Thursday, April 15, 2010

Multiple Twitter Personality Disorder

I recently attended a Canadian Society for Marketing Professional Services (CSMPS) luuncheon featuring
Craig Faulkner speaking to social media.  His presentation gave me a few tips on how to adjust my social media thinking for my 'day' job. 

But it also got me thinking that perhaps I'm suffering from multiple twitter personality disorder.  And I don't think I'm alone.  I was chatting with a couple of other twitter friends on the weekend - and by chatting I mean in person sitting next to each other talking (which to me is the real value of twitter... but more on that another day).  My 2 friends are entrepreneurs and both had a personal and business twitter account. We laughed about creating a unique voice and audience for each of our accounts.  Then I rather sheepishly admited to managing four (4) twitter accounts. 

Somedays having 4 different and very distinct accounts is a challenge.  But I still seem to be in control of them all... well except for those few times when I click the wrong personna on tweetdeck or hootsuite and I tweet something about diaper training on another account.

First there is my personal account @tjrossignol. This one is the most complex cause it is the personal me.  It is the mom, wife, marketer, tv viewer, lover of gossip, toilet training triumphs/failures, sci loving, sort of sarcastic account.  Lots of topics open to discussion just like this blog and ME.  Pretty much anything I'd say at a cocktail party after a glass of wine is fair game on this account.  I have a good group of twitter friends on this account. We get together in person for family outings, playdates, tweet ups, vancouver mom's night out, marketing events, etc.  They are great supportive pals and lots of fun to chat with online and in person.

Then there is the @WIL_Fdn.  This is the Women in Leadership Foundation account, which I manage with some help from a couple of other lovely volunteers. This account is all about inspiring and celebrating women.  Bringing women together and helping them empower themselves.  Topics include Women's leadership, professional advice,  entrepreneurial information, research, what other women's groups are doing and of course information so we can meet up with some great inspiring women at our events. We follow and are followed by some very interesting and successful women.  So I need to think networking profesional, and remove the glass of wine from my "voice" on this account  (and I apologize for those few training updates from @tjrossignol by mistake).

@Fashion_frwd40 is the side of my personality that has always loved fashion.  I'm sharing the details of my adventures in rediscovering my love of fashion after 40.  Just like the http://fashionforward40.com/ blog I tweet celebs over 40 fashion, my own experiences, great trends and tips from other fashionable tweets.  Now the people watching, slightly catty girl, with 2 glasses of wine (or perhaps a cosmo or two) comes out.   I'm still in the community building stage here.  I've started attending more local events and meeting people in person always seems to benefit my twitter relationships.

My final account is my work one.  I do the marketing for a professional services firm. This one is the hardest as I'm not an expert in the service we offer.  So I'm listening more than talking.   We are a creative thinking firm, so I use that as my guideline for content.  But so far I listen and RT more than I provide original content. 

Confused yet!  Me too.  I guess as long as the accounts don't start chatting amongst themselves without me, I think I'm okay. 

So how about you?  Do you have multiple accounts?  How do you create a unique voice for each?

2 comments:

  1. I have 2 accounts. My regular old me one that most people know and love AND an annonymous one that I use as a connection to the blog I started a while back as a place to vent frustrations I didn't feel comfortable sharing on my regular blog. It's like an "alter-ego" kind of thing. I hardly ever use it but occasionally the mood strikes so I bounce over to the other account.

    I found it difficult to keep "me" out of the other account which is silly, because it is still ME, just not the usual me...does that make sense? Maybe that is why I barely use it

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  2. I have only one twitter account. My husband has 2, and they definitely have different 'feels'. I could see how that would happen, but I'm glad to keep everything in one place. It just feels easier to me.

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