After doing countless Twitter trainings with clients and managing many handles, I’ve realized that a person’s success with Twitter all depends on one thing – and it’s not the number of Twitter followers they have.

The truth is, the one thing that will really change the way you use the platform is who you are following. This will affect who follows you and it will determine the quality of content you are seeing. It will also address the two concerns I hear time and time again from people just starting out on Twitter:

1. I don’t have time for this
2. I don’t see the point

When you follow the right people, your time will be more efficient because you won’t be following people who tweet junk, and therefore you won’t have to shift through junk to see what is being said. You’ll also see the point of Twitter more quickly, since determining who “the right people” are will force you to establish your purpose for using the platform. When you understand your goal and then follow the people who will get you there – you’ll inevitable figure out the point of the platform.

But following the right people isn’t just imperative for newbies. It’s a best practice for all of us. Everyone goes through Twitter slumps from time to time. You know, those days (OK sometimes weeks) where you feel like everyone is tweeting about their breakfasts and there is nothing interesting to say or re-share. That, my friend, means it is time for a Twitter Spring Cleaning. This is where you cull through the people you are following, determining who is still relevant to your current goals, and cutting those who are not.

As I am in the middle of one such spring cleaning myself, I thought I’d put together some tips for those of you who also might like to do a little list refining.

• Don’t be afraid to cut someone - No matter how many followers you have, unfollowing someone isn’t a crisis. People on Twitter understand that everyone is on there for different reasons and an unfollow isn’t an indication that that person is irrelevant – they just aren’t relevant to you. My only caveat would be, don’t unfollow someone who you think may notice and be genuinely offended that you are no longer following them. Those few people you should keep.

• Make a criteria for who stays – I am very clear about who I am following and why. Are they someone who will actually talk to me? Are they providing me with insightful information about social media, pr or marketing? Are they a client? These are all my reasons for keeping someone. Anyone who doesn’t fall into these categories, I am cutting.

• Check if they are following you back- When a lot of us started on Twitter we all began following celebrities and social media “gurus.” While some of these people may be tweeting some very interesting content, they don’t know who you are and they definitely won’t be reading your blog. I cut a lot of these people because I’ll see their content anyway when the people I follow retweet them all day long.

• Organize the people you are keeping – Once I stated my criteria to myself, I made Twitter lists. As I have begun the lengthy process of weeding through people, I add each person I keep to a list. If they don’t fit on one of these lists, then they don’t fit my criteria, and they are gonna get the cut. For the people who fit on more than one list, I try to choose which one suits them best. This way, when I browse for content via my lists, they won’t all be the same.

• When you are finished, go out and follow new people – The beauty of unfollowing a bunch of irrelevant people means that you have more space for the people out there who do line up with your goals. This will get you more/fresh followers, who will be new eyeballs to your blog, website or personal brand. For tips on how to find new “right people” to follow, check out this guest post I did on the Flowtown blog a couple of months back.

• Do a gut check – Does this person annoy you? If so, unfollow them. I am not a fan of people who are tweeting out song lyric quotes or pressing the RT button all day long (add a little context to your RTs, people!). So even if they fit into one of your categories, but your Twitter styles don’t jive, there is no need to follow them. If you are really nervous about cutting someone just because they bug you, you can still list them, even if you aren’t following them. That way you can still check in with them from time to time, but their tweets aren’t clogging your stream.

There are many people on Twitter who will tell you to follow back pretty much everyone who follows you. While I think that sounds nice in theory, I don’t think the current landscape on Twitter allows for that. Almost everyone has an agenda (or they should), so find the people whose agenda lines up with yours and keep them. Then, cut the rest. It will make your use of Twitter much more efficient and it will help you prioritize who is worth a relationship investment. Best of all, it will keep you interested in the platform by ensuring that the content you are reading is top quality and on target with your goals.

