Summary: Twitter Chats have their regular followers yet even some experienced event planners still don't know about them. Here is a quick primer to get you up to speed on the top 10 Twitter Chats that all event planners should add to their schedules.

Top 10 Twitter Chats for Event Planners & Event Industry Professionals

Twitter Chats have been around for such a long time that I could just hear some Twitter veterans groaning as soon as they saw the title of this blog. After all, it's old news. Everybody knows about Twitter Chat, right? I manage the 30,000+ member Event Planning and Management group on LinkedIn. More often than you would expect, I interact with members who are finding out about Twitter Chats for the first time. They are delighted when they discover what a useful resource Twitter Chats can be. So, we're going to cover the basics. I invite Twitter Chat newbies to post your questions. I invite Twitter Chat veterans to post responses, share tips and list any chats or tools for monitoring them that I haven't included.

Twitter Chats - The Basics

A Twitter Chat is a regularly scheduled interactive event that takes places on Twitter. The format for Twitter Chats (also known as hashtag chats) is:

Hashtag (#) + a keyword. Example: #eventprofs

Every Twitter Chat has it's own schedule, format and etiquette. A number of Twitter Chats have online guides, Wikis or Facebook pages to explain what the focus and structure. For this reason, you may want to observe for a few minutes or review documentation so that you are clear about what is expected before you jump in.

Some Twitter Chats take place only once or or twice a week. When the chat is over, there is little interaction unless it's a follow up that is directly relevant to the topic of the most recent chat. Others encourage the use of the chat hashtag for interaction between scheduled chats. Tweeps share information, tips, blogs, and articles using the hashtag. Some Twitter Chats evolve into communities and establish LinkedIn groups to take the interaction deeper than what is possible in 140 characters. Some chat communities have face-to-face tweet-ups. It's the perfect way to take networking beyond cyberspace and into the real world.

If you miss a chat, there is no need to worry. A transcript of summary is usually shared on Twitter within 24 hours. Some chats even have an archive of chat transcripts.

Benefits of Twitter Chats

Twitter Chats provide an opportunity to engage with other Twitter users and discover new people to follow. They give instant access to information to help you keep abreast of trends within the event planning industry.

Twitter Chats & Hashtags for Event Planners

1. #eventprofs Eventprofs: A thriving community of event planners and other event industry Professionals. This was the first Twitter chat for event planners.
   Tuesdays 9 - 10 PM EST/6 - 7 PM PST & Thursdays 12 - 1PM EST/9 - 10 AM PST
   
   • Eventprofs Chat Schedule
   • Eventprofs on Facebook
   • Eventprofs Wiki

2. #TTOT Travel Tuesday on Twitter: Social media travel event. Five questions, every 10 minutes
   Tuesdays 9:30 AM & 9:30 PM GMT.
3. #engage365 Engage 365: For events professionals interested in social media for events & conferences. Similar to #eventprofs, but discussions focus more on event technology, engaging attendees, and event marketing.
   Fridays 1 PM ET.
4. #assnchat Association Chat: Chat for association professionals discussing current industry trends, technology and strategy
   Tuesdays 2 PM ET

5. #luxchat Luxchat: Excellent and highly relevant to event planners who work in the luxury market sector. Usually features a high profile guest. Representatives of a number of upscale resorts have been featured. Some chats are on location.
   Monthly. 3rd Wednesday of every month at 5:30 PM ET
6. #tourismchat Tourism Chat: Bi-monthly twitter chat focusing on social media in the tourism industry.
   Thursdays 2 PM CT, 3 PM ET
7. #speakchat Speak Chat: Engaging. Event planners, professional speakers, and speakers bureaus discuss a variety of industry related topics and issues.
   Mondays 9 PM ET.
8. #tni Traveller's Night In: Covers a new travel topic each week. 10 questions tweeted by various hosts.
   Thursdays 3:30 - 5:00 PM ET.
9. #weddingmarket Wedding Market Chat: Trends, marketing and information for the wedding and bridal markets.
   Wednesdays 10 AM PT/ 1 PM ET/6 P GmT.
10. #AVchat AV Chat: All you ever wanted to learn about AV, a key ingredient for many successful events.
    Thursdays 4 PM PT/7 PM ET

Bonus:

The following Twitter Chats are not specifically designed for the event industry but Event Planners will find them extremely helpful chat. They are well worth checking out regularly.

