Are you on Twitter?

If you haven't yet heard of Twitter, you should know that it is one of the hottest social network services around.

If you have heard of it, looked at it, and couldn't figure out why you'd want to know that John Smith was heading over to Starbucks at 2:30, or how knowing that Ellen's kids were driving her crazy today is going to help your business, well, that was my first impression, too. In fact, I kept thinking the name of the service out to be "Drivia" (a cross between drivel and trivia.)

But now that I've gotten better at using Twitter – and "unfollowed" a couple of people who posted way too frequently -- I can see what all the buzz is about. In fact, I've seen a couple of surges in web traffic after pointing to some blog entries, picked up on some industry information I might not have heard about for a couple of months, and got some press – all as a result of posting on and reading Twitter.

For those who haven't used Twitter, the service lets you "follow" (i.e., read posts written by) people you choose to follow on the service. People who find you can follow your posts.

The service let's you post very brief updates about what you're doing, what you think is important, what you've posted to your website, or just about anything that's on your mind.

Posts are short -- they're limited to 140 characters. People who choose to follow you can read your posts when they log into their accounts, and you can read the posts of people you follow when you log into your account.

Some of the things I've found key to making Twitter a useful tool instead of a waste of time are:

• Finding and following people who I find interesting or helpful
• Being followed by people who think I may post interesting or helpful information
• Choosing to "unfollow" people who post too often on non-important subjects

There is one thing about Twitter that you have to watch out for, though: getting yourself hooked on it. Just like other communities online, it's easy to get so involved that you want to check Twitter and post to it multiple times a day. (It's easy to do, too, since you can post from a cell phone or a computer). For most people, though, constantly posting to and reading Twitter can waste a lot of time because it will take your focus away from tasks you need to complete.

To avoid the problem, pick a specific time each day to read and post, then turn it off.

I've been using Twitter for several months, and feel I've barely scratched the surface as far as making it a useful tool. To learn more, I just ordered Twitter Power: How to Dominate Your Market One Tweet at a Time. The book was written by a friend of mine, Joel Comm, who has used social media and other online tools to build his own business.

If you're on Twitter or decide to join it (it's free), you can follow me at: http://www.twitter.com/JanetAttard

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