When I first started using twitter, I did what most people do when they start -I started following people, finding interesting hashtags, and having conversations with people. It wasn’t long before my home feed was inundated with tweets of all sorts – articles, photos, observations and banter between people. I was completely overwhelmed, and to tell you the truth, I stopped using twitter for nearly a year!
It wasn’t until 2011 AGOSCI conference that I started test the waters of twitter again, thanks to a twitter ‘how to’ lunch session organised by Bronwyn Hemsley (follow her @BronwynHemsley – she is passionate about helping health professionals learn to use twitter for professional learning).
By 2013, I was in love with the power of twitter for connecting and engaging with other health professionals, especially during conferences! I live tweeted my first conference during #AGOSCIConf2013, and am looking forward to live tweeting at #ILT2014 in May.
I have to admit, I am a bit of a sporadic twitter user – I tweet extensively during conferences and workshops, and participate in the occasional tweetchat (a dedicated time to discuss a specific issue), but it can be weeks inbetween tweets. I don’t think I am getting the most out of twitter, so I’ve got a bit of a strategy to increase my effectiveness on twitter, without letting it take over my life!
- I’m using a twitter program called Hootsuite to save #hashtags I am interested in – My current saved streams include: #slpeeps #wespeechies #atchat #ilt2014 #icp2014 #agosci and #assitivetechnology
- I’m setting a time limit for checking twitter each day – just 10 minutes – and setting a timer!
- I’m also dividing my time – 5 minutes to check check and reply to any direct mentions, @replies and interactions and 5 minutes browsing my home stream and saved streams and jumping into or starting conversations.
- If I have @replies and @mentions later on in the day I’ll keep the conversation going. I get notifications on my mobile device about these. I’m not sure if this will work, so I’ll keep an eye on how I use this.
- I love sharing articles with people. but I like to take the time to find the best quote or comment. I save all my interesting articles to pocket, and use the service buffer to send them at over the week, so I don’t start too many conversations about articles all at once.
Is twitter sucking all of your time? Or do you avoid it? Let me know how you manage your time on twitter….