Making Tweeps

I having been using Twitter for several years now and still loving it. The only issue I have are the challenges of getting others to adopt it. For me, Twitter is a great tool in my personal life and also a fantastic workplace tool. When trying to sell use of Twitter among my coworkers and personal acquaintances I tell them of the ways I use it and anecdotes of times it has been of great benefit. I have even sat with people assisting them with setting up an account and given one on one tutorials on using Twitter. Still, most have not adopted its use or gave it a limited try and then let their account stagnate.

Of course I am still determined to make tweeps of everyone - not giving up. Here are some of the things I tell people and coworkers when I describe the benefits of using Twitter.

• It is a fantastic means of creating a personal learning network (PLN) no matter what industry your are in or your interests. 
• Attending tweetchats, which are great learning events. These are where Tweeps in a specific community, like learning and development or health care providers, etc. discuss specific topics. Typically, they are fast and fun learning events. Interested, try #lrncht on Thursday nights. FYI, most tweetchats are very informal and about learning, connecting and having fun with people you share something in common. 
• Use as medium to teach and share your own knowledge. One can also post their Twitter feeds in courses, web pages, corporate blogs, etc.
• Be an active, vocal consumer. I will applaud great service from stores and restaurants, but I also provide my criticisms when necessary.
• Participate in the back channel of a conference, while attending or from afar. Heck, if enough attendees are in the back channel it is almost as good as attending live. I have followed sessions at elearning conferences and even had several tweeps there surprised that I was not physically in attendance, but was so involved in the session's conversation (backchannel). 
• Hear the news as it is happening and by the people making it. Yes, you must carefully consider the sources and accuracy, but that goes the same from most other sources too.

Am I missing something? Feel free to add it to the comments section.

For those of you who are not tweeps yet or want to some basics on using Twitter, here are a couple of resources. The first is is good intro for learning and development professionals. It is from @LnDDave and although it does not include his audio, the slide content itself stands up well even without the full webinar audio.

Twitter 101 for Learning Professionals from David Kelly

Twitter has an introductory tour available. This is also a good place to start for anyone new to Twitter.

If you know of some good ways "making tweeps" or have additional resources for introducing the power of Twitter, feel free to share them in this post's comments section. Thanks!