Small Business

A Businessperson's Guide to Using Twitter

By Rick Broida

Updated on: June 10, 2009 / 12:15 PM EDT / MoneyWatch

Still not sure what Twitter is, how to use it, and why you should care? Dave and I will enlighten you in an upcoming Guy Vs. Guy debate. In the meantime, CIO offers Twitter: How to Get Started Guide for Business People. (Bad title; better content.)

The article explains what Twitter is, how to create an account, and, most importantly, what you stand to gain by doing so. Here's an excerpt:

Though some people use Twitter to keep people in their personal life updated, Twitter has developed a business following. People in a particular industry (say engineering, software development, or public relations) often use Twitter to keep up with news, opinion and happenings in their field, for example. Once you get going with Twitter, this information will come to you.

If you're more of a visual learner, check out our post from last year that explains Twitter in plain English (by way of a 2-minute video).

And speaking of previous posts about Twitter, don't miss these gems:

How are you feeling about Twitter's business potential? Are you making productive use of it right now? Thinking about ways to do so? Or just not seeing any value? Share your tweets --er, thoughts -- in the comments.