The Greatest Business Use of Twitter: Brainstorming Hashtags

It occurred to me the other day when I became involved in a debate on the Social media masters degree, that we were missing out on potentially one of the greatest ways to use Twitter for business.

The debate I was involved in was being marked by everyone putting #masocialmedia in their tweets that were part of the debate. This is how trending topics are marked. It allows people to search for the hashtagged line in order to keep track of a popular topic or in this case debate. This is especially useful on Twitter apps like Tweetdeck, which allow you to open a window based on a search, and have it update to your chosen schedule, i.e. every 5 minutes. This is an excellent way to keep track of a trending topic or debate.

But it could also allow businesses to brainstorm with its customers and the wider public. Imagine it: a business like O2 that gets a lot of traffic to its website(s), runs a prominent article about a new product it plans to launch soon, and invites people to suggest a name for the product, and/or a catchy slogan, suggesting that they submit their ideas in Twitter using the #O2AprilBuzz hashtag.

The company would then have people monitoring the ideas and taking anything with potential, or putting everything into a draw, or using whatever is submitted by the most people -- whatever they choose. This would also generate publicity for the company from sites like WhatTheTrend etc. The first company to do it will also be able to put out a press release on their new use of social media, which will likely generate more coverage in the press. Perfect all round!

If you like this story please vote for it on Mixx