Recorded using Screen Jelly.

Twitter is already overwhelming for some users. Add lists and groups on top of that and you’ll find even more confusion.  Tweetdeck makes those both easier.

In the video above, I walk through adding a user to a group and a list with just a few mouse clicks and without leaving Tweetdeck.

Seesmic sent the insiders and email today announcing the addition of Twitter Lists to the Seesmic client. The image above is an example of how the lists would be selected.  There are a few other screen shots and some explanations on the Seesmic Help Desk.

Seesmic is the first to add Lists to their client. Loic and his team continue to shine both in making a solid Twitter client but in keeping it cutting edge.

This might have me pitting Tweetdeck against Seesmic once again.

What’s your client? Are you using Lists? Will this be a game changer?

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• Seesmic Desktop Adds Support for Twitter Lists (mashable.com)

Realtors use Twitter. Shocked? You shouldn’t be.  Real Estate Agents are voracious consumers of new communications technology. Proving that out, several agents turned out for Twitter training given by Karen Goodman (Arch City Homes blogger and premier realtor), and me. The class was offered by Keller Williams Realty.

Agents were aware of Twitter and it being a social network.  A few of the real estate agents were already members, as well as being Facebook members. Universally though, they were using only the basic web sites and none was using Twitter on a regular basis.

Training took Twitter from the ‘what is it’ level up to installing Tweetdeck on personal computers.  The questions focused primarily on privacy and distribution. People were worried about being spammed and spamming others.

Here’s a few of the questions and how Karen and I chose to answer them.

• If someone starts following me do I start seeing their posts?
  • No.  It does mean they’ll begin seeing of your Twitter messages
• Do my Twitter messages also post on Facebook and LinkedIn?
  • Not automatically. There are add-ons and tools that allow cross-posting; those are all optional and can be controlled.
• Someone I’m following starts spamming, talking about porn, etc. What can I do?
  • Unfollow them. Visit their Twitter profile page and unfollow them.
  • They don’t stop copying you? Visit their Twitter profile page and block them.
• How do I find people I know?
  • Using Find People on the Twitter home page.
  • Email or call that person. Most reliable choice. Avoid’s picking someone else with the same name.
  • Check that person’s web site for Twitter and other social network information.
• How do avoid being sucked into too much Twitter use?
  • Time control – only open Twitter at regularly scheduled times. Much like you’d handle email inbox review.
  • Browsing control – unless you have plenty of time, only check your replies and direct messages.

These may seem like basics to many of you, but these are questions anyone in business should be asking.  Approaching Twitter and other social networks with a plan, even if it’s a ‘don’t do this’ plan is better than winging it as a business user.

We also discussed what’s appropriate in terms of content.  Realtors online seem to line up on two sides; those that broadcast listings, and those that never talk shop.  Karen explained how becoming a local area expert is more valuable than spewing out listings.  Expertise shared equates to trust building and from there to clients.

Attendees were quite involved, asking good questions, and wanting to understand how Twitter connects, and how it could be used. A great follow up class would be on mixing up social networking to find what works best for each individual.

If you’d like to have a Twitter class at your work, please contact me – todd at toddrjordan.com, @tojosan on Twitter, or by phone (636) 486-4723.

Realtor shout out to attendees from Keller Williams Realty:

@patislay

@jbbutler03

@karenprinster

@Nancygkw

.

Tweetup at Pujols 5 West Port Plaza

Karen Goodman, aka @KarenStL, and I will be presenting a class on Twitter for Real Estate Agents. Introducing them first to what Twitter is followed by hands on.  Hands on will cover not only how to send a tweet, that’s a Twitter message, but also installing a client on their personal computer.

Key topics:

• What is Twitter?
• Signing Up
• Sending a tweet
• Replies and Direct Messages

Hands on will cover how to find and install a few of the popular Twitter clients. Tweetdeck will be the primary client used in the demonstrations, and will be the first client recommended and offered to install.

Training is open to all St. Louis area real estate agents.  If possible, please RSVP to Karen Goodman, 314-677-6538 office, or karen – at – archcityhomes.com. It is this Wed, October 28 from 1:30-3:00 pm at the Keller Williams office in Kirkwood. Agents from any brokerage are welcome to attend, but registration is required for non-KW agents.

