Seminar in Digital Communication: COMM 648
syllabus | schedule of events | notes on our Twitter use

In an era of digital communication, businesses are using all possible avenues to reach their publics. Our goal is not only to gain an understanding of strategic communication in digital spaces, but also to immerse ourselves in the practice of this type of communication.

Twitter is a growing and viable form of information access and distribution between people. Thus, we’ll use Twitter to share information and engage in particular thought communities of your choice.

In this seminar, Twitter participation will be evaluated on several criteria:

1. Professionalism: Tweets should be thoughtful, well-written, and free from errors.
2. Connectivity: Tweets should often connect readers to other information on the web (using links, hashtags, #comm648, @mentions, re-tweets, etc.).
3. Continued maintenance: Twitter use necessitates a measure of frequency. You should be active at least daily (tips for staying active on busy days).
4. Work inside a community: You should participate in at least 4 twitter chats over the course of the seminar (find Twitter chats). When you participate in a Twitter chat, consider adding a post to your site/blog/portfolio about your experience (see examples here and here).
5. Interest: Tweets should engage your audience in clever ways in an effort for you to learn how to use social media for strategic communication. Experiment with your tweets to see how to gain traction, what kind of things get re-tweeted, how to engage followers and those you follow, and, perhaps most importantly, how to write effectively for social media.
6. Connection IRL (in real life): Twitter creates connections online, but meeting your followers face-to-face adds strength to your experience. Attend at least one Twitter-marketed event (a tweet-up, social media workshop, or other gathering) during the seminar. Consider adding a post to your site/blog about this as well (see an example here).

To get started, login to Twitter, find a conversation and follow along. Need help?