One hit wonder

Nielson Online released a report that says 60% of of people who sign up for Twitter forget about it in 30 days. Is that you?

In my effort to educate the world, or at least my small world, about social media and all its wonder, I find an inordinate amount of people who tell me – “I tried Twitter – – I just don’t get it.” What’s there to get? Twitter itself is currently a very simple application. You follow people &/or businesses. They Follow you. You exchange 140 characters of information. So I tell my friends, it’s not Twitter that you don’t get, you need to figure out what Twitter can do for you.

The question you need to answer is what is your audience, and what are they using Twitter for. My husband uses Twitter to follow the Howard Stern Show.  I have a friend that uses it like an instant messager, to chat with people at work. I have clients that use Twitter to reach out to the press, and I have clients that use Twitter to see what people are talking about. Adam uses it to stay up on industry news and to schmooze. Scoops Kristin uses to say meaningless things and Haris uses it because I told him to. I use it instead of a newspaper, and to show people that I use Twitter (@pmaloney, BTW).

Event marketing, PR, conversation monitoring, entertainment, distraction . . .  what do you use twitter for? Or did you give up?