Twitter

I have a new job.

As I sat in Dave's kitchen discussing the finer points of said job I admit I had my smug face on.

You see, it sounded like the type of job that most people would dream of doing! Actually I take that back, it sounded like the type of job that most people who need to work set hours during the day in order to do the mother/wife/superhero/chum thing and also quite like to type would love to do and as that description suits, I was happy.

Now I'm two weeks into the new job and I will admit I'm somewhat stumped. Previously I answered a phone (or three) booked jobs, sorted advertising, wrote technical reports and drank coffee while waffling to my bosses wife. Now I answer one phone which rings so infrequently that I keep checking it to see if it's working, I write technical reports occasionally when anyone remembers to give me the data and I scribble......a lot. I also drink lots of coffee with my bosses but anyone would agree that that's a must in an office environment, do you know they even asked about it in the interview "How many words per minute? Oh and do you make good coffee?" (At home I make terrible coffee and tea just to get out of making it)

Now the part of this new job that confuses me is social networking. My understanding of this strange beast was that you sign up, you agree to be friends with people who made your life hell at school and people who you just cannot remember, no matter how great your memory is. You search for people that you possibly slept with just to see how badly they have aged and you IM your friends to arrange going out then to discuss who was the drunkest, who raided Rachael'sAnne Summers bag to the fullest effect and how someone got their double EE's into that cheerleaders outfit. I know it all sounds very boring but I'm a mother, outside of mothering my pleasures are few.

In this new job I have been given the task of setting up, updating and growing followers on these social sites. So far I've done Facebook, Myspace, Bebo, Youtube and Twitter because those are the only ones I know. It was all very easy to set up but it is pretty much impossible to get people to follow you, which is quite disheartening on a personal level as I am a demon in real life social situations and can charm most people either with cleavage, sweetness, humour or (rarely) intelligence but I just cannot think of a way in. Seriously what do I say........"Ummm Hi want to follow me because I think the company I work for is great even though it bares no relevance to anything you have written on here" No, I think not. I cannot find anyone who does the same thing as we do. Have you ever heard of a web design agency that also offers marketing and advertising services with a video recording and editing department, music and band representation as well as employing two electricians? No? Well I'm not surprised quite frankly, you see it's looks confusing when it's written down like that but in reality it's extremely simple and runs very smoothly but I just cannot market it on these sites because it's such a mishmash of stuff.

So now I'm stuck, every day I log into these sites and write little updates on what we're doing and see what other people are doing but in honesty I mostly just read Stephen Fry's Twitters because they make me laugh and respond to random posts but I really do need to work out what the etiquette on these things, I respond to anyone who gets in touch and would feel terrible if I didn't but then I respond to people all the time and rarely get responses.
........Then there are the famousy types who are just people and are allowed to contact their friends and spy on EX's too but I just find the following thing plain weird because, well I don't know anyone famous apart from a footballer but that was before he was who he is and is just best forgotten then there was a band member who turned out to be gay, a girl I went to college with was on doctors for a while but no one I could pick up the phone to, so maybe it's just me but I don't very often bother people I don't know. regardless of what they do for a living. I might have to on occasion for work but I've never got an autograph or joined a fan club or contacted them purposely because they are famous, I enjoy reading some posts but that's mainly because I'm nosey and it's something different as I don't go to the Bafta's or fly to New York or go book signing in Australia all that often it's nice to read about other people's experiences of life.

So after much meandering down different paths of thought and writing this for ages, I'm no further along and still have no idea how to get people to follow the company I work for on social networking sites, I may to consider becoming famous although I've yet to work out what I have a talent for other than typing really quickly.

I suppose I ought to do a bit of work now..........Stephen Fry here I come!