Twitter was an accidental tool built to solve an internal business problem. It took a while for the builders to realize that it was really a product itself that other businesses could use. Here are some specific real world examples of how some business have used it.

At first glance, it is hard to see how a business transaction can even get started with no more than 140 characters, but then google’s AdWords do quite will with even less. Twitter usage does not require any secret sauce, results may vary, and there certainly isn’t a well defined roadmap, but this book does show how some path finding companies are learning how to use this relatively new medium, by heavily relying on concrete examples of how specific businesses have managed to use twitter successfully. For the most part, twitter has become an adjunct to these companies’ other communications methods, becoming fixtures in the marketing mix, as well as extending customer support in some cases.

These mini case studies also outline the emerging rules of the road of this very public communications channel. Like the medium itself, these are based on common sense and common courtesy, resulting in a surprising self policing capability that other electronic channels lack.

There is also a short history of how twitter came about, another serendipitous result of a sequence of innovations that cannot be planned or anticipated, neither individually nor collectively. The book does not have any detailed instructions on how to use twitter, or its various attributes (such as the APIs), but does present an in depth view of how others have made it part of their business, even when a specific business case may be hard to make.

Twitterville by Shel Isreal, ISBN 9781591842798, 306 pages organized as 17 chapters in three parts with an extensive index, published by the Penguin Group. Available online at Amazon, and Barnes And Noble.

© Copyright 2010 Chuck Brooks for FutureWare SCG

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