You Just Might Learn Something

Okay I’ll be hon­est, it hasn’t done any­thing just yet. And that is because I just stepped in the great big world of tex­ting… and hav­ing a capa­ble cell phone. It’s not a fancy smart­phone or any­thing like that but it is a def­i­nite step in that direc­tion. I’m a bit weary of cell phones and all that tex­ting jazz, but we’ll get to that story later.

I picked on of those nice phones with the lit­tle key­board that slides out. I’m still hit­ting two but­tons some­times but it’s get­ting there. My tex­ting mus­cles are get­ting a work out. But that is besides the point. The point is this: it will open up some new ways to keep in con­tact with oth­ers. Or at least keep­ing them updated.

I sent out a few texts to ping.fm and straight Twit­ter to test it out and I can see how this is going to make things a bit eas­ier. How does that say­ing go? Oh yeah…

Work smarter not harder

Social media can be a very big mouth­ful and a great way to waste your time. But it’s not all bad. It’s also a great way to build a rep­u­ta­tion and get your name out into the world. It’s a great way to make con­nec­tions and build rela­tion­ships. So how do we avoid it becom­ing a time sink? Find other, more effec­tive, ways to use it.

Pro­grams such as Tweet­deck or Hoot­suite are amaz­ing for help­ing you orga­nize your tweets and get a bet­ter idea of all the chaos. That’s a good place to start. But now I have a new device that will help me work smarter as far as Twit­ter goes.

The way I use Twit­ter is mostly for retweets and I find that I for­get to make reg­u­lar tweets and just talk to peo­ple. I’m sure peo­ple love the blog posts that I tweet (you do, don’t ya?) but I’m sure my Twit­ter would be much more enjoy­able if I was a lit­tle more per­son­ally involved.

In comes this lit­tle device. This lit­tle time saver. There are a few rea­sons why this is going to help me run some things more effectively.

- Text updates
This right here is a biggy. Like I men­tioned I would always for­get to post actual updates. Now with this I don’t have to worry about going to the com­puter just for that. Now I look at my phone and go “oh yeah, I can update from here!“

– Post my thoughts
This is the other biggy. I love Twit­ter sim­ply for the fact that posts are so short. One lin­ers and snip­pets of advice are great for post­ing here. I get a lot of those run­ning through my head from time to time but never took the time to write them down. Now when inspi­ra­tion hits, I whip out the phone!

- Keep in con­tact
I still firmly believe that hav­ing a well run busi­ness, both online and off, is about build­ing rela­tion­ships. It’s all in who you know. I scratch your back you scratch mine. Pick your anal­ogy, but the point is the more peo­ple you know and work with the more oppor­tu­nity you have.

Of course I’m sure I will find more uses, but this one lit­tle thing has made cer­tain aspects of my busi­ness a whole lot eas­ier. Twit­ter (and Face­book) here I come!

~Chris

Cell phones have come a long ways and help us do numer­ous things. What are your opin­ion on them? Also how they help you with your business?

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