Putting Twitter to Work For Your Freelance Writing Business

Twitter is some kind a strange marriage between a blogging platform and an instant messaging client.

You post updates that are made public (known as “tweets”) and people are able to respond to you directly, should they feel the need to comment. Keeping the platform “micro” is the 140 character limit on anything you post.

Posting can also be done in a variety of ways: through the Twitter web site, through integration with some IM clients like Google Talk, by text messaging a number from your cell phone or through a desktop client like Twirl.

Like almost every web-based service these days, it has a social aspect as well. You can make a list of people to “follow” so you’re given a list of all their updates.

Now, like many, when Twitter first hit the scene I raised an eyebrow and said “Why?” At first it seemed to be people posting instant updates and updating the world on how fast the line at the grocery store was moving.

But as I’ve slowly adopted the service, as a freelancer writer, I’m beginning to find more and more uses for it.

Providing updates on projects

Most traffic through my Twitter feed comes through during the 9-5 hours while people are working away, generally stopping briefly (or more likely procrastinating) to tweet about what they’re working on and how it’s going.

While the details of your workday may be mundane to anyone outside your line of work, they can be of great interest to your clients if they’re interested in following along with the project (and if you’re willing to give them your user name to follow.)

Finding work

It may not happen often, but it is possible to find work on Twitter by following potential clients.

Every now and then a tweet pops up along the lines of “Need someone to produce content for my blog, anyone know a good writer?”

That’s the spot where you come to the rescue.

Finding sources

As a writer, I frequently need to find warm bodies to interview for stories. By following a lot of folks in the sector I cover, I often learn little details that indicate that they may be useful for a story.

From the tweets I follow, I can see who likes or dislikes a certain product, who holds certain views on a subject and well, almost anything folks are willing to share with their followers. All of which can lead a journalist to someone to speak to.

An example: A few weeks ago, the front page of the local newspaper had a piece dealing with a labor dispute between the government and the public service union. By the time I turned on my computer, government employees were already tweeting their thoughts on the issue.

Admittedly, I wasn’t working on this story, but I realized I’d have known exactly who to contact for comment if I had been.

Robert Janelle |
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Robert Janelle is a ragged video game-addicted journalist in Canada with an affinity for all things paisley. Described as being rather loud and skittish, he generally can be found consuming caffeine in large doses, organizing (or re-organizing) things and playing with two annoying (but adorable) kittens.

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