Confessions of a twitterholic
Hi, my name is Chris, and I’m a twitterholic. (all together now: “Hi, Chris”). Until last Sunday, I was under control, a social twitterer only. I only started using twitter this last November, when we launched our new company web site. It made sense as another outlet for our thoughts and opinions on healthcare marketing. I’d tweet once or twice on the weekends, with friends at a party, or to celebrate the victory of my favorite sports team. If I tweeted more than once a day, it was a rare day.
But then, last Sunday, I fell completely off the wagon. That’s when I participated in the Healthcare Communications Twitter Show, a regular twitter gathering held every Sunday from 8-9 p.m. CST. Co-founded by Arik Hanson, a communicator at Fairview Health System here in the Twin Cities, the show is put on by the Healthcare Social Media Group, and is a moderated session where healthcare communicators, marketers and others gather to have a conversation about various topics.
Last Sunday was my first show, and it’s hard to explain the experience. Imagine 40 or 50 people in a room, tossing out questions and comments one after another, non-stop. Some are asking you questions, while others are responding to your responses. There are side conversations, people shouting across the room, near-chaos for an hour. Instead, this all occurs in a twitter chat room, meaning statements are limited to 140 character tweets. It’s like 50 people constantly hurling text messages at one another, non-stop, for an hour. To call it frenetic is to do an injustice to the word frenetic. At times, my fingers cramped, and my eyes literally glazed over (yes literally, not figuratively), as my contacts felt four times thicker from lack of eye juice. It was insane.
But it was, in a word, intoxicating. That hour simply flew by (and this from an xBox junkie, where video game playing can suck time like no other pursuit). I interacted with people from Seattle, St. Louis and Nashville. There were communicators, marketers, competitors, PR-ers, social media wizards and a few physicians (way to go docs!). I had extended conversations with a dozen people that lasted into the night, and some throughout the week. Topics included the value of awards and rankings in hospital marketing, managing user generated content from health system employees, and the idea of gag orders on patients by physicians (preventing patients from posting negative comments on the Internet).
And now, I’m addicted. I’m tweeting constantly. I tweet in the morning. I tweet by myself. I have a few tweets for lunch, then another after for kicks. I sneak a tweet waiting for the kids at the bus stop. I stay up late into the night tweeting, and loving every minute of it. I find myself having to turn it off completely, go cold turkey, just to get work done.
Why the sudden spiral into chronic twitterholism? Because now I’m engaging in true dialogue with others. I’m building relationships – good ones. And I’m learning a ton.
If you haven’t tried it, have a tweet on me. Take a sip. Heck, have a case of tweets. You’ll be buzzing in no time.
Hey, Chris. Are we living in the same body? That was my experience on that Twitter show, too! I, too, was intoxicated by the discussion! I think what was so thrilling was there were so many ideas floating about. It was a tremendous opportunity to be among experienced thought leaders who could rev up your mental motors and get you deeper into the subject matter.
For sure. Quick finders and Visine are recommended, but other than that, people can engage at almost any level. I just can’t let someone’s great comment or question go unanswered, so I’m my own worst enemy.