happen to be friends with Nelson Mandela or Richard Branson there doesn’t seem to be much point checking what all your friends are up to every minute of the day.  But this is where people’s opinion of Twitter starts to change, because it’s not only setup for you to follow friends, but more importantly for you to follow the individuals or organisations you find most interesting.  It’s a mini news service from the people you actually care about getting your news from.  By adding these respected and interesting people to your feed you can create a network that includes whomever you would like to include.  How exciting…

The twitter platform, created by Jack Dorsey is now considered the SMS of the internet.  By limiting posts to 140 characters it solves one of the largest problems with the internet.  People’s limited attention span.  With a huge amount of content on the web people’s attention spans are at an all time low and quick bites have become the way to grab your share of this attention.  An average tweet only takes a few seconds to read and can therefore be readily consumed by busy internet users.  By learning to say what you need to convey in under 140 characters the potential amount of people the message can reach will multiply.

Now with easy access to Twitter from mobile devices the platform has become the world’s largest platform for sharing real time data.  This could be in the form of business information, sports scores or emergency procedures during natural disasters.  With businesses taking advantage of this and building large followings branding through Twitter is now one of the premier communication channels for marketing.

As Twitter continues to mature a fine line is beginning to be drawn between what is acceptable and what is too much advertising or self-promoting.  The backlash of the latter can be brutal and damaging to an already established brand.

So as you setup your twitter account and choose who to follow, just remember that these big and popular feeds are being followed by millions and therefore the people on the other end are very careful and methodical about how they use the 140 characters.  Takes a bit of the fun away, but it’s a far cry from everyone’s first impressions of sending each other tweets about that mornings flavour of oatmeal, or whinging about the guy next to you on the train.

McIntyre, D 2009, 'The Future Of Twitter', Time, 29 May, viewed 9 December 2012, <http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1901188_1901207,00.html>

How Your Mobile Device Is Creating Unprecedented Opportunity

It’s 8:15pm and having cleared away dinner I’m sitting down to watch a movie and enjoy my well earned time off… well that’s what I thought until once again I give in to temptation and check the emails on my iPhone.  Three minutes later I’m on a call to a client in China who’s having issues with one of our products with another two emails to be replied to when I finish with the call… Some might think this is not normal behaviour, but for many this is becoming just another average Tuesday night.

But while more and more people are complaining about not having privacy (Sharwood 2012) or stringent working hours, a select group are instead discovering a new kind of freedom not previously possible without the extended connectivity mobile devices and social media networks are offering them.  

Welcome to the world of the remote worker…

Mobile Devices + Undefined Working Hours = Remote Workers

With easy access to the internet and social websites through phones, tablets and laptops the remote worker is able to keep in touch with employers, co-workers and clients from anywhere.  Whether this means being able to stay at home with their children, travel the world while working or living in a cheap economy while working in a richer one these workers are trading defined working hours for freedom of location.  Something that would not have been possible without the immediate connections these mobile devices allow us to have through social media.

With work responsibilities becoming more and more fragmented a recent survey showed 54% of business owners believe the majority of their workforce will be working online by 2017 (Orsini 2012).  Which means mobile devices are only going to become more important and integral to daily tasks.  

But one major issue companies currently have with remote employees is the difficulty in managing an employee you rarely see (Ewbank 2009).  To work around this issue we may see in the near future a shift towards more video style conferencing in mobile devices.  With iPhones facetime feature now working with a WiFi connection (Apple 2012) meetings can be held face-to-face (though still through a screen) on a regular basis, and other devices are quickly following suit with their own conferencing applications.

Is It Time To Change?

Whether you already have the ability to work remotely or are currently sitting in an office booth it may be time to re-evaluate the way in which you communicate with clients.  For me that means being available in the evening to work through problems with overseas clients, but on the other hand I’m now able to watch my nephews karate class on a weekday morning.  With mobile devices continually becoming more evasive in our lives you too may soon be in the position where your working hours become more diverse and unattached to an office environment.  

Now grab your phone, kick back on the couch and go check those emails…

Ewbank, K 2009, ‘Remote Working’, SoftwareKnowHow.info, 2 January, viewed 2 December 2012, <http://www.softwareknowhow.info/Buyers-Guide/Remote-working/103>.

iOS: Using Facetime, Apple, viewed 2 December 2012, <http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4319>.

Orsini, P 2012, ‘The Great Shrinking Office? More Companies Hire Remote Workers: Survey’, CNBC, 14 June, viewed 2 December 2012, <http://www.cnbc.com/id/47815587/The_Great_Shrinking_Office_More_Companies_Hire_Remote_Workers_Survey>.

Sharwood, A 2012, ’10 Ways Smartphones Are Destroying Our Lives’, News.com.au, 19 November, viewed 2 December 2012, <http://www.news.com.au/technology/smartphones/ways-smartphones-are-destroying-our-lives/story-fn6vihic-1226519813913>.

3 Reasons Your Business Needs A Blog

Since 1997, when Jorn Barger first coined the phrase ‘web-log’ (later shortened to ‘blog’), these online journals have transformed the way in which we learn and interact online.  Beginning as more traditionally styled news sites blogs were initially difficult to setup, leaving them in the realm of computer programmers until platforms such as LiveJournal and Blogger made blogging accessible to anyone with an internet connection and a desire to write (Chapman 2011).  

These days over 392 million people read wordpress based blogs alone (Wordpress 2012) and these sites have become a staple of many people’s information diet.  Therefore blogs are fast becoming a central point of contact between businesses and customers, providing expert and relevant information directly from a company to clients and potential clients.  So if your still on the edge deciding whether blogging is the right platform for your company here are three reasons why I believe it’s time to set yourself up as the ‘expert’ in your niche, before somebody else does…

Building Traffic

As search engines control what results display in what order it makes sense to work out what Google and friends use to order these results.  After all 58.4% of all google search traffic goes to the top three results on the first page.

Search engines decide who gets these coveted top spots by rewarding sites with relevant content.  Their algorithms search the text on your pages and decide how useful it is based on keywords, how fresh the content is or interaction with other websites and web consumers.  

By creating a blog for your business you can take advantage of this and put your website in front of more potential clients.

Demonstrate Your Point Of Difference

It’s difficult to inject personality into an e-commerce store or a static webpage without coming across arrogant or just plain weird.  This is where a blog can really help differentiate your brand.  By taking potential customers inside your business or on a journey through product development a company can build unique relationships with clients who care about you because you have shown them how your company is different and unique within it's space.

Create A Vibrant Community

While Facebook and Twitter are excellent for interacting directly with customers a blog offers more flexibility in how you setup and monitor data distribution so as to reach your target audience at the moments when they’re most likely to interact.  By using this to advantage your business can build a community who are excited about and happy to share your products with their networks.

So if your trying to find an edge on your competition it may be worth looking into setting up a blog and using it to connect with customers and help shape your unique brand.

Chapman, C 2011, ‘A Brief History Of Blogging’ , Webdesigner Depot, 14 March, viewed 27 November 2012, <http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2011/03/a-brief-history-of-blogging/>.

Goodwin, D 2011, ‘Top Google Results Get 36.4% Of Clicks’, Search Engine Watch, 21 April, viewed 27 November 2012, <http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2049695/Top-Google-Result-Gets-36.4-of-Clicks-Study>.

Larkin, C 2011, ‘What Is Blogging And Why Should You Do It’, Exploring……Why And How We Blog, 15 December, viewed 27 November 2012, <http://whydoweblog.com/2011/12/what-is-blogging-and-why-should-you-do-it/>.
Stats, Wordpress, viewed 27 November 2012, <http://en.wordpress.com/stats/>.