So we’ve just heard of another Twitter “oops” from the actual human being behind the brand – yes, there is a person (or team) actually drafting and sending updates from brand accounts. Chrysler’s Twitter handle was supposedly “compromised” this week when a tweet went out dropping the F-bomb. Later, it was reported that the agency (or person) responsible for tweeting on behalf of the brand accidentally wrote a tweet meant to come from his/her personal account, but sent it from the brand they’re responsible for managing.

Before you think I’m scolding, let me just share – I, too, have accidentally tweeted from one account when meaning for it to come from another. Though I didn’t include any f-bombs or #gettingslizzerd in my tweets, it was enough to make me sweat for a few seconds, delete the tweet and move on… a little more cautiously. And so I offer the following advice when managing brand tweets:

Use tools to schedule tweets - Though I am all for the real-time updates, if you feel that content must be shared during off-hours, be smart and schedule the tweets using Hootsuite, SocialOomph or other platforms. It’s better to have followers respond to a brand’s tweet and receive a response 40 hours later than to run the risk of offending someone who spent years building the reputation of a brand. Trust me, your client will prefer the former.

Designate different apps when using mobile devices to live tweet - I’ve had the iPhone and I now own a Droid. On these, I’ve tried the Twitter app, TweetDeck and Seesmic. Though the perk of TweetDeck and Seesmic is to only need one application for your numerous handles, the risk of tweeting from the wrong account is very high. That’s why I’d recommend using a separate application for each account. It may seem redundant, but you should be taking the extra care and time to ensure that you’re careful with your tweets – it is your job on the line after all.

Encourage your client to be transparent - Followers aren’t ignorant enough to think that all of our messaging points in tweets are coming from a long approval process or that a robot is making the posts. If a brand is upfront with its followers off the bat and explains that there’s a team of people making updates, they will appreciate the fact that your brand is now a living, breathing being and most will be quick to forgive for human error. Red Cross took it a step further by joking (kindly) about the man behind the #slizzerd.”

Triple check before hitting “send” – I know, it shouldn’t have to be included in this list, but how else are major brands like Chrysler, Red Cross, Kenneth Cole and Charlie Sheen making negative social headlines. Well, I can’t actually save the last two examples, but you get the point. If you have to log out of Twitter.com to log back in and ensure you’re in the right account, or click the avatar in your desktop app a few extra times to bring the drop down menu of handle options, or check that you’re in the correct mobile Twitter application for the designated account – do it! It will save your job and your personal brand that I know you’re trying hard to build.

Tweet others the way you wish to be tweeted – This should go for your own personal account. If you’re writing tweets that could be offensive to the brand’s followers, what makes you think that you wouldn’t offend your own followers? We all have days where people drive like idiots, we want to get sloshed on the weekends or we can’t stop staring at the UPS delivery guy/cute intern, but before you hit “send,” do you really think your followers need to know? If you take the extra step to think about the tweet coming from you, it’ll save you from accidentally costing your client its hard-earned reputation.

Though I have my own thoughts on the right way a brand should handle this situation and the wrong way, what’s important to remember is to slow down, develop a system with tools to save yourself from these embarrassing and sometimes costly snafus, and most of all, pay attention before hitting the “send” button.

In the past couple of months we’ve written several posts on how you can build your social community by partaking in Twitter chats. Specifically we’ve  talked about PR chats and travel chats, but that doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface. There are all sorts of Twitter chats already established for anything you may be interested in and you can find these or create your own by using Twitter search.

Once you’ve identified the hashtag you’d like to follow, its time to figure out your preferred method of keeping up with the conversation. While following a hashtag sounds easy enough, there are a number of different approaches and tools to follow a chat in real-time. Here are some options, along with the pros and cons:

TWITTER.COM - Setting up a search in Twitter can be hit or miss – especially when it comes to chats. In my personal experience, it’s been challenging to find a conversation based on a hashtag, so once you see a tweet in your “Home” stream, click on the linked hashtag to bring you to a page where they’ll all populate.

Pros to Twitter.com – You control how often the tweets are updated by clicking refresh. As you’ll see in some of the options below, for larger, more popular chats, it can become overwhelming when the stream is updating faster than you can read.

