Although the UBD team has been on Twitter for quite a while now, we hadn’t setup a company account until now. We have a lot of exciting things planned for 2009 that will definitely surprise you!

In Q1 2009, we have something very special to show you and we will be announcing it first on Twitter. We also plan to use Twitter for exclusive contests, promotions and giveaways.

Tweeting has proven itself to be an incredibly useful and important tool for communication, rivaling both instant messaging and blogging. In fact, it’s almost a mixture of the two.

If you haven’t set up your free Twitter account, do so now here. You won’t regret it.

Blogging

Blogging allows you to reach out to those in your community as well as your potential customers on a personal level. This is one of the main advantages of having a blog. Your potential customers can get to know you and your company, before actually speaking with you. Thus, creating that much needed rapport.

Instant Messaging

For those of you who use instant messaging to communicate with friends, colleagues, and clients, you know that IMing is mostly informal. You don’t have to worry as much about being grammatically correct, spelling, etc. Instant messaging is largely direct communication with one other person.

Twitter – Bridging the gap between Blogging and IM

One of the most important aspects of using Twitter is the informality of connecting with others. It is not invasive to respond to someone’s tweet whom you have never met. Even if that person is a thought leader in your industry. In fact, I would recommend it (just don’t overdo it)!

Building relationships within your community can take your business to “the next level.” Twitter is a fantastic and informal way to do so. If you can strike up a conversation with a person over Twitter who has a large following, there is a good chance some of those followers will start following you.

You can also use Twitter to let your clients, colleagues, and friends know what you are up to throughout the day. It is a great way to stay connected with all of them.

My favorite aspect of Twitter, is the ability for me to get a peak into the lives and insights of those I respect. I am able to follow the leaders of my industry and others. This is actually quite amazing.

Most of the people that I follow provide a great deal of value to my day. Sometimes I am not able to read all of the blogs that I want to, but I am able to keep up with most everyone on Twitter.

Sending Traffic to Your Blog Via Twitter

As with writing a great tittle to your blog post, tweeting about your blog posts, requires the same attention to detail. You want to get those who are following you on Twitter to go read your posts right? Well, then make the tweet interesting and grab there attention.

One thing that you want to be careful of is not tweeting so much that you are seen as a spammer. Keep in mind that while Twitter is more informal that your blog, you should still be seeking to provide value and insights to your followers.

The more that you are involved with Twitter, as with most other things, the better results you will have. There are tons of really useful tools, such as Twitterrific, that help you manage and get the most out of your Twitter experience.

There are lots of different reasons why Twitter is having “hockey stick” growth right now, and I recommend you start using it as soon as possible.

Are you already using Twitter? If so, what tips do you have for new Twitter users?

Here is a list of popular blogs and tools about Twitter to help you get started:

• TwitTip – a blog all about Twitter written by Problogger
• Free Twitter Buttons
• Twitteriffic

P.S. Make sure you are following the UBD team on Twitter:

• Josh Mullineaux (that’s me)
• Matthew Blancarte
• Nate Whitehill