I setup my Twitter account in April 2008 to see for myself whether Twitter was worth its weight. 

I initially setup Twitter just for the web, but that wasn’t very engaging.  I then set it up for my phone and that was too engaging for my lifestyle (plus I don’t have an unlimited texting plan).  I finally decided to choose the IM option and to turn ‘devices on’ for every person that I am following.  The result was a perfect level of engagement.  I could occasionally scroll through the list of Twitter messages in G’Talk and do a few @ replies to people that I wanted to comment back to . . . I could even scroll back several conversations to see if I had missed a conversation that was important to me.  Finding links was also a cinch via G’Talk.

Finding people to Twitter was pretty easy.  I started off with a core group of SEO personalities and then went through their list of people they are following and started following them too. 

Here are my 5 favorite things about Twitter . . . so far :-)

1. I’m random, and so is Twitter – Thoughts pop into my head randomly.  One moment I am thinking about ways to remove duplicate content (canonicalization issues), the next moment I am thinking about the latest Smallville episode, and still the next . . . something else.  Twitter is the same way.  If you follow enough folks you get to ‘follow’ a wide variety of topics and offer your 140 character response.
2. You learn the personalities and relationships of the SEO community – The things people share on Twitter is invaluable in business and fun for personal entertainment.  I’ve learned that @randfish is good friends with @mdsimmonds (my competitor) and, thus, I’ll be more cautious about what I share in PMs to Rand—no offense to Rand, of course, it’s just wise business.  I learned that there are quite a few divorced SEO men on Twitter and here at SEOmoz (refraining from stating their names).  One night I even created a blog post with @rishil on the subject live via Twitter.  It was hilarious and @status_girl got a kick out of it, as well as others.  If you missed it, @rishil is supposed to be publishing it somewhere soon.  I’m giving him the credit and only asking for an SEO specialist anchor text from his blog for my troubles.  (Is that a form of paid links, Matt?)
3. I’m never bored or lonely with Twitter around now – Yeah, so I am divorced, new to Chicago, and a workaholic.  Thus, my social life isn’t the grandest at the moment.  Pathetic?  Sure, it’s pathetic, but now with Twitter I just randomly post things that I am doing.  If I head to the movies by myself, I Twitter my thoughts on the movie.  If I see something interesting, I send out a Twitter about it.  As I crash for the night...yet another Twitter.  Thank you Twitter for enabling me to be anti-social but not feel bored or lonely when doing so.  ;-)  (Full disclosure: The people at my current employment are really awesome and I go out with them at least once a week.  I’m also doing some occasional dating.)
4. It’s quicker than an RSS feed – If you want to know what is happening in SEO before it even gets on a blog, Twitter is the source.  I’ve heard about MicroHoo news first on Twitter.  I’ve heard about interviews first on Twitter.  I’ve heard about scandals first on Twitter.  Twitter is the pre-production information of the SEO world—the coolest thing is that some of the information never makes it to production, but having Twitter makes you privy to that ‘never released’ information.
5. The realization that I am normal or everyone else is at least just as strange – People vent their frustrations.  People talk about how hungry they are and how they are getting impatient for a pizza.  They text random drunken thoughts.  They...well, are normal everyday people that just happen to also be leaders in the SEO community.  The SEO community is relaxed and quite forgiving—Twitter underscores that truth.

P.S. If you want to ‘follow me’, use my Twitter profile or use my Twitter name of @BrentDPayne.

Brent D. Payne