What have I learned after one month of Twitter?

#notmuch (#justkidding) (#incaseyourewonderingthesearetwitterinsidejokesandmyspacebarisnotbroken)

I started up a Twitter account (@CanFieldNat) about a month ago with the goal of increasing readership and awareness of our journal.  I'm doing this by:
1. Announcing newly published articles
2. Creating and retweeting other information related to natural history with the goal of gaining followers and providing them with information they appreciate

I was skeptical of Twitter's usefulness.  So what do I think after one month?
I think that Twitter is useful ... to a point.  Twitter is actually useful for alerting new readers to CFN articles.  There are a number of hits to CFN's website through Twitter domains, indicating our tweets are indeed driving visitors to our articles.  That's good.  But Twitter can suck your time if you're not careful.  I'm skimming other people's tweets, but not diligently reading them all.

My friend Alex MacDonald (@NatureCanadaPAs) alerted me to a report, summarized here, describing effective methods of tweeting for organizations.  Interesting stuff.  For example, there is an optimal number of hashtags to include; too few and people don't find your tweets, too many and your tweets look messy and people dismiss them.  So I'll try a few of the report's suggestions in the future.  Except its suggestion of tweeting more on the weekends.  That's my time to go kayaking with my son.  I'd be a pretty bad naturalist (and father) if I gave that up for tweeting!  #FatherhoodFail

#GottaStopHashtagJokes