So how have I benefited from this, you ask? In my role as an IT Architect in IBM’s Global Services division, I am typically the senior technical resource on large client projects, and so customers look to me not only to define the system architecture, but for overall technical guidance in a wide range of areas. This of course is a challenging role to play – and in fact one of the most common questions I get from people I mentor is simply, “How do I keep up?” Social media, and Twitter in particular, has become the key to this. Note that this issue probably occurs in most domains where generalists are needed as much as specialists. It just so happens that technology information is rampant on Twitter, which makes it a good starting point.

But as you describe, it’s just the starting point. It’s not easy to leverage Twitter for benefit. In truth it’s really hard. Thus I think it’s certainly worthwhile focusing discussion in this area. Look at the facts: we know that a large percentage of new Twitter users give up, as they are unable to derive value. Why? They can’t find people to follow that will provide them value. The comments from Mark (@openworld) have some interesting thoughts in this area, but there is still so much more that needs to be done.

On the other end of the spectrum, quite a few people I know are following large numbers of people – say, 500 – 2,000 or even more! Now we’re in the area of information overload and the need for filtering as you mention. But for almost everyone, the filter is in the form of time – i.e. the filter is inherent in that they only skim through small groups of tweets at certain times. I think we are just at the beginning of being able to think about how to filter. Twitter lists are a basic step, but a group of people is not necessarily an ideal filter in a specific topic or domain, as most people tend to be multi-faceted. Projects such as Ellerdale and Kosmix are trying to solve filtering issues via semantic analysis at a macro level, and various applications are being developed to try to do this at a micro level as well, e.g. Tweetworks. Personally I tend to be very picky about who I follow on Twitter – and on a daily basis I add 2-3 people and also remove 2-3 people (one of the things I noticed I did again today). This allows me to avoid increasing the overload, while forcing me to think about the value I’m getting out of people I’m following (and whether I should continue following). But additional mechanisms to help with the filtering would certainly make a huge difference as well.

Hope I touched on the questions you were asking, Venessa!

Humans by nature gravitate to cohorts (in general). The big differencec between the world of today and the pre-socialmedia world is the composition and number of these cohorts. In the past, for most part folks associated with friends from their workplace, their school, a club — the common theme being that there were atmost a few and most of them were localized. Further, the topics of conversation were not very diverse in most cases . Even if someone wanted to talk about an out-there topic, many a times they couldn’t as it was not an easy task to find like-minded folks outside of their cohorts.

The big difference I see now and one that has tremendously benefited me is the ability to form several “cohorts” across the world on a wide variety of subject matter. You can find subject matter experts or subject matter distributors in almost every field out there, and more importantly, irrespective of their title, social status, financial status etc. folks are open to communication and sharing of ideas. This more than anything else has catalyzed the fusion of domains to form outputs of tremendous value (as an example, the cross-breeding of ideas from sociology and anthropology is beginning to benefit the Marketing discipline).

So I end the post with what I started out with – The Power of Twitter: CONNECTEDNESS.

The strategies Venessa has outlined previously, as well as those described by @spirospiliadis, intrigue me. The concept of some tweeters getting subsumed by another, more comprehensive tweeter feels very foreign to me. Looked at straight, the process doesn’t appear qualitatively different than using RSS feeds; the greater interactiveness of twitter makes it sound more depersonalizing to me.

The concept of depersonalization has come up for me a lot, as Venessa brings the challenge of providing more value to our followers. Social media’s turning over the soil from Modernity’s role-defined interactions to relationships really aligns with my own core values. This hearkens back to Venessa’s Puppetmasterpost and the question of what ephemeral value gets lost when one closely orchestrates their online presence.

I apreciate getting connected to people, like you, who are multi-connectedly conscious about a larger frame and filling it with content, or making content visible to the world. Being of service retweeting whats relevant to me, I give more importance to following the right sources.

great way of being involved!

thanks for your awareness,

Satiish

I’ve stated my case before in one of your post about using an inductive thinking model to use twitter to it’s full effectiveness, for me i’ve experienced using this model because it’s the only way i can keep myself sane and still keep my curiousity for information at a level that is not ovoerwhelming and yet still viable and reliable.

This inductive thinking model is first to observe. The initial step when i follow someone is to observe they’re past fifty or so tweets, to see if there are any consistencies in their tweets, if there are, i then tag them accordingly in the tweet deck platform.

Then comes the step of pattern recognition, which breaks down even more the information they are tweeting about. When i see patterns in their tweets, i bring it to a next level of grouping,

Let me use an example, about six months ago i began following many people around the topics of social relationship customer management (scrm), innovation, customer relationship management (crm) co-creation, user experience and so forth, all in all it was about 100 people, which now has been narrowed down to five people.

These five people i call scrm mastermind group, because they are consistent in the pattern of unfolding the topics, almost like being in school and each day i learn something new but it’s information that is nt scattered but methodical.

The end result has been finally having some footing on what scrm is, how to use it, and in depth knowledge on the topic.

Less is more works in these situations but first from the inductive thining model which is…

Observe, recognize patterns, creat a tentative hypothesis and then my theory.

This helps in my line of work because i am an idea person, always sharing ideas and strategies that bring added value. and that added value is in the details.

in six months following these five individuals, i have implemented many ideas based on the knowledge i attained.

I am planning on doing this on other topics of interst which will go thorugh the same process i used to identify and outline my scrm mastermind group.

of my 650 followers only fifty have my full attention and the rest are not tagged, just put to the side and scanned daily to see if anything pops up which does. if i see a consistency in their tweets, theni tag them accordingly.

I like to say i’ve tagged you accordingly.

Also, i eliminate the need to follow other people when i ‘ve found a complimentary connection with a person that i know follow that person, it avoids me to get caught up in more information.

for example you follow people that i don’t because i know if you rt them then it’s in congruence with the information i need/want ffrom you.

Same goes with mindmapping i don’t follow everry person on this topic, i follow one person because he’s been tagged as consistent and reliable.

in the end each day i learn something new and relevant which i then find way to implement that information in everyday daily activites, from ideas i have on an ad campaign i am working on, or how to increse value on customer acquisition, and so forth….

the key here i believe is to make decisive decisions, and i found using a inductive thinking model works for me.

i like that sentiment. remembering that the “stuff i don’t know i don’t know” category is immense tends to keep me humbled.