Birds do it, U.S. president Barack Obama does it and so do Canadian farmers.
Twittering is one of the newest ways to stay connected. Using the internet-based Twitter site at twitter.com, twitterers send out quick, frequent messages from their computer or blackberry to let people know what they’re doing.
Tim Hoven, an organic beef farmer from Eckville, Alta., has found Twitter useful for building relationships with his customers and giving them a feel for what he does on his organic beef farm.
Each Twitter message answers the question, “what are you doing?” in 140 characters or less.
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Hoven’s twitter answers can include working with cattle, in the field or in the house doing books, travelling to his local farmers’ market, stopping at Tim Horton’s for coffee or putting the kids to bed.
“I’m trying to give urban people a little glimpse of what happens in a rural lifestyle.”
At the bottom of each e-mail, Hoven invites customers, friends and family to join his Facebook page or follow him on Twitter.
For Hoven, the technological connections are just one more way to build relationships with his customers. By following him on Twitter, Hoven hopes the next time customers run out of beef, they’ll think about Hoven Farms.
“It’s about building a relationship with the customer,” said Hoven, who has 72 Twitter followers.
In turn, he follows more than 100 Twitters.
“I’m a geek at heart,” said Hoven, who likes to stay up to date with current trends.
“Is it worth it making money yet – no, but it’s not a big thing that I had to spend $10,000 to get into it. You go to a web page and sign up and take a minute every couple days to update what you’re doing. If something interesting happens you write it out and let people know about it.
“People do seem to be interested, especially in urban areas. People have lost the connection to the soil. This way urban people have a chance to connect to farmers.”
Sylvia Schneider of the horse magazine Canada Equine on-line, sends twitters to 127 followers with the latest news in the horse world. When Canada won the Nation’s Cup, she sent a twitter with the news. When a horse barn at Northlands was shut down because of equine distemper, she sent a twitter.
“It’s immediate. It gets the message out faster,” said Schneider, who first set up the equine twitter during the Mane Event horse conference. She used her cell phone’s text features to update followers on what was happening during the conference.
“It was quite exciting.”
Schneider received immediate news on her personal Twitter account when a U.S. Airways airplane crashed into the Hudson River and during a recent massacre in Mumbai, India.
“I knew about it before anyone else because I was following it on Twitter,” she said.
“It’s a very valuable social media tool.”
Lori Creech, communications manager with Alberta Beef Producers, set up an Alberta Beef twitter account at the beginning of March as another way to get information to producers.
“It’s a great way to keep people up to date moment by moment.”
She initially plans to use Twitter to notify producers, industry and the media about upcoming newsletters and radio talk shows but eventually hopes to post twitters during the resolutions debate at ABP’s annual general meeting. By letting producers know the outcome of each resolution, she hopes they will feel more connected with the industry.
“It’ll only take a couple seconds. It’s not a big deal,” she said.
“It’s a trial run and I’m feeling my way through to see how it goes.”
Want to twitter?
Go to www.Twitter.com, choose the Getting Started button and sign in. New twitterers are encouraged to create a unique twitter name. Beware that any name with birds is likely taken. In the end, I used my own name.
Finding twitters is like finding interesting websites – it’s a bit of a trial and error. The twitter home page offers a selection of movie stars, singers, baseball players, magazines, television stations and newspapers to follow.
An easy way to find twitters is to go to a favourite website and see if it has a twitter icon on its home page. Once you’ve found one site, it’s easy to join other twitters and start tweeting.
Agricultural tweeters include the Alberta Beef Producers twitter site at albertabeef and Hoven Farms at Timhoven.
Prime minister Stephen Harper also tweets at pmharper.
