Everywhere you turn, everyone is talking about Twitter.<\/p>\n
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Some people love it and describe it as if it were the best thing since sliced bread. Others think it is the most ridiculous thing to ever become popular.<\/p>\n
My opinion is more moderated. I think, as a networking tool, Twitter has value. I also think that Twitter can be used in a way that makes it a grand waste of time.<\/p>\n
Should you start becoming active on Twitter? That depends.<\/p>\n
I see Twitter as a conversation starting tool. And a starter of conversations that are best continued outside of Twitter via more conventional means.<\/p>\n
If you don\u2019t care about connecting with others who you may not otherwise connect with, then don\u2019t bother. But if you\u2019d like to make some connections \u2013 now is the time. Twitter\u2019s user base is growing and the novelty of being followed or following someone will decrease in inverse proportion to Twitter\u2019s user base.<\/p>\n
Here are some basic tips for using Twitter as a procurement professional\u2026<\/p>\n
1. Don\u2019t use Twitter on the job unless it is actually part of your job to do so. Each of your posts \u2013 or \u201ctweets,\u201d as they are called \u2013 is time-stamped. Despite some diminishing unemployment statistics, companies are still laying off employees by the hundreds of thousands each week and you don\u2019t want using Twitter during work time to be the reason you\u2019re unemployed.<\/p>\n
2. Be conscious of tweet quantity. As a follower (that\u2019s the word used when you sign up to receive a particular person\u2019s tweets), I have a hard time digesting when people tweet more than three times per day. I usually won\u2019t follow someone who tweets that often. It\u2019s just a turnoff. You want to be \u201cfollowable.\u201d Ten or more tweets a day is way more than I want to hear from one person. And posting tons of links within a day gets annoying, too. How much time do you think people have to be reading on any given day? \u201cChain tweeters\u201d (I think I invented a term there) create the personal brand of being someone that has nothing else to do all day.<\/p>\n
3. Be conscious of tweet quality. Even if you post a reasonable quantity of tweets, it is a turnoff if your tweets have nothing interesting to read. Yes, the Twitter home page says \u201cTwitter is a service for friends, family, and co\u2013workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing?\u201d and above the text box where you type in your tweet it says \u201cWhat are you doing?\u201d But the most annoying tweets are those where people actually do type in what they are doing! If you are using Twitter as a professional networking tool, I\u2019m sorry to report that no one cares if you are in traffic, no one cares if you just bought a hot dog, no one cares about anything personal about you (sorry if this hurts, but it\u2019s true). Posting those things does your personal brand more harm than good. Better to not tweet than to tweet something boring. Make your tweets valuable!<\/p>\n
4. Never, ever complain about work on Twitter. As fleeting as a tweet feels when you post it, it can last forever in the mind of someone who read it. Twitter is just not the appropriate forum for work complaints.<\/p>\n
5. Twitter can be a good tool to help you become more concise in your writing. Twitter limits your tweets to a maximum of 140 characters. That\u2019s not a lot. So you have to squeeze in what you want to say in a small amount of space. Unfortunately, leaving out details can result in misunderstandings. So be careful to be both concise and complete. Not a bad skill to have.<\/p>\n
6. Tweet about things that your followers don\u2019t have access to. I personally enjoy reading tweets about procurement conferences that I wasn\u2019t able to attend. I am getting some info on what I am missing and that\u2019s pretty valuable to me. (As a guilty pleasure, I loved reading tweets about how mediocre the ISM conference was last week, especially after their marketing person started \u201cre-tweeting\u201d some of the early posts from people who tweeted about being on their way. She didn\u2019t re-tweet much after people started tweeting negative things from the conference itself.).<\/p>\n
7. Use caution when asking or answering questions. Its not only Twitter\u2019s 140 character limitation that can cause misunderstandings. It is Twitter\u2019s lack of associating a reply with a tweet that can cause misunderstandings. I\u2019ll use a real-life example from a Twitter conversation between myself and Tim Minahan, Ariba\u2019s Chief Marketing Officer, to illustrate. Here\u2019s how it went.<\/p>\n
Tminahan: Marketing guru Seth Godin: market has shifted from \u201chow can I spend money to grow my brand\u201d to \u201cshow me how I can save money.\u201d Do you agree?<\/em><\/p>\n Nextlevelpurch: i agree, but as recessions are relatively short, so too will be the focus on saving $ as the go-to mktg strategy, except\u2026<\/p>\n Nextlevelpurch: \u2026except for those of us whose value proposition is saving money in good times and bad.<\/p>\n Tminahan: My question was whether procurement success in today\u2019s market requires new skills (technical, financial, engineering)?<\/p>\n What??? What do technical, financial, and engineering skills in procurement have to do with Seth Godin \u2013 a marketing guru?<\/p>\n Well, I looked at Tim\u2019s tweets and in between his Seth Godin question and my reply was another question that he tweeted. That tweet said: BW says: 3M US job openings can\u2019t get filled due to a skills mismatch. <\/em>Is this a metaphor for procurement market?<\/em><\/p>\n I replied back to Tim and noted that I was answering his Seth Godin question but never received a reply from him. Again, because tweets are so fleeting, I wouldn\u2019t be surprised if Tim didn\u2019t know what I was talking about.<\/p>\n So be careful not to ask too many questions because it may be difficult to know which questions your followers are answering. And \u2013 despite that 140 character limitation \u2013 try to indicate what question you are responding to when you do want to offer an answer to a tweeted question.<\/p>\n So what do I post on Twitter?<\/p>\n I post links to my blog posts and new PurchTips articles. I believe that traditional blog readers are migrating to Twitter for their online time, particularly with the degradation of quality that I\u2019ve observed among long-standing procurement blogs. So, I think Twitter helps keep this blog (which is hopefully getting better, not worse) where the eyeballs are moving. I also post \u201cProcurement Thoughts of the Day,\u201d which I indicate with the prefix \u201cPTOTD.\u201d These are just random things on my mind that you may or may not find useful, inspirational, funny, or none of the above. Here is a smattering of them:<\/p>\n Understand that these tips are only my opinions, not necessarily best practices. Take them for what they are worth.<\/p>\n\n