Instead of having friends as on Facebook, Twitter users have followers. I’ve used Twitter for several months now, following people mainly in the Christian publishing industry. Some of the same people are friends on Facebook. As of today, I am following 49 people, and 56 people are following me. Some say that you should follow everyone who follows you, but I don’t follow people unless it appears that their content will be of interest to me.

What I Like About Twitter

• Posts (tweet) are short and often provide links that I can access if I want to know more. It doesn’t take me long to scan the list and read the things I’m interested in.
• I can post announcements about new blog posts to help build my readership.
• I can follow people I want to know more about and ignore the ones that are following me in order to sell me something.
• The new Lists feature allows me to separate my preferred follows from the ones I’m just following as a courtesy.

What I Don’t Like About Twitter

• Some people resort to text message language in order to get a longer message in the 140 character limit. Besides having trouble interpreting some of it, I see this as cheating!
• Some people must just tweet all day long. There’s a limit to how much I want to hear from any one person, no matter how much they know about writing and publishing. If you have that much to say, use a blog.
• I’m following publishing professionals for information about writing and publishing, not about where they’re going, what they’re having for dinner (breakfast, lunch, snack), or what the weather is like where they live.

Twitter Marketing Effectiveness

Although there are things I don’t like about Twitter (and other social media, for that matter), I have to admit that they can be effective. I do see an increase in the traffic on my blogs for a day or so after I tweet about a post.

Recently, a family in Vermont needed funding for medical treatment for their special needs baby. The mother let friends know about the problem via Twitter. Someone set up a page on her Web site where people could make donations through Paypal. The message went out on Twitter, Facebook, and other social media. See the details in this article, “How Social Media Saved Jaeli.”

Other Articles About Twitter

Seven Twitter People Every Author Should Follow

Nine Ways to Promote Your Book Using Social Media

See my previous posts on Facebook here and on social media in general here.

Read my post on Twitter, Facebook, and Tweetdeck.

Social media are a great way to build your contact list. Although there are several options, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn seem to be the most popular with writers. The first two can be used to network with publishing industry folks as well as friends and family. LinkedIn is more for networking with other professionals. There’s a great article on the Writers’ Digest site entitled “A Writer’s Guide to Social Networking” that covers these three social media. Take a look at this article this week, and I’ll write about my own experiences with them in my next post.

Meanwhile, for those of you who have not tried social media, follow the links below to how-to information on Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin:

Ehow/Facebook or Butterscotch.com/Facebook

Butterscotch.com/Twitter

Butterscotch.com/LinkedIn

First, Wikipedia defines Social media thusly: “Social media describes the online technologies and practices that people use to share opinions, insights, experiences, and perspectives. Social media can take many different forms, including text, images, audio, and video. These sites typically use technologies such as blogs, message boards, podcasts, wikis, and vlogs to allow users to interact.”

Twitter: Let’s look at Twitter first, since it’s the simplest of the social media. Follow these links to learn how to Twitter and how it’s used by other Christian writers.

How to Twitter

Twitter and the Christian writer

Lee Warren’s thoughts on Twitter

See my Twitter page, and follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/emilyakin

Facebook: You can do more with Facebook. Your posts can be longer, and you can add photos and notes about yourself. Start with the how-to videos, and then check out how other writers use Facebook.

Videos on how to use Facebook

Facebook for Writers

My Facebook profile: http://www.facebook.com/emilyakin

And finally, advice on how to manage your time on social media:

General Social Media Tips for Writers

I invite comments from writers on this post. As I said, I’m not sure it’s helping me promote my writing, but I’d like to hear about the experiences of others. Comments are moderated, so, if you do comment, it may be a few hours before your comment appears here.

For e-mail, there are tutorials on Hotmail, Gmail, and Yahoo. If you’ve heard Mozilla Firefox mentioned as a great alternative to Windows Explorer Web browser but didn’t know how to find out about it, there’s a tutorial for that. Learn how to follow blogs on with the RSS Feeds and Google Reader lesson. Social networking is covered, too. Take your own personal beginner course for Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Visit the tutorial page to see the rest.

Butterscotch’s sales pitch for the tutorials says: “Butterscotch tutorials are your step-by-step guide to maximizing your tech potential. Our tutorials offer tips and tricks explained in plain English, without the jargon. Short, sweet and to the point, we offer practical PC advice you can start using right away to save time, money and headaches. We help you get the most out of your computer and gadgets.”

There’s no time like the present, so link on over to Butterscotch tutorials right now and try it out. Be sure to turn your audio on. Not only will you get to watch each step, you have an instructor describing it throughout. If you don’t see the play bar for the video, mouse over the bottom of the video box and the play bar will appear. You can adjust volume some there, too. If you have difficulty and/or have questions, feel free to e-mail me at akinemily(a)gmail.com.