Oct
Below are Tweets from just now expressing thoughts percolating in my head a really long time — since I started really “getting” how compelling Twitter can be. The causality is the same (Twitter captures spontaneous remarks and thoughts, there’s something behavioral and genuine about what’s expressed there) but the business and social implications are two-fold:
1. Foundations for trust develop on Twitter in intense, versatile and communicable ways
Networking relationships between otherwise loose ties seem to grow much stronger much faster than should reasonably be expected here for as contrived an exercise as Twittering is.
2. Profound market, product, news, civic, cultural, world (you name it) awareness flourishes here
The quality and relevance of the data about what humans seek from your products, your brand, your business might prove to be a lot purer and more relevant than what you get at the output end of expensive market research, or even from a darned good blogosphere listening program.
The Tweets (mine unless otherwise noted)
when people are questioned point blank in focus groups and market research, they often don’t even know their own minds and hearts…
when we fill out profiles on social networks, i believe something similar happens. but when we spontaneously tweet, the good stuff surfaces.
that’s the best that i can come up w/to explain why i get so much better a sense of someone from 4 pgs of tweets vs. their LinkedIn/FB etc.
Remi_Fagbohun @Pistachio: this is true. Most people don’t know their hearts and minds…do you? I think I do…(link)
@remi_fagbohun true, many do not. but for both the aware and unaware, what we naturally remark upon is a better map than our forced answers.
seerysm@Pistachio I agree w/ that completely - always thought its a fatal flaw of such research. You often don’t ‘know’ until you are in the moment(link)
@seerysm i’m thinking the most valuable business use of Twitter = the cloud of real information. marketers think ~3 million a small audience
@seerysm but i think ~3 million is a hella big focus group.
kimnishida @Pistachio Great point! I completely agree with you. I have made better connections, much faster on Twitter than on any other 2.0 site.
swbuehler @Pistachio Malcolm Gladwell did a good related talk at TED a few years back. Video’s up there somewhere. 28 minutes ago from twhirl in reply to Pistachio
thegreenparent @Pistachio that’s so true. So many people see themselves as one way but act in another. Is it fair to say that tweets are the window…
@Pistachio to the soul?nutmegananne @Pistachio - i love this theory! Makes total sense to me. Twittering=revealing your id?????????
pjrodriguez @Pistachio Some of my industry colleagues are only on Facebook. If they have a number of status messages, photos and groups, it also works.
Davealevine @pistachio I think you are right. Plus people are so much more nuanced than the little boxes we try to put them in. Cue: old Weeds intro…
@davealevine even the boxes we try to put ourselves in. proximate coincidence is a more natural way for humans to get acquainted…
@davealevine wandering around a “space” and having random interactions is how we’re most comfortable sorting & connecting ourselves…
@davealevine parallel interaction, side-by-side interaction that’s focused on a social object, not confrontational, is how humans bond?
kitson @pistachio It’s the difference between *what we say* and *how we act*: Worlds apart. It’s why *behavioral* targeting is what matters most.
MrsRoadshow @Pistachio Interesting thoughts. See as “national conversation,” “pulse” on many things. Seeing flow of ideas, observations triggers others.
i am SO blogging this.
Coda:
@Pistachio I wouldn’t necessarily consider 3 million a focus group any more. All that kind of group can provide is sraw pole/first impressions.
@ppatel i was being colloquial for impact. it’s a market awareness cloud. but it provides more than a straw pole. just search ANY brand name
@ppatel …at ANY time and you learn precisely how people interact with it in their natural state. like observing chimps in a lab vs Goodall
NOTE: I was gonna call this “There’s Something About Twitter.” Right before I hit publish @jakrose suggested the title, from another tweet I’d just written. Hope you enjoyed this little trip through my funny ol’ brain and that you’ll subscribe to the TouchBase blog for complete coverage of business use of microsharing (Twitter, etc.)
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And not for nothin’, but Twitter really *is* micro sharing for macro results, no?
But to your topic…profiles are what we think people need/want to see of us. Updates are less frequent, content is contrived to sit and be relevant over a longer term.
If one tweets more than one or two tweets at a time, who a person is–good/bad/indifferent, funny, quick, bright, knowledgeable, helpful, quirky, etc., absolutely shows through (unless the person is a great actor/liar). It’s simply too hard to do otherwise.
That’s why you get a better (and faster!!) sense of people on Twitter than on FB/LI etc. It’s also why truer/faster connections are made between people.
FWIW… this has always been the case with chat. Twitter’s just redefined the way chat happens.
Gotta love that.
Very cogent observation. Trust comes from interaction, not declaration. Trust is earned/granted through observations over time, not from a static assertion.
I am new to twitter (or, more accurately, new to using twitter), and from what I’ve seen so far am inclined to agree with you. However, another thing I have been struck with is how many people on twitter don’t seem to really know who they are and seem to be using twitter to construct an identity of sorts.
The theory that we only know who we are as a result of the mirror image reflected back to us from social interaction has been around for a while. But, it’s interesting to see it manifest in this way, from this platform. I wonder if the effect is the same. It might be possible to gain a greater awareness of others through twitter, but is it also possible to gain greater self-awareness through twitter? Hmmmm….
Mark me down as one of those who feels that networking relationships are quickly made (or maybe that’s just in my head). I do judge people by their streams: Do they provide interesting information? Do they answer tweets? Are they funny?
I recently asked for a recommendation for a service. Someone I’ve had back-and-forth tweets before said something along the lines of “these people are good and they’re our clients.” Because of our (small) Twitter relationship, I’m 80% sure I’ll go with that recommended service.
That’s the power of Twitter. But you have to believe…
I have often commented that Twitter reduces the degrees of separation faster and more efficiently than any other medium I have used. On a personal note, my tweets are an accurate representation of my personality and not a business “persona. Reduced to 140 characters, you get up close and personal fairly quickly.