Can I Help You?

Posted by TeamCharlie on February 15, 2009 under Gabe's Twitter Gems, Social Media, Twitter | Be the First to Comment

“Ask not what your followers can do for you. Ask what you can do for your followers!” -@KidsAreHeroes

I have recently gotten into the habit of asking the question “What can I do for you?” when I sign on to Twitter.  As I was reading tweets one morning, I noticed the majority of the messages were relating back to the person who wrote them.  “Please vote for me!” “Please retweet my business offer!”  I wanted to throw in just a bit of the opposite to see what would happen.  So I posed the question: “What can I do for you?”  I actually got one response for a suggestion for a brand of hard drive for a Mac.  I unfortunately do not own a Mac (yet), so I felt unqualified to answer. But I did give him the contact information of a local computer repair shop that I have confidence would willingly give him an educated answer.

So when I ask this question I am not being rhetorical. I seek out tweets that ask for specific things that I can do.  It might be simply googling for something that the requester had asked for.  It may be a graphics task which I can do rather easily.  I even helped one lady with a quadratic equation.  Now I haven’t done these since high school which was when all I had to write with were tablets and chisels, but I found a site that explained how to do it and I helped her. 

So why do I do this? Because I have found it to be the fastest way to connect with people.  Once I have done whatever it is that they asked for I now feel I know that person a little better and are more aware of their tweets (and hopefully they of mine).  This is when Twitter becomes really fun and why I like it so much.  So next time you need something, just ask or respond to my question when I ask it.  I’ll do what I can to help you.