Why Twitter is like an Irish Pub

This is from my friend @meetdux. It's a great analogy that I just had to share.

A friend asked this morning how to best explain Twitter to the uninitiated, I responded that a pub is an analogy I use all the time.  I don't want to take credit for this since I came across this explanation awhile ago - sorry but I can't remember where I saw it.

Anyway, let me explain in detail why Twitter is like an Irish Pub

Imagine walking in to a busy Irish Pub for the first time. You can stand still and NOT enjoy the experience since it's quite noisy and crowded. People are shouting, laughing, arguing, crying, singing and maybe just drinking. You can try and aimlessly walk around and listen in to conversations people are having, but being a first timer to an Irish pub, you might not know how you should be interacting with others.

When I joined Twitter, I didn't find any value in listening in to the 'noise' and aimlessly adding followers to jack up my friend count (in hopes that they'll follow me back). My initial interaction with complete strangers were superficial and irrelevant.

Then I started to listen to conversations of people I know

Even if your first experience at the pub was not ideal, you come back the week after. You walk around and listen in to conversations of people you know of: celebrities, politicians, educators, geeks, heros, athletes and even posers & wannabes. Now it gets interesting - what you're hearing is less noise and increasingly becoming relevant. A month after I joined Twitter, I scrubbed through the list of people I follow and kept only those that are relevant and interesting to me.

Promote, facilitate and engage in meaningful conversations

On your third visit to the pub, you start to hang out with group(s) of people you're interested in and engage in meaningful conversations. You ask questions, make fun of others, stir controversy, immediately answer queries and participate in friendly debates. You're having fun now and enjoying your time at the bar (and it's only your second round of Guinness on tap)!

I started to find real value in Twitter once I engaged in meaningful conversations with people. I've met a lot of great people and as a result, was able to easily connect with them once I meet them in real life. I highly recommend to get Twitter client tools to better facilitate this other than relying on the Twitter website.

Talk to people directly

Now that you're enjoying the Irish Pub experience, you are quite comfortable in having a private, one on one conversation with people you hang out with. With Twitter, that's called direct message. Keep in mind that you can only direct message people that follow you. In addition, DMing is great for short private messages since Twitter has a 140 character limit for each tweet. It's still not a replacement for e-mail or even better, a phone call.

Feel free to send this post to your friends who are Twitter newbies. Enjoy!

Posted via email from truenewfie's posterous