• #b2bchat B2B (Business to Business) Chat: A a lively gathering of B2B marketers
  Thursdays 8 PM ET - #b2bchat Linkedin Group
• #linkedinchat LinkedIn Chat: All things LinkedIn – what you like, what you hate, useful strategies, favourite apps
  Tuesdays 7PM CT/ 8 PM ET - LinkChat LinkedIn Group
• #blogchatBlog Chat:A weekly conversation about blogs.
  Sundays 8 PM CT/9 PM ET - Blogchat Linkedin Group.
• #profschat MarketingProfs: Actionable know-how to help you market your products and services
  Fridays Noon ET - MarketingProfs Linkedin Group

Event industry professionals will find useful content by using the following Twitter hashtags:

• linkevents
• #meetingprofs
• #pcma
• #mpi
• #bizbash

How to Participate in Twitter Chats

• In Search, type in the Twitter Chat hashtag and hit "Enter".
• You'll see all of the tweets that have recently been posted using that hashtag.
• To add your content, type your tweet in the "What's Happening Field". Include the hashtag in your tweet. Presto, it will be visible to everyone monitoring that hashtag.

If you never participated in a Twitter chat, these videos will demonstrate how you can join in on Twitter or using applications like Tweetdeck or Twitter Chat.

Tweetdeck

Tweet Chat

Hoot Suite

Twitter Chat & Hashtag Definitions

Unfortunately, what the Hashtag (wthashtag.com) is no more but this tool is helpful in identifying what the various Twitter Chat & hashtags mean:

• Tagdef Hashtag Look up
  If you have a new chat or hashtag, you can also add and define it here.

Photo Credit: simonwheatley

Summary: Twitterfeed is a great tool with many advantages but it does have its drawbacks. No 2 human beings can ever be entirely in sync about everything. If you share other people's content with your followers through Twitterfeed or any automated tool, sooner or later, someone is going to post content on their blog or in their periodical that you feel you can't endorse. What are some strategies for handling it when it finally happens to you? Here are some lessons from the school of hard knocks.

Twitterfeed: Balancing Pros and Cons

Twitterfeed has a lot going for it. It's a fabulous tool. I discovered it quite a while back and immediately started to use it. In fact, I discussed it in-depth in last fall's Social Media Marketing for Event Planners  Event Coup series.

Twitterfeed Pros

1. Twitterfeed and other automated tools help you ensure that your content is visible.Twitter moves quickly. If you don't tweet regularly, your tweets will disappear from the global tweetsream before you know it. It is impossible to sit at your computer or to be constantly checking your Blackberry or Ipad 24/7 to manually tweet information. Once you set up your Twitterfeeds, you can distribute content round the clock.
2. Twitterfeed makes it easy to distribute your blogs and articles to a wider audience.

   It gives small to medium bloggers and periodicals the advantages of syndication that were previously enjoyed only by major media outlets. Even while you're sleeping your content can be distributed to followers in other time zones quickly and easily.

3. Once you have a following, with Twitterfeed is a great way of ensuring that your followers have access to the very best articles and videos from blogs, magazines, and news sources around the globe.

   Never before has it been so easy to tailor content to your readers and followers.

4. With Twitterfeed, you can hashtags automate and categorize your Tweets to help other Twitter users easily locate content that is of relevance and interest to them.
5. Twitterfeed is easy to use.

   There is almost no learning curve. The site provides instructions and you can be up and running in no time

A Twitterfeed Lesson From the School of Hard Knocks

In fact I could think of no downside to Twitterfeed until today. Here is what happened.

I returned home from church and decided to log on to Twitter for a few moments. When I checked my tweetstream, I was absolutely horrfied. @outspokenmedia had posted a new article on their blog. Their blog has some great content including marketing tips and the latest perspectives on social media use. In fact, I felt their content was so innovative ad outstanding that it was one of the first blogs I added when I first discovered Twitterfeed. Unfortunately, today the title was a shocker. I won't repeat it but it was certainly well beyond my zone of comfort.

I can just hear some readers thinking "Bwoy she gwan prudish". (Translation: "Man she's prudish".) I'm originally from Jamaica so please indulge my Jamaican patois in situations like this.

Now a lot of their followers LOVED it. They found it bold, edgy, cheeky, in your face, and refreshing. It fits the tagline on their Twitter profile. What I call disgusting, some people call provocative. It's generated some buzz, people are talking about it and it's getting their name out there even more. They have over 9,500 followers so clearly, a lot of people love their approach and there were many positive comments about their tweet and article.

Let's face it, when we take a risk, it generates a variety of reactions. Some will like what we have, others won't.It's just not the kind of headline that I want out there associated with my name when prospective clients are considering using my services. It's a personal preference. Another example would be profanity. Some people are fine with it, others aren't. When Richard Branson was in Montreal for the F1 in June, he was quoted using profanity. Donald Trump has been beeped on Celebrity Apprentice. It may not be my cup of tea but this hasn't stopped either of these executives from being HIGHLY successful.