Twitter has had retweeting since it began.  Sure it’s only been formalized over the last year.  Lots of the clients didn’t incorporate retweet(RT) behavior selections until recently. But soon that may all be for naught.

Twitter staff are hard at work designing in retweet functionality.  That’s right. The age of RT @name may soon be replaced by a little symbol and the Twitter user name doing the retweet.

Here’s what they have to say about why:

Retweeting is a great example of Twitter teaching us what it wants to be. The open exchange of information can have a positive global impact and the more efficient dissemination of information across the entire Twitter ecosystem is something we very much want to support. That’s why we’re planning to formalize retweeting by officially adding it to our platform and Twitter.com.

But what will it look like?

hand sketch of what Twitter retweet might look like

The short explanation:

Imagine that my simple sketch is your Twitter timeline. You’d see @ev’s tweet even though you don’t follow him because you follow me and I really wanted you to have the information that I have. (The star, reply, and retweet options only show up when you hover over a row on Twitter.com which is why you don’t see them all the time.) Also, if you find my retweets annoying, then you’ll be able to turn them off.

Seems like a long overdue feature based on current usage of the retweet. Lots of folks are going to love this, especially the folks writing clients. No more copy/paste/prefix etc.

Pros

• Easy to understand
• Easy to use
• Provides visibility to who originally tweeted and who is retweeting
• Preserves the chain of original person tweeting and follow on retweeters

Cons

• Easy to use – what I envision is folks that would have thought twice about retweeting something will no only have to click a button and go. No complexity = easy spamming.
• Loss of visibility to who is retweeting.  This sounds contradictory to the visibility pro listed above but it’s something different.  As it stands now, you’d see a retweet as a tweet by me for example and then the retweeted text.  In the future state, my name would appear in small text and though visible would be easy to ignore.
• Customization might decrease.  Currently each client can choose their own way to handle inserting retweets.  With the API option, it seems likely that client creators may opt to use the built  in functionality instead of something creative.

Either way, I welcome it as something new and hopefully something that brings more folks in that were put off by the whole concept of a retweet. No more confusion about who posted the original is a big plus for folks protective of their Twitter stream.

Cheers @ev and @biz.

BTW, I’m @tojosan on Twitter.

Mixero, a multi-platform Twitter client, just got another update. Thought it’s in closed beta, it’s already making waves.

The latest update makes it easier to manage contacts, set up active lists for viewing tweets, and provides universal filtering.

What’s universal filtering you ask? It’s an option to globally ignore tweets with a given word or words in them. Those tweets will disappear from ALL windows. This filter is in addition to filters already present on specific channels, active windows, or groups.

I’ve already put this feature to use to block spymaster assassination messages. Thank goodness.

You can read about this and the other updates on the Mixero blog. If you already have the client, simply shut it down and restart it to get the update.

Seesmic’s team has released a new Twitter desktop client. It supports several much requested features.

Feature Highlights

• Multiple Twitter ID support – reading and posting
• Multiple column
• Easy search – converts to column
• Closing columns is not the same as deleting – searches and other columns saved
• Easy to generate user lists – become columns
• Adobe Air application – runs across platforms

These aren’t unknown across other Twitter clients, but it’s a total revamp of Twhirl, the previous Seesmic client.  Mind you the version I’m trying out is a ‘preview’ release and some or all of the features may change.

First look

• Seems smoother than other clients – might just be perception, but I’m not seeing the spinning disk on my Mac
• Color scheme could use some work or themes
• Easy to form user lists and searches.  Doing a search instantly forms a column and places it out to the right.  Same for user lists.
• Seems to grab all available friend updates – was never sure about this with clients before
• Includes easy short URL and image support, including built in web cam shots. <- fun bonus

All in all, I’m not sure it’ll replace Tweetdeck as my preferred client.  It doesn’t have integration with Facebook or 12Second.tv, both of which I use.  If you don’t care about that integration then I recommend giving this a try.

Since it’s preview, you’ll have to register at the Desktop site. You’ll receive an email shortly after that to download it.

If you aren’t using a Twitter client, then you aren’t really enjoying Twitter.

Yours,

Todd

@tojosan