Cons to Twitter.com - As mentioned earlier, I’ve had challenges with being able to find particular search terms and I’ve noticed that Twitter.com’s accuracy isn’t as spot-on as some other real-time tools. They also often “rate-limit” you, which means if your IP address has performed too many searches on Twitter within a given time, they won’t let you make any more. This makes it impossible to search for your hashtag.

Additionally, Twitter.com only lets you view one stream at a time, so if you’re looking at a conversation feed, you can’t go to someone’s full profile unless you click away from the #hashtag feed.

TWEETGRID (or TweetChat) – A lot of popular and recurring Twitter chats offer users a special website that auto-refreshes in real-time as the conversation takes place.

Pros of TweetGrid tools – You can view multiple streams at the same time (real-time updates of conversation based on the hashtag, @mentions, and an option to create your own stream to monitor what you wish during the chat). Most of these tools also automatically add the hashtag matched with the conversation to your tweets, which is very helpful for those of us that get really excited about the conversation and forget to add the tag.

Cons of TweetGrid tools – My main complaint with the tools I’ve tried (during #TNI – Traveler’s Night In) is how it updates. I do like that I can choose how often the stream updates (0 seconds, 15 seconds, 60 seconds, etc.), however instead of showing updates one by one, the entire block of tweets I was looking at moves down to the point where I can’t keep up with the conversation at all. I assume this tool would be helpful for a smaller online gathering of people, but with the weekly average of 500 people participating in this one conversation, it’s just too hard to monitor and reply easily.

DESKTOP APPLICATIONS (Seesmic, TweetDeck, Hootsuite) – So far, I’ve had the most success using my Seesmic desktop application. Just like any other tool out there, it can be buggy and decide temporarily to not update at all, but for the most part, I prefer this to the other options. I’d go so far as to say that as a marketer responsible for the daily maintenance of clients’ Twitter accounts and my own, desktop apps are the way to go.

Pros of desktop apps – I can create and monitor as many streams as I’d like. I can view Home, so I’m still watching other discussions taking place outside the chat, I can watch @mentions, DMs, search terms and the allotted conversation by hashtag. Additionally, if I want to view a user’s profile, I can click her handle and see her profile, followers, recent tweets, etc. I can follow, block or DM those users as well, all from Seesmic. Another pro of Seesmic is the real-time updates. When the updates are happening too often and I begin missing tweets, I can scroll down and that keeps the stream still until I decide to bring my cursor to the top again, where it’ll continue to update in real-time. With the newest version of Seesmic, I can view TwitPics right in the stream under the 140 character tweet. I warn you of this perk though, as there are many-a-photo I wish I hadn’t caught a glimpse of.

Cons of desktop apps - My only issue with these applications is the constant updating. As mentioned in TweetGrid tools, it can become overwhelming as your stream continuously moves down, making it nearly impossible to read, respond or click on anything your fellow conversationalists share. The only other issue I have is that when Twitter traffic gets too high, Seesmic tends to stop completely, unable to update any stream, making me miss anywhere from five to 20 minutes of a conversation, which I have to then turn to one of my other options.

SMART PHONES – There was one instance where I used my iPhone to partake in a Twitter chat (again Thursday’s #TNI). I was in the passenger seat driving from San Diego to Phoenix and didn’t want to miss my weekly addiction. I’ve downloaded both the Free Seesmic and Tweetdeck apps to my iPhone and found out that I only have a limited amount of tweets with the Seesmic app – whoops! As for Tweetdeck, it wasn’t 100% useful. After fighting AT&Ts coverage battle, I gave in and stole my boyfriend’s Droid, where I simply used the Twitter app. I can now say, I’ve tested most Twitter-related smart phone apps.

Pros of Smart Phones – Let’s face it – they’re portable! You can hop on any conversation wherever you happen to be (unless you’re held prisoner by AT&T). With Seesmic and Tweetdeck, you can set up multiple searches by account and monitor discussions by refreshing your feed.

