The Point of Twitter

After this week, I have a better idea of the purpose of Twitter as it relates to businesses.  People want to share things in the moment.  Businesses can take advantage of this by using Twitter to find out what consumers are thinking about in real time.  They can use this information to engage individual potential customers in a conversation that could eventually lead to a sale.  The NPR podcast "On Media" says that Google helps find information about things, but Twitter will tell businesses how people feel about things.  Personally, I see people posting tweets about their lunch, and I think "who cares?".  However now I have a better understanding that those seemingly inane statements can be relevant to, for example, a local restaurant.  This week's studies have motivated me to pay a little more attention to Twitter and find out its place in my life and career.