Normally, with Twitter, if I see something in my tweetstream that doesn't fit my personal tastes of values I just delete it. I tried to delete the tweet but it took MANY attempts. I've noticed this has been happening with Twitter of late. In fact, the only way I could get the deletion to stick was to tweet something else and then go back and delete the Twitterfeed tweet. I noice the same thing happens sometimes with Tweet Chat.

Problem solved...so I thought. After all, it was late Sunday morning. Likely no one would be around to see it. I tweet a lot of content. Even when there is is something I really want to get out there and I tweet it many times, very little of it gets re-tweeted. Just to be on the safe side, I checked my mentions and re-tweets. Horror of horrors, not only had that tweet been re-tweeted by about half a dozen people, a couple had negative reactions to it and 1 person had sent it out on 2 accounts as a re-tweet using MY NAME rather than my Twitter ID. Talk about a reputation management nightmare. Visions of a mass exodous of followers danced in my head. I couldn't understand how that happened. I have since determined how that happened. To make it easier for people to find me, my FriendFeed is in my personal name rather than my company name. That tweet went instantly from Twitterfeed to Twitter to Friendfeed to Google. OUCH! 

Twitterfeed Caution

So my take away from all of this is that while Twitterfeed is a fantastic tool, it shares 2 great drawbacks with other social media automation tools.

1. With Twitterfeed and other automated tools, you have no opportunity to see and approve content before it's tweeted.

   Since no one has control over what another person posts in their blog, magazine or newspaper, it's a risky proposition.

2. Once a Tweet is out there, it's out there.

   You have no control over what other Twitter users do with it. It can end up in Google within 3 minutes and, after months of longing for Twitoaster to pick up some of your content, the very thing that you don't want out there can be what gets distributed.

Google appears to be very selective. There are popular topics about which I tweet on a regular basis. I have longed for Google to have "Latest Results" for those topics to give me more exposure. It doesn't. You guessed it. Google now has "Latest Results" on the first page of search results for MY name and a link that you can click to get EVEN MORE.

I've done some acting but I'm not a celebrity. I Googled some famous Canadian celebrities like "Art Hindle" and "Drake". Art and Drake didn't have a "Latest Results" section and neither did any of the other Canadian celebrities I checked. In fact, not even Lady Gaga has a "Latest Results" section on the first 3 pages of search results for HER name in Google. What maked me so special? I guess I should be flattered that Google feels that I am more important than top celebrities and popular topics but the timing couldn't be worse. Now if a prospective client is checking me out by name, they can access my latest Twitter results on the first page. If they look for my company, they'll find my Twitoaster conversations. That's good news as I can be certain that some of the content I want to release gets out there but there are downsides when technology goes wrong.

Damage Control: What to do When Automation Goes Wrong

As the Internet matures, there will be many tools that make our lives easier and allow us to get our content to wider audiences. Automation is a great advantage but it does have its drawback.What should you do if something gets sent into cyberspace with your name attached?

1. Monitor what's out there on a regular basis.

   . Check your Tweetstream a couple of times a day (by clicking on your User ID or "Profile" in Twitter. Have a look at your Friendfeed. Monitor the conversations that are ending up in Twitoaster.

2. Never leave Twitter or any other Internet account where you have some automated processes on automatic pilot for too long
3. When content is released with which you would not want to have your name associated, delete it as soon as you see it.

4. Ask people who re-tweeted it to delete it.

   Most people are good at heart and they'll help you out.

5. Apologize

   Make sure that your followers know that the content did not have your blessing and apologize for the inconvenience.

6. Immediately send out more content to replace what shows up in "recent results"

   Get your blogs out there and add your name as an author. Release new content. Re-tweet positive content with your name or company name.

7. After you're finished freaking out (I have), find the humour in the situation.

   Remember this too will pass.

8. If you have a blog, blog about it

Preventative Strategies

How can you prevent a reputation management crisis from happening in the first place? There are no foolproof strategies but there are a few things you can try to minimize risk

1. Ensure that your Friendfeed is in the same name as your Twitter account
2. Consider setting up a separate Twitter and Friendfeed for personal content
3. Be clear about your boundaries and what is outside your zone of comfort

   For me that includes expletives, profanity, and suggestive content

4. Thoroughly examine the archives for blogs, magazines, newspapers, and other content sources you are thinking of adding to your Twitterfeed to ensure that the tone and content are within your zone of content.

   I did that but it wasn't enough.

