Twitter- What It's Taught Me So Far

In the past few months, I have been on social media overload. I have had a Twitter account for roughly a year, but never used it the way I do now. Before using Twitter correctly, I falsely believed that people only used it to track their favorite celebrities and to post about pointless activities throughout their day. Although many people do use Twitter for these things (sorry, not following you anymore!), many people do use it to positively interact and learn from people that relate to their specific interests.

I am honestly amazed with how much I have learned in the past few months from using Twitter. Not to diminish the quality of my education or the knowledge of my professors, but I have learned more "real-life" information from the people I follow than I have in the classroom.  By following the right people in relation to what I am most interested in, I have been able to precisely create my own little niche in the big bad world of social media. I recently looked through the list of who I follow and came up with the following breakdown: 30%- PR organizations and professionals; 20%- News sources; 20%- Peers and friends; 10%- Travel information; 10%- Political figures; 10%- Celebrities. By combining these categories, I can immediately get all of the information most important to me. In less than 5 minutes, I can scroll through my feed and see breaking news, helpful PR tips, and what other PR students are up to.

However, the most important thing I've learned so far is that Twitter and your experience with Twitter is only what you make of it. If you want to use your little slice of social media to learn and interact with people in your field, reach out to them first! By never interacting with your followers, they most likely will never notice you or care what you're tweeting about. Another important thing I've learned is to remember who you follow and who follows you. I keep this into consideration whenever I type a new tweet, and make sure to ask myself, "Is this somewhat relevant?", or "Who else does this affect?". This doesn't mean that each of my tweets is serious and professional, but it does mean that you will never see a tweet from me saying things like "I hate my lifeeeeee!", or "Ugh, so stressed out". 

To sum things up, Twitter has allowed me to get all of the necessary information I need throughout the day from current events to the latest social media trends. It has also let me interact with amazing people in the PR world from upperclassmen at Temple to CEOs working in the business. I can't wait to see where Twitter leads me next, and look forward to interacting with more people along the way!