How I use Twitter to build and support my community

David Gurteen

17 Sept 2009

My Community

16,000 people in 154 countries

Why do I bother?

I give in order that I may receive!

What I give

Give stuff and point to stuff– Both my stuff and stuff of others– Website, newsletter, RSS feeds, email etc

Give my help and support I collaborate with people Connect members to other members Run free events e.g. Knowledge Cafes I use social tools extensively to do this

What I receive

Find like minds– Connect with them and build relationships– In order to achieve things

Learn from them Have fun with them Gain their help and support Spread ideas that are important to me Market and sell my stuff ***

– consultancy, talks, knowledge cafes, workshops Again social tools play a major role

Most important benefit is the relationships

Relationship building process

1. Find an interesting person

2. Establish connection with them

3. Build a relationship through social tools

4. Do stuff together

5. Go to 3

Connection Process

Find a like mind– Sometimes trip over them, sometimes search

Enter in my contacts database Google them & find a reason to communicate If no response back off else

– Connect on LinkedIn, Dopplr, FaceBook– Invite them to join my community & receive newsletter

Subscribe to their blog and Twitter feeds Meet them face to face at first opportunity

Three principals

I want to share knowledge!

I want to be transparent and open

I want to be found and connected to wherever I am!

Social Tools are at the heart of my community!

How I use Twitter to build and support my community

And how you can use it too!

Twitter

What ever I say I cannot do it justice Huge ecosphere (the TwitterSphere) It’s not about what you had for breakfast It’s not a just a publishing tool Like blogs in the early days it is

misunderstood Great for networking & building communities Google it & play with it to understand it

Twitter uses

A means of mass broadcasting and receiving short “messages”

Inform people “what is new” Announcements Point people to interesting things Keep people informed of activity or status Ask questions

Twitter Basics

Post Tweets to a blog 140 characters A Tweet can include a URL and #tags You can follow people; they can follow you Messages sent through browser, sms, im or

third party application Limited conversational capability

How to get followers

Follow people! Find a big names in your field And follow their followers Either blindly or selectively But over 2,000 people there are limits I don’t follow: people without a photo, bio or

intersting tweets unless I know them

How I use Twitter

To read -Tweetdeck To publish – Tweetdeck, Bitly To connect – Follow interesting people To interact - @reply, DM To conduct polls To ask questions To invite people to my events To meet people To build relationships

Building my community

Tweet news items several times a day Tweet personal events/thoughts less often Retweet RT really interesting stuff Use DMs to reply If @reply then try to preserve context Use Bitly to track what interests people

Bit.ly

Standard Twitter URL shortener But much more Tracks real-time statistics on click-throughs If you open an account will allow you to see

all your URLS and their stats! Tool bar accessory to enable easy tweeting

Building my community

Sensitive to time zones Repeat Tweets to hit different time zones Always attribute Search columns in TweetDeck for KM #KM tag Publish news and quotations

RSS to Twitter

I have 3 Twitter accounts DavidGurteen: my regular Twitter account GurteenNews: what’s new on my website GurteenQuotes: quote of the day Take an rss feed & turn into a Twitter feed

– rsstotwitter.com– twitterfeed.com

Building my community

I have conversations in Facebook over Tweets posted in Twitter!

Have published lists of KM Tweeters on my website

Exploring what my new iPhone can offer

Complementary tools

Thousands of them – just Google If you can think it there is a tool to do it! TweetDeck Twitteriffic for iPhone or Mac Twittercounter Bit.ly All sorts of widgets

Understanding Twitter

Create an account Start to play with it Google for uses, business applications,

complementary tools etc Follow people/orgs like TechCrunch,

Mashable, Robin Good Use social tools to learn!

Twitter!

Hi David,

You're a good guy and you clearly know your stuff when it comes to KM.

But really this twitter nonsense is just embarrassing, it's the butt of jokes in the business world and a research note for a bank, Morgan Stanley I think, by a teenager said that teenagers don't bother with twitter because they know no-one reads it. Facebook has some relevance and is quite useful as a networking tool but personally I don't think it's the revolution that it is touted as.

In business we need to get back to technology that helps us DO things not obsess about technology that helps us SAY things.

I think one of the reasons our economy is losing ground is because of our obsession with things like Twitter that don't actually have any practical use in business beyond adding another channel to bombard us with useless information. We have email, SMS and, I acknowledge, there are some useful networking tools such as facebook and linkedin. Twitter adds nothing but hype.

Best regards, Dermot.

So what is your reply to Dermot?

Knowledge Café Question

David GurteenGurteen KnowledgeTel: +44 7774 178 650Email: david.gurteen@gurteen.com

www.gurteen.com

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