Oh Twitter, thy excellence is a charm

The masses have dubbed Twitter good while some see it as bad and very ugly; with a tinge of backstabbers, groupies and ass-kissers. Nonetheless, judging by its ever accelerating membership, it is only fair to agree that Twitter is popular.

A number of ordinary South Africans have celebrities because of this form of social media. Certain people’s egos and personalities have become bigger and more ostentatious due to how smart, rich and important Twitter people have measured them.

I’m thinking, this is the reason some companies have taken up this platform with the aim of promoting their services and products. Twitter brings an audience that carries some power in regards to publicising something without being paid to do so. This is exactly what some companies sought after.

Many companies have succeeded is utilising this tool while some have struggled and, to some extent, failed dismally.

Their mistake, in my opinion, has been to emulate the typical angles big corporates have already worn and tired. They failed to build their subsistence outside the box.

I believe that the lack of creativity (in these companies) can be blamed to not completely understanding the majority of people who dominate on Twitter and how they can actually take advantage of their presence in the sphere.

Case in point, many companies tend to associate their brands and products with musicians, actors and whoever is always on television. The intention here is to make sure that their product is always spoken about or at least seen on television without having to go the traditional way of advertising and selling it.

That is good and it works. Sometimes.

However, these companies fail to understand that Twitter exist on their laps free of charge and with it comes a number of people (let us call them Twiples) who are willing AND able to promote certain products to a reasonably large audience.

The majority of these Twiples have ordinary jobs – that which we never consider exciting – and some of them are just students. But, their tweets are read, and considered important, by many followers who are impending customers for these companies.

For example, I have less than 300 followers on Twitter and many of them are industry individuals. But, I follow – and get followed by - two people; Tendai Sean Joe and Lelo Boyana.

When Lelo and Tendai comment or retweet a photograph I have tweeted it gets viewed by thousands of people. Sometimes, if they retweet one of my tweets or comment on it I will get tagged on comments by a several people, whom I do not even know from bar of Twitter soap. At times I would get follow requests based on their one and only comment.

One more example: I usually tweet English translations of Xhosa terms and expressions. So, a few weeks back, Lelo was asked by one of her followers as to where can s/he get Xhosa lessons. In response, Lelo tweeted my name. From that one response, I got loads of follow requests within one hour. For me this was unusual and very scary. Thanks to having locked my tweets, I was able to opt for people I thought were of interest to me.

These are the people many companies, public relations agencies and products should be associated with. I know only two, but I bet you there are many where they come from.

While they might not be musicians, actors or leak nude photographs of themselves to get attention, they carry a very useful audience on Twitter.

So, using them comes in handy, literally.

Besides, many of these musicians, actors and ‘celebrities’ (God only knows of what) do not have many followers on Twitter. Of course, this can be blamed to the fact that they hardly tweet anything remarkable. Not even something that helps their image.

Possibly, I have just blogged about something many people have already said or tweeted. But, I see no harm in repetitively preaching this kind of gospel. Especially after receiving more than two thousand views on a photograph I tweeted last night simply because Lelo commented on it while I usually get less than five.

Happy read!

Tweetrospection

Without a doubt, Twitter is one of the most popular channels of social media in the world. In my opinion, IT IS the most loved and used channel currently. Once upon a time Facebook had this throne. However, today that is no longer the case.

Just like any form of social media (My Space, Mxit and Facebook), Twitter comprises all sorts of people; perverts, attention seeking people, stalkers, pastors, prostitutes and people who seem to simply exist –particularly on this channel- just to ridicule others.  

 Thanks to being extensively used by young people, Twitter has become the preferred target for social media marketing. However, it is not only businesses that use it for this purpose but individuals (celebrities) as well, because they want a quick way to connect with an audience, and this way they are able to enhance their fan base.

While this channel is perceived and dubbed the best tool, many of its users developed a tendency of using it to tweet the most disrespectful things to other people; ‘ordinary’ people try to set scores with ‘celebrities’ while certain ‘celebrities’ look down and undermine the same people they depend to create their fan bases.

Tweectivities

There has been an event where a well known DJ was having an argument with his follower because the follower tweeted that this particular DJ was rude. In his response, the DJ said something along the lines of “fans should know their place, just like WE know ours...”

My question here was that, where exactly is a fan’s place? Is it behind the store counter when buying the music? In a queue at Computicket waiting to purchase a ticket to a DJ’s concert??

I fail to understand people such as this DJ, not that there is a need for me to understand them. How do you present yourself to the public as a genuine public figure when you are ordinary but change for the worst and become disrespectful, when you are popular, towards the same people who help to get your business, your image booming?

The most recent incident, as recorded by the most popular entertainment site, involves the elegant Sonia Booth who, by the look of things, was infuriated by a Twitter user, whose reasons to start a fight are still unknown. Just like many other provoked ‘celebrities’, Booth hit back and as a result swear statements were exchanged.

In reality, when we find that the people we surround ourselves with appear to be not so friendly and mean, we find ways of eliminating them. Bonang Matheba, on the other hand, emerged with a very skillful way of eliminating the ‘’not so friendly’ people she has on Twitter; she blocks them.

Me and many people on Twitter looked Bonang’s strategy and not only found it funny but ridiculous as well. Evidently, it slipped the mind that, Bonang after all is a human being too and therefore is subjected to feeling the pain and the hurt many of these people’s tweets might have caused. Blocking them for her proved to be necessary and working too.

Not only does she block, Bonang makes it a point that she retweet mostly –if not only- the nice and positive things many of her followers say to and about her. At first, I found this a bit egocentric of her. However, I came to realise that, we are living at a time where if we don’t draw attention to the positivity that oozes out of the few nice people we have around us, we can never see or feel just how good and beautiful we are. Of course, in this perspective, one needs to be very assertive and well aware of what, how he or she is and all that he or she stands for, so that what people say may come as a confirmation if it is positive.

With all these incidents and many others that take place on Twitter, it has become clear that, this channel is not only popular because of the blue chip companies and public figures registered on it, but also  because of people who have personal –or professional- vengeance against others.

Maybe it is safe therefore to conclude that Twitter is certainly not for the faint hearted. In fact, the faint hearted have de-activated their accounts and chose to stay free of the controversy Twitter brings.

If I am not mistaken, T-bo Touch is one of the people who parted ways with Twitter. Maybe he is back these days, I don’t know.

Happy read!