5. Have a look at the Tweetstream for the individuals who publish the blogs to get clues about tone
6. Monitor the content that is shared through your Twitterfeed at least twice per day
7. Immediately delete anything that is outside your zone of comfort or that you feel would offend your followers
8. Remove RSS Feeds from your Twitterfeed and revert to manual tweets and re-tweets if something beyond your zone of comfort has been published.

Next Steps

• Do a Google search for your name and see if latest results are showing up yet.

  If they are monitor them on a regular basis.

• Check out your Tweetstream and delete any Twitterfeed tweets that don't have your blessing
• Get your message out there with new content, as quickly as possible
• If you have had similar experiences, please share them in comments with lessons learned so that we all can benefit.

As for , I still love them but they're off my Twitterfeed. No one could ever accuse these gals of not having spunk. To be on the safe side, from now on I think I'll just re-tweet some of the great content they put out there manually.

Photo Credits: Twitterfeed Images Tony Haile

Photo Credits: Shocked Photo pfaff

Summary:  If you have mastered Twitter basics and you want to improve your effectiveness in the use of Twitter, there are 4 tools you may want to consider using:

• Tweet Effect
• Qwitter
• Goodbye, Buddy
• Mr. Tweet

Bonus:

• Twitter Karma

These 5 Twitter tools will help you:

• understand the impact of your tweets
• find out which of your tweets caused people to start or stop following you
• get a clear picture of the tweets your followers value and the ones they find annoying
• get a list of people who have stopped following you
• get a list of your best followers so that you can follow them
• develop a better understanding of your followers

The best news of all is that all of these tools are free.

4 Advanced Twitter Tools

Understand the Impact of your Tweets

Tweet Effect

1. Visit the site.
2. Type your Twitter ID
3. Hit "enter".

 Tweet Effect will generate a list of your recent tweets indicating beside each one:

• how many people started following you (highlighted in red)
• how many stopped following (highlighted in green)

This tool will really give you a clear picture of the type of tweets your followers value as well as the ones they find annoying.

Tweet Effect doesn't store any data about you so each inquiry is processed real time. If it's taking long for Tweet Effect to load, just hit reload and you'll be able to see everything it's loaded so far.

Find out Who "Unfollowed" You & Why

Qwitter

If you want to dig deeper, Qwitter will send you an e-mail every time someone stops you with your most recent tweet that may have precipitated the unfollow. If you're getting a lot of unfollows after you've posted something or your Twitterfeed has sent something out, it might be a good idea to delete that tweet right away.

For example, I added the RSS Feed to  Twitterfeed from a blog that I found interesting. I noticed that every time information was tweeted about an article from that blog, I would get a lot of people unfollowing me. I deleted that feed from my Twitterfeed.

Goodbye, Buddy!

Log into Goodbye, Buddy! It will take time to load your followers.  Once that's done, visit the site once a day to get a list of the 30 tweeps who stopped following you most recently. Goodbye, Buddy!  will identify any of these unfollowers who you are still following. You can make a decision about whether or not you still want to follow them. If someone is of interest to you, sometimes they will follow you again if you re-tweet some of their content that you find to be of value.

Develop a Better Understanding of your Followers

Mr. Tweet

Jenese Fryatt, @lyksumlikrish, who I met through #eventprofs on Twitter, introduced me to this fabulous tool. It really helps you develop an understanding of your followers so that you can tweet content that is of value to them.

1. First, follow  @mrtweet
2. Then go to the site.
3. Log in.

Once you log in, Mr. Tweet will take some time to load your followers and people who you are following. It will the provide you with an anaylsis that will:

• give a brief synopsis of each person you follow and each of your followers from their profile
• identify your best and most influential followers and export this as a list to Twitter if you like

  This is really of value because it gives you an opportunity to follow  your most active followers and re-tweet their tweets

• reccommend people you should consider following based on the similarity of your interests and tweet content
• run searches to pull up a list a members by criteria such as country

Mr. Tweet also makes it possible to tweet and give suggestions to your followers about who they might want to consider following.

Bonus:

Twitter Karma

1. Click on "sign in with Twitter"
2. Then, click on Whack

If you have a lot of followers, it may take a while for Twitter Karma to grab all your information from Twitter but it's well worth the wait. You will end up with a map of your account. You'll be able to:

• see who you're following that isn't following you back
• see who is following you that aren't following

For more information:

Twitter Tools for Event Planners, a previous Event Coup feature by Kena Siu, is definitely worth checking out for more tools.

Related:

Social Media Marketing Tools for Event Planners

• Part 1: Websites, Blogs, & LinkedIn
• Part 2: RSS Feeds: Preparing to Share Your Blog
• Part 3: Twitter & Facebook

Photo Credit:  Opening Photo - xtof