The Twitter setup, making it useful

As I dive deeper into the whole Twitter thing, I’m starting to figure out ways to make it work. Between Twitter’s whole-world-but-delayed-chat functionality, I’m finding you can combine Twitter with some things to make it a very useful tool as well as a not-so-instant messenger.

I’ve cobbled together a small set of tools that makes Twitter pretty useful in an all-around way. Those parts being:

• TwitBin
• TwitterHat
• Remember the Milk
• TwitterFeed

TwitBin is the basis for all my Twittering. TwitBin is a plug-in for Firefox that adds a Twitter sidebar. It updates on intervals and has a handy message field so you can send out tweets. Because when I’m on the computer I’m usually looking at a browser, TwitBin makese the most sense because it’s always right in front of me. No need to check the Twitter site or run a secondary desktop application. Without TwitBin, Twitter just doesn’t fit into the workflow as well.

I admit, I’m biased towards TwitterHat. TwitterHat is TinyURL plus advertising. Yeah, I made TwitterHat so I obviously think it’s nice, but I honestly think your average Twitterer can make it worth their while as well. TwitterHat, like TinyURL, shortens long web address into Twitter-friendly size so you can send them along with your messages.

Remember the Milk is a to-do list service. I first came across RTM a while ago when I was one of my List kicks, but I couldn’t get RTM to fit in very well, so I had pretty much written it off. But while doing some Twitter research, I read that RTM now has Twitter support…and it does so in just the right spot. Remember the Milk keeps track of your to-do tasks and reminds you about them. Prior, the reminders simply came as e-mails and calendar add-ins. But now they also offer Twitter reminders too. The nice part is that RTM reminds with direct Twitter messages, and as it so happens I have Twitter set up to forward direct messages to my phone. Another nice feature is that you can add tasks to RTM simply my Twittering it commands - no need to go to the RTM web site, login, and add from there.

So lets connect a few of these dots. I have TwitBin open all the time at work in the browser. I get a call from the Wife that I need to come home early and take the dog to the groomers. I then send a Twitter message to RTM with the task and time. Then when the time hits, RTM sends me a text message and I’m reminded about the dog. And because I typically have my phone with me or within ear shot, I’ll notice when I get a text message.

Twitter now lets me slow-chat with friends but also serves as a great utility to keep me a little better organized. So Twitter just got a whole lot better. Throw on top the fact I can use TwitterHat to promote my blog and I’m now more motivated to message too.

Lastly, though, is TwitterFeed. TwitterFeed is a simple service that checks an RSS feed and Twitters anything new. I have TwitterFeed checking my blog feed every few hours and it tweets any new articles. I’m using TwitterFeed as a way to get my articles in front of others, but there is no reason you couldn’t use it to send you some other feed so it ends up in your TwitBin. TwitterFeed is a set-and-forget-(and-free) app that is really handier than it may first seem.

And that’s my setup with which I Twitter. The trick with Twitter is getting it to fit into your daily routines and activities, not to adjust your flow to fit Twitter. It took a while to dial it in just right, but so far the formula is working out pretty well.