Cons of Smart Phones – You’re at the mercy of your wi-fi connection. Additionally, these apps can also be buggy and won’t load for minutes at a time, in which you miss the point of the real-time chats.

I have tried them all and though it’s a personal preference, I still think the desktop app wins in my book. Which do you prefer? Are there other tools out there that do a better job of pacing the conversation for you? Leave a note in the comments.

By now, you’ve probably noticed an influx in social media usage amongst the entertainment industry.  The film business is a natural fit for social networks – movies are innately social, and people want to talk about them. Following suit to the Classic Hollywood star system and legendary fan magazines, social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, blogs and even entertainment check-in sites have created a new way to market movies, all while collecting invaluable market research along the way.

Among the plethora of movies being marketed with social media, one in particular really caught my eye – Tim Burton’s Twitter-Written story.

In a nutshell, Burton announced he wanted Twitter followers to help write his next script. He began with one line, and encouraged people on the platform to complete the plot by contributing content while  including the hashtag #BurtonStory within the tweet. Starting November 22 and ending December 6, the @BurtonStory attracted 11,307 people to follow the campaign – a good indication of the type of audience the movie would have if ever produced. Burton and Co. also set up a website for people to track the story where they can also download a PDF version of the final copy – another resource to measure whether people are attached to the plot or not. The tale began with an offbeat sentence, and one can only imagine where the storyline ended, but ultimately, the campaign was successful in connecting people with the potential film. All in all, the campaign is a great attribute to social media and its presence within the movie biz. Whether or not Burton plans on turning the fan-written story into a reality, he has shown how social media can successfully create buzz around a movie or script – all while collecting measurable data about the film’s target audience in the meantime.

Another example of how studios use social media to promote a film is Paramount Pictures’ Facebook campaign for low-budget horror flick, Paranormal Activity. The particular campaign demonstrates how to create buzz around a movie online, and also convert sales at the box office. The studio set a goal of one million Facebook fans as a prerequisite to release the film nation-wide, and sure enough, the goal was met. Not only were people eager to participate online, but they also felt ownership over the campaign – motivating them to actually purchase a ticket to go see the movie. The film grossed more than $150 million at the box office, and was ultimately a social media success.

Social media goes hand-in-hand with the film industry. Not only do platforms such as Twitter and Facebook allow studios to connect with a larger audience of viewers, but they also capture invaluable information that may indicate the success of a particular film in a certain region. There are plenty of examples pointing to why social media is the next big thing in marketing for the film industry, now it’s a matter of how both industries continue to evolve with one another to determine its full potential – stay tuned.

This week, Super Bowl advertisers Audi and Mercedes-Benz both announced plans to launch social media contests leading up to the 2011 Super Bowl. Both car companies are offering big prizes – new cars! trips! – to the winners of their social media contests, which will utilize Facebook and Twitter.

So what do you have to do to win these contests? According to USA Today, Mercedes-Benz is awarding cars to the two-person team that can get the brand the most tweets and Facebook “likes.” Audi is going a similar route, awarding trips to fans based who post the best, and most, on Facebook and Twitter.

While I love seeing more major- and especially luxury- brands jumping further into the social media game, I question whether these contests are the most effective ways to use these mediums. Basically, it seems these car brands are asking their fans to spam their online communities by focusing on quantity of posts over quality. I for one, am not interested in sending dozens of tweets and Facebook status updates to my followers for any car brand, no matter how much I want a new car. I imagine others who have worked hard to build credibility and influence amongst their social networks feel the same way.

So will these social media contests reach the RIGHT kind of audience? My guess is no. It will reach the type of people who have no problem spamming everyone and who, in that case, are probably not that influential or engaged.

There are many other directions Audi and Mercedes-Benz could have gone that focus on engagement and influence, rather than quantity of posts. Utilizing Klout, asking fans to create original content (videos, pictures, blog posts, etc) and using some more recent social media platforms and tools like QR codes and Foursquare seem like they would be much more effective in targeting, and engaging with, the right demographic for their brand. Most importantly, these brands could then focus on the quality of their engagement, not quantity. Both brands have not yet released their full strategies and campaigns, so I am holding out hope that they have a bigger picture that utilizes some of the things I mention above.

