wondering

Wondering why the hell Apple isn't joining conversations on Twitter.

Have you noticed that you're getting more and more responses from brands on Twitter lately? Comcast set the pace early on with Frank @comcastcares. Now Twitter teems with brands. The automakers are listening. I tweeted about the automaker bailout, @scottmonty from Ford writes me back. @Zappos, aka Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh, is all over Twitter - not in a customer care capacity, but simply adding value by letting people get to know the person behind the brand. (Check out the great blog post he wrote on how Twitter can make you a better and happier person.) Airlines are on board (@delta, @jetblue and more). CNN, Home Depot, Whole Foods and Starbucks, and the list goes on and on. (For more specifics, see the Mashable post on 40 of the best Twitter brands.

But it's not just big brands jumping on board, the smaller players watching and responding to posts. I recently tweeted about using a space heater, and @vornado responded me asking me what kind. No offense Vornado, but I thought that was pretty funny! When I responded to @dogster post regarding my pet insurance, I got an immediate follow from @VPI. I bet most of you have never heard of VPI. (Trust me, when you have a dog like @elguapito, you need pet insurance!)

So let's see. My space heater and doggie insurance are paying attention. But all the gazillions of times I've written about my MacBook Pro or my iPhone (which is pretty often), or my iTouch -- there has been a deafening echo bouncing of the walls of cyberspace. Apple's absence is so prominent, it is starting to create an actual black hole. Can you feel it's pull?

I've asked questions. I've raved and raved about products. Ok, I've complained about a couple of things. I also wrote a lot about my switch from PC to Mac. Nothing. Hmm, I haven't tried "Dear Apple" -- but I'm pretty sure how that will go. 

So why the hell isn't Apple listening & responding on Twitter (or anywhere online outside of their own site). It's APPLE. A brand that is the very definition of early adopter. A brand that does an excellent job of customer service in traditional channels.

The two Apple tweet accounts I found are about broadcast, not having conversations. @appleinc tweeted for one whole day on January 6th at MacWorld (self-promotion). And @applenews (more self-promotion). Do they think they checked the box because those accounts exist?

Dear Apple, I love you, but need to know this:  when are you going to get with the program?...............................<giant sucking noise>.......................

crap!

Wondering when Facebook will fall...

Ok, so I've been meaning to start this blog thing for awhile. I'm a creative director with a passion everything digital marketing. There's SO MUCH going on out there, but I figure it's good to start simple. For me, here's what's simple: Twitter.

Granted, I get 200 e-mails a day, and no less than 5 meetings a day, and so I don't have a lot of time to go to Facebook and wade through it all. YES, you can get Facebook on the iPhone. But i still have to see all the stupid crap everyone is doing, and learn who threw a snowball or did well on the movie quiz, plus get to see what bad photos of me that have been tagged. To do list: untag Facebook photos.

From the moment I joined Twitter (@shweri), I knew it was brilliant. So simple, yet so engaging.

There is no bullshit surrounding it. It has one purpose. Characters are limited to 140, saving all of us from any long-windedness (even saving ourselves from ourselves). And Twitter comes to you. I never go to Twitter.com. I text from my Blackjack and use Twittelator Pro on my iPhone.

You can turn off individuals you follow remotely (e.g., those always Tweeting about drinking coffee or working late again). It's your time. You shouldn't have to be bored. And people can turn you off too. Good motivation for you to raise the bar too. It's beautiful. 

True, if you don't have an unlimited data plan, you're screwed. But c'mon. It's time to get a data plan!

So I'm a Twitter faithful. My creative team is on board. We brought Twitter extensions to campaigns for P&G clients when it was still fairly new (thanking @biz and his crew for their help). Yes, it's a small audience. But as Motrin will tell you, it's an important audience. And as the world gets more overloaded with the onslaught of input, Twitter will go more mainstream and will have an advantage over the Facebooks of the world. Sort of like when Google showed up on the scene and was such a relief from Yahoo. It was simple and focused.

Beyond the simplicity, Twitter gives you a break from the uncomfortable forced social networking niceties that haunt you on Facebook. Your long-lost high school acquaintances can't friend you on Twitter. They can follow you, but you don't need to confirm or follow them back. Each time I'm guilted into confirming people I haven't seen in decades on Facebook, I know I'll continue to shrink (run, hide) from this platform.

The world is going bite-sized, baby, and I'm all over it.

Which is funny given the length of this post! So I will make this a two-parter. So stay tuned to the about Twitter topic that sparked me to start here with my blog before Facebook sidetracked me.

And do tell me if you think I'm smoking crack here. Most people seem to love Facebook. (I thought it was fun for about 3 or 4 weeks.) Maybe I'm just less tolerant of clutter because I have so much of it.