For public relations and journalism professionals, Twitter can be a powerful tool.  The rise of social media has resulted in tons of PR and Journalism professionals looking to use Twitter to improve their strategy, but is Twitter always the way to go?

In their article Twitter for Public Relations: Fact and Fantasy, Forbes mentions the three main reasons public relations professionals should use Twitter,

“Announcements.  You want to tell the public something about you, your business or your client such as a new product, an award, an upcoming event, or introduction into a new market; or to keep your audience updated during a crisis or emergency. Research.  Find out what your competitors, clients, friends, media or influencers are tweeting about.  Networking.  To meet new influencers, clients, friends, competitors or reporters and follow them and get them to follow you.”

Although Twitter can be useful for accomplishing those tasks, Forbes also warns about the hype surrounding Twitter and PR.  The amount of time and effort required to make Twitter work for PR can be exhausting, so many PR professionals look to paid services like Hootsuite to manage their use of Twitter and other social media accounts.

CBC Radio also warns journalists about the use of Twitter in journalism in their article.  CBC Radio discusses the influx of media outlets embedding tweets into articles to showcase the voice of ordinary people, but often times these tweets are not accurate or are not posted by real people intending to tell their truth.  Embedding tweets in articles can be useful in giving a voice to the ordinary person, but journalists must be extra careful when deciding what tweets to include and ensure that they are true and from an actual person.  Twitter allows for people to hide behind a screen, so journalists must take extra time to check that the person is who they say they are.

Although journalists must be cautious when using Twitter, it is still a very powerful tool.  Steve Buttry discusses the ways Twitter is most useful to journalists on his blog, The Buttry Diaries.  Journalists can use Twitter to keep up with breaking news, follow newsworthy people and organizations, crowdsourcing, find story ideas and continue the conversation.  Buttry maintains that Twitter is one of the best tools for journalists, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t good practices and bad practices when it comes to using Twitter.

Twitter comes with both challenges and benefits for journalists and PR professionals.  Columbia Journalism Review asks the question, “should all journalists be on Twitter?” in their article.  According to the article, 59% of journalists are on Twitter.  With majority of the industry on the platform, it may be hard to keep up without being on it yourself. Even if Twitter isn’t particularly useful for your beat, it is still important for learning how to communicate with different audiences in different ways.  Social media continues to evolve and new platforms will likely present themselves and it is important for journalists to keep up.