Do you think Audi and Mercedes-Benz are on the right track with their new social media campaigns?

Addiction – while bad in relation to drugs or other vices – is desirable for social media strategy. We’d like nothing more than to have our communities “addicted” to our clients’ pages. So how do we achieve the level of devotion in the social space that so many apps and games are getting? To answer this question, I thought it’d be a good practice to dissect one of my own guilty pleasures and discuss exactly which components can make for techie addiction. Here’s what I’ve learned from my slight obsession with the iPhone trivia game, QRANK.

Only available once a day, the goal of QRANK is to choose 15 of the 20 possible questions and answer them quickly and accurately to beat your friends and earn achievements.

• Keep it timely – The beauty of QRANK is that the majority of the trivia questions  are about current events from the front page of your national newspaper. This timeliness makes the game relevant to a broad audience and raises the probability that the gamer will find the topic interesting. This is the same principle we apply to blogging – if the topic is being discussed right now (or better yet, you can predict the topic will be discussed in the near future), you should plan ahead, do your research and be the first to make a post. Readers who trust that you will “break” timely news in your industry will check back often, possibly even daily.  Plus, with proper SEO, timely posts can expose your blog to new visitors, chatter in the social space and increased website traffic.

• Keep it interesting and concise - QRANK provides players with a daily dose of news, historical anniversaries and conversation starters, all with sentence-long explanations. The brevity makes it easy on the user to digest the information and then re-share later. This is something to keep in mind when people are asking you to write a paragraph long status update on Facebook for your company page. Your fans just want a snippet. Only choose the most important and interesting information if you are hoping to have your fans actually read your update.

• Community and competition – Almost every social platform and app out there has incorporated a “social” element. QRANK makes your scoring relevant by ranking you among friends, locally, by state, nationally and globally. QRANK has also incorporated a Facebook Connect option allowing players to taunt their friends and family by posting scores and acquired awards to their Facebook profile. Building a sense of community and healthy competition on any of your company’s social media platforms will keep people returning, but it’s more than just giving out free things. It is building a community where your “fans/followers/users” are doing more than just following your brand. They know each other, respect each other, and would be open to a little friendly competition with one another.

• Moderation really is the best policy -  We need variety in our lives, and sometimes we’re not capable of calling it quits on our own. QRANK’s resolved this issue by limiting players to only one 20-question game per day. Everyday, brand new questions are generated and shared, but players can’t get sick of overindulgence. This lesson is particularly relevant on Twitter where it is easy to over-share. Sure, there are users that tweet every five minutes, but your company doesn’t have to be one. Tweet in moderation so that people stay interested and don’t become annoyed.

• Incentives - The numerous awards you get from Qrank don’t get you anything (in real life), except for bragging rights and a chuckle over some of the more ridiculous awards. And yet, they are still desirable to the user. This is a reminder to not dismiss intangible rewards in the social space. Even if you personally hate foursquare and think earning a “mayorship” title is pointless, these are elements to an addictive social strategy. Smart companies are capitalizing on these intangible rewards by offering real rewards to match them, giving even more incentive to loyal brand ambassadors.

What’s your techie guilty pleasure and why? Oh, and if you have an iPhone or iPad, I challenge you to a trivia duel. My user name is KatyHarrison20.

You’ve likely heard the buzz that yesterday was “Cyber Monday.” So what the heck does that mean, you ask? And how should/can it affect your marketing plans?

Well, Cyber Monday is…

Cyber Monday is a marketing term created by businesses. The goal is to persuade people to do their holiday shopping online on the first Monday after Thanksgiving. Hoping to see similar results to the hugely successful “Black Friday,” online businesses began offering one-day-only sales to appeal to those who didn’t want to brave the malls or who didn’t find everything they needed.

The marketing term is still relatively new but awareness about the shopping event has grown leaps and bounds. Here we are, only five years after the first Cyber Monday, and everyone from CNN to Wall Street Journal to BusinessWeek is talking about it.

