I started noodling around with the text for the introduction to Popcorn Content.

 

This is just a part of it. If you have the time and inclination to comment, I would love to hear your feedback...

 

==

 

It has been suggested that Twitter is like a party or some other gathering, where you wander around in the crowd, saying hi, sharing a few words and picking up snippets of conversation from those around you.

 

If you step away, you miss some of the conversation. That’s OK. In fact, you can never get to hear everything, because no one person is connected to or followed by everyone else.

 

So you hang around the people you are most interested in.

 

The party analogy is pretty good, but it’s incomplete.

 

The party model of connecting with people is two dimensional. It is a group of people who all know the host and many of the others who attend.

 

But with Twitter, millions of people are holding these virtual parties simultaneously.

 

Imagine fifty people holding a party on each of the fifty floors of a high rise, but without the floors and the ceilings, and with every other party being equidistant from your own.

 

Everyone who is attending your party is also the host of his or her own party, on a different floor, at the same time.

 

His or her party comprises his or her “followers”.

 

You share many of the guests, across different parties, but not all of them.

 

While you can host only your own party of followers, you can attend many different parties simultaneously.

 

As a networking model, this is a beautiful thing.

 

It allows you to find an ever-growing group of connected people who interest you and may be interested in you, and in what you do.

 

When you write your 140 characters or less, you’re not writing a short article, you are taking part in an interconnected conversation.

 

The Twitter conversation is multi-directional, continuous and fragmented.

To everyone who has taken the trouble to share their business experiences with Twitter, thank you. I really appreciate you taking the time.

 

I’m still working on the Popcorn Content outline and will welcome case studies and examples for weeks to come. So keep submitting until I finish writing the guide!

 

As I look through what has been submitted so far, it seems to me that simply “being there” is job 1 if you want good things to happen.

 

When you are consistently active on Twitter, your chances of bumping into someone who can help you or hire you naturally increases.

 

That makes Twitter a fabulous tool for entrepreneurs and other solo professionals.

 

First, follow people who are interesting, helpful and potential contacts or clients...and then just “be there” in a positive way.

 

Sure beats cold calling.

As I progress with my outline for Popcorn Content, I’m now looking for some solid examples of how using Twitter has resulted directly in a positive business outcome.

 

(Come to that, it would be interesting to hear if there are examples of how being on Twitter has resulted in NEGATIVE business outcomes.)

 

Do you have a story you can share?

 

As a business, have you been able to achieve measurable results with Twitter?

 

As an individual professional, have you secured new clients or projects through Twitter?

 

I know there are several levels on which one can achieve success with Twitter. At the “soft” end are the longer-term benefits of networking and holding the attention of influencers and prospective clients. That’s all good. But I’m particularly interested in hearing about the “hard results” end, where a profitable outcome can be directly attributed to using Twitter.

 

If you have any examples you can share, please use the comments function below.

 

Thanks!

 

Nick

To persuade both myself and others that this book is going to happen, here's my mindmap so far.

It's a skinny thing right now. Just a few elements. Before I'm ready to begin writing, this will be a big, scary tree. : )

(Do you use mindmaps for your writing projects?)

Using Twitter is not about individual Tweets of 140 characters or less. It’s about writing thousands of words, one Tweet at a time.

 

And those Tweets are not just short pointers to your blog or web site. They are part of the overall fabric of your Twitter following and community.

 

You reply to people. You Retweet. You send private messages. You share links. You promote your followers.

 

And you say your thing. You share your message. Your promote your blog, site or services.

 

A day or week of tweeting is like a box of chocolates. Many different fillings and flavors.

 

Every Tweet is a chocolate. But it’s that range of different fillings that makes it so attractive.

Short-form writing on Twitter isn’t simply about writing something useful or interesting in 140 characters or less.

It’s also about writing within a medium that is transitory.

While your Tweets from last week may be archived way back somewhere, they are invisible.

You are what you are writing about now. You are as interesting as your last twenty Tweets. As useful as your last twenty Tweets.

This may be not be a problem for someone using Twitter simply for pleasure. But it presents an interesting challenge for companies and professionals.

It’s a little like standing on a beach and watching the waves roll in. Each wave breaks and unless there is another wave following, the show is over. Like a wave, your individual Tweets have a very short lifetime.

So you need to keep them coming if you want your audience to keep watching and reading.

From a branding perspective, this is very weird. Or rather, it’s a big change.

Brochures and web pages are pretty permanent. Say what you want to say once, and your message is there for all to see, tomorrow, next week and next month.

Not so with Twitter. Say what you want to say now and the message will be lost and gone within a few hours.

This means you have to continually repeat your branding message, but without repeating yourself.

Now this gets more interesting.

Why? Because while you can write a permanent positioning or brand statement for your brochure or website, you can’t keep repeating the same sentence on twitter.

In other words, your brand can no longer be articulated as a single, permanent statement. It has to be expressed within a continuous flow of new, fresh and engaging Tweets.

You are no longer what you say you are. You become what you show yourself to be.

What’s popcorn content?

It’s simply my branded name for micro-content (think Twitter), and the title of a short book I am writing.

The thing about “popcorn content” is that is easy to digest and a pleasure to share.

And, like a bag of popcorn shared among friends, it moves fast.

That makes it immensely attractive.

You can write it. Your friends and colleagues can write it. Your customers and readers can write it. Even your boss can write it.

And you can all share it.

It also strikes me that while Twitter is THE platform right now for this kind of super-short content, there is no reason why short-form content shouldn’t be just as powerful on other platforms as well.

Do blog entries all have to be long, or can they be short as well?

And does every page on your website have to be a few hundred words in length, or is there a place on your site for popcorn content? Or even on your intranet?

This doesn’t mean shortening your existing blog posts and web pages. It means rethinking the opportunities that are available through these channels.

Like popcorn, short-form content is at its best when it is shared, at speed. And that opens up new ways to work with your website, blogs, email and e-newsletters.

And what about the purpose and function of this new, short-form approach to communication?

Twitter has already shown us how flexible and information one can be with just 140 characters.

But can it be used to sell? Can it be used to educate and inform?

I suspect that the full potential of short-form content has yet to be discovered and understood.

That’s why I’m writing this short book on the subject.

And I would like your help.

I would really appreciate your input.

I don’t want to start writing until I hear and learn from others who have had success with short-form writing and who, like me, suspect that what we are seeing now  is just the beginning.

Please leave a comment and share your views, insights, opinions and observations.

Thanks.

Nick Usborne

Follow me on Twitter...