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Twestival and the 2.0 Crowd

Upon hearing the words social media and party, most people would be forgiven for picturing a pack of feral youths causing thousands of pounds worth of damage before being chased off by an army of policemen. However last night Twestival broke that mould, not only did it not require a police presence at the end of the night but it also raised a substantial sum for a worthy charity.

Initially a small gathering of London Twitterers, Twestival became a global phenomenon with more than 175 cities holding events organised by volunteers who have come together through Twitter, showing how effective it can be as a mobilising tool. With the proceeds going to charity:water, an organisation that funds clean water projects in developing counties, the event aimed to raise £700,000 for charity, a figure it now plans to squash.

Here in London the event was heavily attended by tech media, such as Andrew Lim, Mobile Editor at CNET.co.uk and Jemima Kiss, a reporter for The Guardian newspaper, who have in turn spent a large portion of today discussing the festivities on said social media tool.

One frequent criticism of social networking services and online life in general is that it isolates the individual from the “real world”. Twestival perhaps represents the perfect combination, utilising social media tools to promote and organise the event, whilst the event itself representing an opportunity for “Tweople” that regularly converse online to meet up in the flesh.

This is one way that Twitter in my opinion differs from Facebook, in that it promotes interaction between groups of people that share interests rather than your established social circle. The use of Twitter as a PR tool to participate and generate conversations with new audiences is therefore an attractive offering.

Perhaps I’ll arrange a tweet-up soon, any fellow Londoners interested in bog snorkeling?

All of a Twitter – Measuring Online Reputations

Despite coverage appearing in media outlets, ranging from The Daily Mail to CNN, the 23rd January will be regarded by many as the day that Twitter became mainstream. This was the day that Britain’s two most famous Twitterers, Stephen Fry and Jonathon Ross, set the micro-blogging service alight as they discussed their love of the online tool on Ross’s comeback programme. Combined with Stephen being subsequently trapped in an elevator, the media landscape is now abuzz with news about Twitter and its abundance of followers.

With Twitter now being accepted as mainstream, companies are now wondering how to measure and monitor their brand reputation in an increasingly digital landscape. It is now accepted that we have moved from a watch and listen to a search and share society, where people are having active discussions and forming opinions not via traditional outlets, but through social networks, forums, blogs, virals, RSS, UGC, link-building, wikis and of course Twitter.

Actively monitoring this array of digital outlets represents a new challenge to today’s brands looking to not only monitor their presence against competitors, but also to play an active role in these discussions.

For brand managers looking to provide a basic overview of how they are faring in the digital arena against their competitors, TweetVolume, a tool that scans and counts the number of times a word or phrase appears on Twitter, and Addictomatic, a tool that builds a one page summary of results from 18 sites ranging from YouTube to Flikr to Twitter, are great starting points.

With media now sourcing stories from a range of digital outlets, be it a Facebook group or Twitter thread, the ability to measure, monitor and engage with online resources is key to an effective PR strategy in today’s increasingly digital ecosystem.