So why is Cyber Monday such a big deal?

According to research done by shop.org (who incidentally runs CyberMonday.com) more than 106 million people were expected to shop on Cyber Monday 2010 – that surpasses last year by more than 10 million shoppers. And, according to the article today on CNNMoney.com, sales were up nearly 20% from Cyber Monday 2009.  Sales were also more than 31% higher than the online purchase for this year’s Black Friday.  In short, Cyber Monday was a success.

How did Cyber Monday accomplish this?

Promotion of the event – and lots of it. All possible avenues were used to get the message out there, including traditional and not-so-traditional ways:

• Direct Mail
• Print
• Online banners
• And of course, Social Media

Being new to the Cyber Monday game this year, I did a quick social media search to see how much chatter the event was getting. Not a surprise, it got a lot, especially on Twitter.*

• #CyberMonday was a top trend on Twitter yesterday
• The @CyberMonday handle sent out more than 9,000 Tweets
• According to PR Week, the social media buzz for Cyber Monday was 6.5 times greater this year than last.

So you may be wondering how businesses can take advantage of the growing number of Cyber Monday consumers.

What businesses should do to benefit from Cyber Monday:

• Umm, participate!  The marketing and promoting is already being done.  All you need to do is offer a good discount that won’t be available the day before or the day after.
• Add messaging to your website.  You should be keeping your website content fresh anyway, so do so by promoting your sale. Start well in advance so that your offer can build buzz online.
• Tweet and/or Facebook it. Spread the word via social media and be sure to use the #Cybermonday hashtag.
• Email your loyal customers and ask them to pass it on.

Bottom line – you don’t need to spend a lot to benefit from the Cyber Monday marketing train – you just need to Get On Board…Toot Toot!

* Info gathered at 5 PM on 11/29/10

My last post shared travel specific Twitter hashtags that travel & hospitality PR pros should follow. This time, I wanted to share public relations specific hashtags that any public relations professional (or aspiring professional) can use to find like-minded PR people to follow, get useful information about the industry and possibly find a PR job. My list of the best PR hashtags are:

#pr20chat - The hashtag stands for PR 2.0. Moderated by Heather Whaling (@prtini) and Justin Goldsborough (@JGoldsborough), this chat happens every Tuesday at 8 PM EST and discusses public relations related issues and their social media implications.

#u30pro – Every Thursday at 8 PM EST. This chat was founded by Lauren Fernandez (@cubanalaf) and David Spinks (@DavidSpinks) and focuses on issues surrounding PR professionals under 30.

#happo – This hashtag stands for help a PR pro out, and that is exactly what it aims to do. Founded by Arik Hanson (@arikhanson), #happo uses social media to leverage relationships and help connect job seekers with PR employers. Follow #happo at any given time to find the latest jobs in PR as well as other important PR news and information. It is also useful if you have a PR question you need help with.

#solopr – Weekly #solopr chats happen on Wednesdays at 1 PM EST and are moderated by Kellye Crane (@Kellyecrane). This chat is designed for independent public relations professionals and those interested in learning more about this career path. While the chat is weekly, users of this hashtag tweet tips and information with is all the time.

There are also plenty of others that contain useful information, like #prsa and the very general #pr which are great for finding other PR pros and up-to-the-minute PR news.

Do you want more followers who would be interested in your blog posts? Do you want to find interesting PR people to engage with? Do you want to find a PR job? I recommend trying out each of these hashtags and chats and seeing which one is a fit for you and how you can best use them.

In our ever-evolving world of social media, it’s hard to keep track of Twitter followers, Facebook friends and email contacts all in a day’s work. I get it, you’re busy – and that’s exactly why Gist may very well be your new best friend.

Gist provides a venue for real-time conversation by compiling all of your contacts into one dashboard.  The site pulls information from Outlook, Gmail, Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin, making it your one-stop shop for all things social networks. Gist gives you a quick snapshot of what’s going on with your key contacts, allowing you to connect quickly and efficiently with your network.

