All a Twitter
8th February 2009
Here at Blue Fish Events we like to stay on top of current trends. Facebook has proven that its not just for teenage girls by revolutionising our methods of communication in business and the next big hit could well be Twitter.
If you haven't yet encountered Twitter, its a social networking and micro-blogging service that allows its users to send and read other users' updates (otherwise known as tweets), which are text-based posts of up to 140 characters in length. In English, that means it is a way to send and receive very short messages, very quickly, very easily.
Twitter has already started to change the world - according to wikipedia, "during the 2008 Mumbai attacks, eyewitnesses sent an estimated 80 tweets every five seconds as the tragedy unfolded. Twitter users on the ground helped in compiling a list of the dead and injured. In addition, users sent out vital information such as emergency phone numbers and the location of hospitals that needed blood donations." Pretty impressive stuff.
Now, you'll notice that we're saying Twitter could be the next big hit. When even the Breakfast show on ABC2 is plugging its Twitter address you know this is something that you can't ignore. On the other hand, picking winners in Web2.0-world is a tricky business and the main problem with Twitter is that, frankly, we just don't get it!
In the Blue Fish Events pond we could intuitively grasp Facebook from the first glance and even explain it to our mothers. We've been on Twitter for a while now and we can see the attraction for the web-obsessed but we still haven't figured out what makes it a valuable business tool.
Thankfully we are not alone in our confusion, Event Solutions is also experimenting with Twitter and wondering where the payoff is hiding. They suggest that event managers could use it to:
- Engage audiences through commenting on sessions and speakers
- Obtain real-time feedback from attendees
- Get instant opinions faster than by e-mail
- Provide customer service for registration, answer questions from customers
- Instantly message out information or breaking news
- Quickly schedule meetups with partners and vendors during conferences
All very powerful and useful, but only if your attendees are Twitter-users (twits?) and know how to access the information.
Twitter has not yet reached the 'tipping point' that turns it from a webtrend into a tangible business tool. Until (if) it does, we'll follow the event industry experiment at Event Solutions and keep you posted.
Tweet you later?
UPDATE May 2009:
Since writing this article, the Twitter experiment has exploded. Politicians in the US and UK have been bitten by Twitter controversies and the media coverage of the 2009 Logies was mostly about the disparaging coverage from the Twitterverse. We’re still not convinced that it will become a widely-accepted tool to enhance events but you can follow our tweets at www.twitter.com/bluefishevents.
