Twitter As PR

Well, it's not a surprise, that many people and companies have been using Twitter as more than the normal Twitter baseline to... do what exactly? What is the baseline use of Twitter, anyway?

Allen Stern seems to suggest that the give-and-take of conversation is the basic mode of Twitterizing, and that this mode can be easily coopted into broadcast:

[from When Does a Social Network Become a "Publicity Network"? | CenterNetworks - Social Media News, Opinions and Insights]

A social networking tool becomes a publicity tool when "I speak, you speak, I reply, you reply" becomes "I speak, you listen".

There seems to be a growing commercialism on Twitter. I have no problem with companies using the Twitter network to post updates about their service -- 'Our server is down; back up in a few hours' -- but hucksterism is different. If a broadcast PR model takes over, and fills the channel with spam, Twitter will be ruined.

Comments

[Laura]

> If a broadcast PR model takes over, and fills the channel with spam, Twitter will be ruined.

But Twitter's 'opt-in' messaging discourages spammy 'broadcasts.' For example, if I start following a company because I want their updates and then they change over to huckster messages instead of meaningful updates, I just stop following them. They have no way to force me to read their tweets, so it behooves them to play nice and respect the conversational nature of the place if they want to keep my ear.

[Todd Sieling]

We've been using Twitter since early days to let members know about service disruptions and updates, as well to sometimes bring people into a discussion about a design or policy. As Twitter has grown, we've seen a growth in other users adding Ma.gnolia, but when we take a look at their tweets and to even see if they're a Ma.gnolia member, we sometimes find the hucksterism Stowe is seeing. We don't add those back.

I think Laura is spot on when she says that dropping spammy broadcasters is the best way to deal with it. When nobody's listening, they can shout all they want. Still, it's sad that so many people rush to tilt things towards what much of the web is built to escape.

FWIW, I did a presentation at BarCamp Vancouver about how Ma.gnolia uses Twitter to communicate with members, and included thoughts on responsible ways for using Twitter to talk with a community; slides are found at http://ma.gnolia.com/mugishujo

[Stowe Boyd]

Laura - It's the mix of spammish stuff and real info that's problematic. Like Jason Calacanis' mix of Mahalo spin and otherwsie interesting insight, or Kawasaki's Truemors tweets. I am conflicted because I want to be connected to these folks for the good stuff, but I would like to weed out the ads. So the nuclear option -- dropping them -- is too binary.

Todd - I think Mag.nol.ia is a great case study for leveraging Twitter commercially and non-spammishly.

[bg]

But spam or “Hey, check out this cool new band” it's hard to avoid on the public timeline. Thankfully, it's not happened like that–yet.

Brands still will find a way to get their message in any new media outlet. (Agencies will help them, lol.)