I set a quick Twitter search to see what users were saying about Gist, and was pleasantly surprised with my results. I found a tweet from @rareagent saying she uses the site for social media updates. For example, a blog post from an ex co-worker popped up in her Gist feed, and she sent a note praising them on their work. The real-time conversation ultimately led to a new business opportunity, which she closed in two weeks.  While I don’t know that Gist will drive sales altogether,  I do believe that the program can be used intelligently to capitalize on new business opportunities. This is just one of the many examples I found highlighting the potential of the platform when used properly.

In addition to recognizing new business opportunities within Gist, as a PR professional, I find this tool to be extremely useful to stay up-to-date with media contacts. Here are several reasons why:

• Ranking system – Gist ranks your contacts based on how well you’re connected; therefore, the more networks you’re tied to with someone, the more they show up in your stream. You can also rank contacts yourself, making it easy to connect with media.
• Search – allows you to focus on your contacts from a specific platform. For example, you can search your Twitter followers and see what they’re saying across all platforms. I found this feature to help engage with media contacts on a more social level – through their social networks, rather than via email.
• Dossier – basically an individual Rolodex. Allows you to create a profile for contacts in which you can add notes and keep track of interaction.
• Updates – you can choose to receive daily or weekly updates from Gist. This allows you to quickly see what’s going on at the beginning of your day, and take action on any noteworthy updates.

All in all, my thoughts on Gist are that it’s a neat program that can help you stay organized in a sometimes very overwhelming digital world. My two cents on the platform are – if you’re going to use it, use it well. Grow your networks and engage intelligently to become even more connected with those who matter most.

A big benefit of Twitter is the chance to engage with people who share your interests and meet potential customers and industry influencers. Following Twitter hashtags is an easy and effective way to find these people on Twitter. Plus, since many hashtags function as chat sessions, it provides a perfect setting to engage in a conversation.

For travel public relations pros, there are a few travel hashtags on Twitter that I recommend checking out, either for your personal Twitter account or for a hospitality client account. These hasthags provide a great opportunity to meet travel media/bloggers, hotel and hospitality operators and travel enthusiasts, while giving you a great source of information on travel trends and news.

Below is a brief list of some of my favorites travel hashtags on Twitter:

• #travel - This is a generic hashtag for all things travel. It is not very focused or organized, but is a good way to get a general sense of what is happening in travel in real-time.

• #TMOM – This is a hashtag for the very active Travel Mom Blogger Network. They have regular Twitter parties on Mondays at 9 PM EST where they discuss a specific travel topic using the #TMOM hashtag.

• #TNI -TNI stands for Traveler’s Night In. This hashtag was started by Zip Set Go and occurs every Thursday from 3:30 PM – 5:00 PM EST. Every week they discuss a different travel theme. They also give away cool prizes and special #TNI discounts for participants.

• #TravelTuesday (also sometimes used as #TT) – Every Tuesday is Travel Tuesday, and anyone who shares travel related info uses the hashtag on this day. It is a perfect opportunity to connect with other travel aficionados and give a shout out to some of your travel favorites (similar to #FollowFriday, but specifically for the travel world).

• #satw and #tbex and other specific trade shows and organization hashtags -  Whenever there is a trade show or conference, there is generally an accompanying hashtag to help people at the conference connect and let the people at home follow along.  SATW is the Society of American Travel Writers. Some members use the hashtag throughout the year, however the best time to follow the hashtag is during its yearly convention, which generally falls in October. TBEX is the Travel Blog Exchange and it also hosts an annual event for new media travel writers. TBEX 2011 will be June 11 -12, 2011 in Vancouver and the hashtag is sure to be active during these two days. TBEX also hosts regular meet ups around the country year, so this is a hashtag that can be followed year round.

Once you start using these hashtags, you will find  people with similar interests to engage with in a conversation and find interesting travel information. Even better, you can also use these hashtags to help grow your Twitter followers. A win-win, if you ask me.