Many small business owners join Twitter to attract more clients and get their name out there, but often encounter a confusing world of “insiders” and do not understand what benefits Twitter can actually offer them.

That’s what usually happens: if the Twitter novice gets an account and hopes to be able to dive right into the social network, she or he is in for a big disappointment. You hear that Twitter can be very effective to get yourself known as an expert of your niche, but how on earth are you meant to use it? At first glance it just looks like a crazy bundle of inane chatter about five million different topics. “What’s the fuss all about?”, you think, and want to log off again. But hang on… read a bit further.

What is Twitter? It is a microblogging tool with the aim to network with people who you either know personally or who have similar interests or business ideas. Twitter is a platform where you can tell the world (or better: the people you choose to talk to) what you are currently doing, what plans you have for the day or for your business in general. You can share tips and tricks or brainstorm, but all this has to be packaged into only 140 characters, which is good news for the busy small business owner!

You can actually learn a lot on Twitter when you choose your network wisely. Networking on Twitter is called “following” and it means you click on a person’s profile to “follow” them. Almost immediately you can see what this person tweets (talks) about. If you follow a market leader in your field of interest you can benefit greatly from the advice they post into cyberspace. 

Twitter can also be a personal tool for people who like to keep in touch, without any business interests. This makes it a great platform for your friends and family, especially when you are busy and can’t always keep in touch by phone or email. Just get a Twitter account, follow your friends and ask them to follow you. This way they will know what you are up to in an instant.

Twitter at first is overwhelming, confusing and weird. But once get into it and have a followership that is a bit bigger (over 50) it is very interesting, but you need to filter through the rubbish. Unfortunately, there are spammers on Twitter, too.

A tip: If you get a follow notification from someone, you should check out their profile before you follow them as well, otherwise you have the whole Twitter homepage full of inane sales messages that at some stage will get on your nerves.  Following someone is a voluntary activity; you do not need to follow them as well if you are not interested in what they are doing. It is good etiquette to follow most people who follow you, but if you feel the person has nothing you want to know about and maybe even appears a bit dodgy then just do not follow them.

Make sure you check out the person’s title, website, statement and the number of followers and followees. These should be fairly equal for most Twitter members. If you see a profile of someone who follows 5,679 people and only 23 people follow him (or her) then you know this person is probably not worth your time. Quite often this is the case with internet spammers who follow a large number of people, but don’t want to add value to anybody’s conversation, they just want a quick sale and usually offer only one update with a link to their sales page. This is boring! Sometimes, though, thought leaders and celebrity type Twitter users have a huge following, but do not follow a lot of people. In this case you can probably benefit from following because these people post a lot of valuable advice.

Go for the normal, genuine people who follow a number of people and who are followed by a similar number of people. And check out what they actually tweet about.

It is fine to follow someone who has only 34 followers and follows 50 people, in the same way as it is a good idea to follow someone who follows 8,754 people and is followed by 10,857 people. It means there is some equal sharing in place. People who do not follow anybody are probably too self-absorbed to be a good contact, but if you feel you can still learn from that person’s tweets (messages), by all means follow them, you can still decide later to “un-follow” them.

Twitter thrives on sharing and getting to know each other. Try to post messages that have some value to people. You can choose to send just status updates, like “working on a client’s new WordPress website” or “going to a dog clicker training course” or “just heading up Mount Everest, will be back next year” because they reveal your interests or work expertise, which can help to connect with others. But remember that posts like “wiping the benchtop”, “eating a sandwich” or “going to the bathroom” might be a bit too trivial. The consequence of too many trivial posts could be that people decide to stop following you, and that can be disappointing.

So think about some interesting information to share with your followers. Think value. Be authentic, do not pretend you are someone you are not, do not use a fake photo and say you are Britney Spears’ baby monkey when you are not. You are, after all, on Twitter to grow your business.

Now get out there and have fun…