Journalists report those Five Ws (plus one H) of an event, then they end up reporting the full story.  Small business owners answer those questions of a new venture, and they get the full story as well.

But for months, both are still trying to explore the full potential of Twitter.  As of last week, this is how the story has developed so far, from a business perspective:

Who… is a Twanker and Twidiot? Both are people who use Twitter for impractical reasons, according to the Influential Marketing Blog – a Twanker, purely for self-promotion and a Twidiot, solely for insignificant updates, such as what they ate for breakfast.

The blog’s “10 Basic Rules of Twitter (and How to Avoid Being a Twanker)” is a good start for beginners, though this etiquette guide could also set a few veteran users straight.  For one, it recommends referring to people by their Twitter names on Twitter.

Imagine Twitter is like a play and every user is an actor. You wouldn’t call a fellow actor by their name on stage,” the rule reads, “you would use the character’s name.” Read more at the Influential Marketing Blog.

What… does Chris Brogan do with Twitter? Well, first, here’s why small business owners should care: Brogan, president of New Media Marketing Labs, works with mid to large-sized businesses to improve their online marketing and public relations communications.  But his free services are just as valuable. Throughout the day, at chrisbrogan.com, he serves as a social guru for people with any type of business.
Brogan has more than 93,000 followers because instead of answering, “What are you doing?” as Twitter prompts, he answers, “What has your attention?” And with that question in mind, he promotes products, people, services and other things he thinks are cool at a 12:1 ratio — “12 them, 1 me.” Read more at ChrisBrogan.com.

Where… is that Tweet coming from? According to recent developments, you may find out real soon. Twitter is working on adding latitudinal and longitudinal data to tweets – meaning, that the 140-character messages could also be given an exact location.

Since the location data would only be stored with a Tweet for a short period of time, marketing experts see the feature as best fit for limited-time offers.

“A small business on Twitter could potentially use the location feature to reach out to local customers, or a Twitter user hungry for pizza could search for nearby pizza joints offering specials,” said Claire Cain Miller of the New York Times. Read more at the Twitter blog.

When… is Twitter going to cater more to the needs of business owners? Sooner than some may think. Though Twitter will remain a free service, premium commercial accounts with access to detailed analysis are currently in the works, as reported by DigitalBeat.

Twitter co-founder Biz Stone also hinted toward the debut of a new set of corporate-specific application programming interfaces (APIs) that would allow business users to “more effectively engage with the community, while increasing strategic visibility,” as Solis said.  “We want to build statistics or analytics that let users know – ‘How am I doing on Twitter?’” Stone said. Read more at DigitalBeat.

Why… use Twitter when my customers don’t? As founder of the first Twitter for Business consultancy and co-author of Twitter for Dummies, Laura Fitton (@pistachio) has found five major reasons why.
For one, Fitton points out that Twitter can be used as a platform to aggregate opinions built around any business or industry. Furthermore, said opinions could be gathered via widget and posted onto your business Web site – no Twitter account necessary.

“That’s a great free customer sentiment engine, way to listen  to what’s really going on,” Fitton said.
Read more at HubSpot’s Inbound Internet Marketing Blog.

How… can one drive traffic with repeat Tweets? In two rather informal experiments, Entrepreneur magazine columnist Guy Kawasaki decides to see if taking self-promotion to another level would reap even greater rewards (in this case, clickthroughs).

In his first, he reposted one Tweet four times, approximately eight hours apart: “Power tip for anyone interested in social media: sign up for this. http://om.ly/FmGG I use it every day to find stories to Tweet.” The four posts received more than 5,000 clickthroughs, and also resulted in 700 people signing up for the service he plugged, SmartBrief.

The experiments also yielded a few complaints, though Kawasaki is hardly losing sleep over them.
“I look at complaints this way: What would happen if you told Jack Bauer (“24”) that you’re going to stop watching his show because of all the Cadillac commercials?” Read more at the American Express OPEN Forum.

Readers, is tweeting now a part of your daily business routine? Explain why or why not in the comments.

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Social marketing

Social marketing dates back to 1971, when Philip Kotler and Gerald Zaltman popularized this technique. It is defined as the use of marketing to bring about social change in a large group of people. Typically, you’ll see ads or commercials from non-profit companies or government agencies trying to bring about a positive change in the world. Popular social marketing campaigns are: stop smoking, stop underage drinking, encourage healthy eating habits, don’t drink and drive, don’t use drugs, etc. While no company benefits monetarily from social marketing, it is done for the good of society and it is the people who “profit” from it.

Social media marketing

One of the newest forms of marketing, which started around 2005, is social media marketing. It works by using online tools and websites to communicate individually with consumers. Social media sites like Facebook, MySpace, YouTube, MSN groups, etc. are used to gather groups of like-minded people together to interact and share ideas. Blogs, podcasts, wikis and other shared media sites work to share information to interested consumers. Social media marketing has become so popularized that companies big and small are using it.

Social media marketing gives companies a chance to communicate with their customers on a more individual basis, showing the human or personal side of their business. Using this style of marketing can also help to position a company as an expert in their industry, as consumers flock to their pages for quality content about their interests.

Chances are, your company won’t be launching a social marketing campaign, but it could (and possibly should) be involved in social media marketing. It’s easy to see how the two names could be confused, but it is important to keep the two separate. With a growing concern for the environment, social marketing is again on the rise. So, with both forms of marketing very much active, it would be extremely confusing to refer to both of them as “social marketing”. And, yes, while social media marketing is quite a mouthful, for the time being that is the best label we have for that type of marketing.

So, now you are in the know. Spread the word and let’s end the confusion surrounding these two marketing types. It will be easier for everyone to understand and certainly less misleading if a company is claiming to launch a big social marketing campaign, that turns out to be a MySpace page!

There are literally hundreds of ways that you can use a social marketing campaign to get results; however, if you’re new to the idea then there are certain ones that are easier than others to implement from the beginning.

Make a Timetable
Just like any part of your business’ marketing plans, social marketing needs to be approached properly and with a solid plan of attack. Making time in your day-to-day workings will ensure that you can concentrate all your energies onto getting the right ideas across.

Use Social Media Sites
Over the last few years, traditional methods for reporting the news have gradually been replaced by social media sites. These websites have millions of users who share news stories as soon as soon as they break, often beating established news sites to the punch. Places like Digg, StumbleUpon and Technorati are excellent for users to recommend stories and other websites. If you set up a profile, you can then have friends and colleagues start to recommend your news to other users, which in turn will lead to an increased interest in your business.

Start a Blog
Often looked upon as the musings of lonely people with nothing better to do, blogs done properly can be as effective a marketing tool as you could possibly think. Not only can blogs offer a great opportunity to have the very latest news from your business made available, they can also allow you to show your strengths as an expert in the areas that you’re talking about. Once people start reading your blog and agreeing with what you’re writing, they’ll most probably look at the business that the blog is associated with.

You can start a blog fairly easily – either as a sub-domain on your existing website, or as a separate entity that links back to your site. This second option is an excellent way of growing links to your website as well, which is another important aspect of social marketing. By combining all these aspects, you’ll soon have a far improved presence online, and one that the likes of Google will soon pick up on.