Less than two months ago I had no idea what Twitter was… I mean, I’d heard of it in passing but the idea of it was beyond me. Then one day I spent a few hours poking around and reading the unbelievable amount of articles written on the future of twitter and I was hooked. Not because I like to update people on what I have for breakfast or post every 15 minutes “had a good day today” but because I realized the unbelievable marketing/branding possibilities that lie yet untapped within Twitter.

So much so that my newest business venture is completely based around Twitter! So what is Twitter and how does it work? and why should you pay attention whether you are a soux chef or a internet marketing whiz kid. Well because it feeds into the idea of viral marketing and is probably one of the cutting edge social marketplaces that will put the nail in the coffin of old school interruption marketing. Permission marketing is what happens on Twitter to a wide scale, if you chose to ‘follow someone’ you are volunteering yourself to be updated on their tweets whenever their posted. When you see a tweet you have the choice to click on the link it boasts, respond to it or ‘re-tweet’ it if you think it’s really buzz worthy.

This all ties into the ideas of viral marketing and hives that Seth Godin talked about in his before-its-time masterpiece Unleashing the Idea Virus. Godin describes an idea virus as something that travels through groups of people with similar interests (hives) quickly and organically. Coca Cola’s newest advertising stint to herald the coming of yet another Coke knock-off flavor is not an ideavirus. But when Coke shot to popularity in the early days that was one… because it was organic, friends told friends and it’s buzz spread like wildfire.

Twitter, which itself was/is an ideavirus, is the perfect climate for ideavirus’ to sprout & grow explosively. It allows idea’s that twitterer’s (i call them twits) can grasp onto and spread throughout their ‘hive’ of followers who will in turn spread it through their various hives. Its like a modern version of tag-your-it but a million times more far reaching.

So how does this Twitter-mania apply to you, your business or your brand. Here are three examples to show you the power of Twitter and especially the power behind harnessing it correctly and quickly.

Joe Tweet: Joe Tweet is a guy who owns his own small business that is offline, he has a small website but doesn’t really know how to ‘drive’ traffic to it. He tells the customers that go into his store about his website but wants to really amp up the online side of his biz without spending hundreds in adsense. So Joe Tweet goes on Twitter, Joe is into fly fishing so he finds other who are tweeting about the sport and begins networking with them. Every time Joe posts a new blog to his website or launches a sale at his store he tweets about it with a link. Soon as traffic is driven more and more to his site he begins to sell more items online versus solely in his brick and mortar store. Joe Tweet is beginning to go viral and in the ever increasingly world of online stores he will be sure to counter slumps in store sales by boosting his website purchases.

Jill Tweet: Jill is very different from Joe, Jill doesn’t ’sell’ a product so to speak. She is an artist and a designer. Jill makes her living mainly from being hired by people to paint them specific murals etc. She doesn’t see how being ‘viral’ will help her business at all since she can’t really link to a salespage of any sort. But against her doubts Jill signs up for Twitter and starts tweeting on what she loves, painting and art. Soon she connects with other artists in the town she lives in and abroad. When business slumps in her hometown her Twitter followers suggest various new clients she could court. She gains something of a cult following for her ‘art only’ tweets and her lack of tacky link posting and soon she is up to 20k followers! Now if Jill decides to move, or change her business model to expand it will be easy to harness the power of her 20,000 loyal fans and find buyer’s for her art and clients for her mural work. Jill has harnessed Twitter to ‘brand’ herself silly.

Mr. Tweet: Mr. Tweet is different from Joe and Jill by the fact that Mr. Tweet is already a big wig, successful businessperson. He doesn’t see the point of twitter because he is already an established person in his field. But in this global economy no position is too secure so Mr. Tweet reluctantly decides to build up a Twitter persona. He tweets about what he knows and things in the financial fields, he posts links to his company’s site occasionally and other pertinent info from sites like CNN.com and Forbes. Mr. Tweet networks with other’s in his line of business and soon has a few thousand followers all over the world who are interested in what he is interested in. Then one day, Mr. Tweet loses his job. What is he to do? Well naturally he turns to the 1000+ network connections he’s made on Twitter and asks for advice/suggestions. Within a week he has 100 different direct messages about opportunities for him to check out. Within 1/3 of the normal time it takes to find a new job at his age Mr. Tweet has landed a great gig thanks to his Twitter contacts.

So that’s it people. Get going. Now you know the answer to that burning question What is Twitter and how does it work? If your interested in my premier Twitter membership site for those who truly want to excel on getting viral check out our Twitter marketing firm.

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