I startled myself this afternoon.  I realized as I was pulling into my parent’s driveway that I hadn’t listened to the radio on the entire ride home from the YES Conference.  The whole drive I simply thought about what I had just experienced.

I went on the YES Conference Facebook group page last night to see what type of activity and discussion there was about the event.  To my surprise there was only 23 people in the group, and a mere 4 comments on the wall.  I then started doing Twitter searches with every combination of search words imaginable to see if people were having any discussion about the event on Twitter.  Of course I found nothing again.

So I arrive at the conference today with no idea what to expect.  Walking in I realize there were only around 100 people there, 98% of which are high school students.  This event was “advertised” for 12-25 year old aspiring entrepreneurs, and only 2% were 19 or older.  On top of that, there were only 2 students from Syracuse University actually attending the event, and Syracuse University was the one putting on the conference in the first place.  That’s not to say there weren’t Students from the Whitman School of Management helping, but I found it very odd that during the keynote speaker these students who are getting “Entrepreneurship” degrees (whatever the hell that even means) weren’t even interested to hear the story of a successful entrepreneur and simply hung out in the common area.

They kicked off the conference by showing Shark Tank (if you like Shark Tank, and I really hope you don’t, please watch This Week in Startups instead because Shark Tank is reality TV and isn’t how things work) and during intermissions they had a fantastic DJ blasting beats forcing you to scream during every conversation which made networking extra easy.

Very disappointing conference, with little to show of what comes out of the EEE program at Syracuse University.  As I’ve heard many people mention, there are only 2 companies in the last 9 years that are even doing anything right now who came out of the Universities Entrepreneur program.  Not the best track record considering how many come out of the program in the first place.  However, there was some good that came out of the day.  I had the pleasure of meeting some of the smartest young guys who are very motivated and I have no doubt are going to kill it one day.  I wish I knew as much as these guys do now back when I was in high school.  It’s just very unfortunate that they will most likely be successful anywhere but Syracuse.  It’s just lost opportunities like these that make Syracuse the dying city it is.

Wow, this is some awesome viral marketing.  A video response to the “Jizz In My Pants” song by The Lonely Island called “Puke In My Mouth.”  This is advertising a fake engagement ring that ladies can wear in order to keep creepers away.  This is going after an incredibly small market so making a video like this is almost necessary to make some noise and get the word out about a product. I think traditional advertising is worthless when there is such a small market for your product. I guarantee this video will have over one million views by the end of May.  These people probably got a better response than paying for ad space somewhere, and it cost them nothing. Well done.

“So tell me, what’s this Twitter thing all about?”

If I had a nickel for every time someone asked me this, I’d have $4.38.  Many people have different views on it.  I always hear people describe it as micro-blogging, or that it’s “kind of like an away message on AIM or like your status on Facebook.”

I think it is much more than this.  I always describe it as an open conversation about everything.  So much information flows through Twitter that it boggles my mind.  Of course whenever a new social network comes out, every tries to find ways to profit from it.  I’ve noticed, however, that few businesses have figured out how to leverage Twitter and join these conversation to connect to possible costumers.  Firstly, if you own a business and you don’t have a Twitter account for your business, you are CRAZY and simply don’t get it.  Secondly, those companies that have an account and simply follow as many people as possible in hopes that some return the follow are even worse!  If you are trying to sell something or promote something and you think that following 17,567 random Twitter users (I call this follow spamming) is going to help you, then you don’t get it either.  If you’re not genuine and you’re just looking to sell your products, promote your site, make money, etc. then you are not going to get close to the results you want.  Maybe 5 people of those 17,567 will really be interested in what you have to say.  You just wasted a whole lot of clicking for no results.  So how can you really make use of Twitter?

A lot of good companies out there that really understand Twitter have already built their brand and don’t need to do much more than be awesome to grab peoples attention.  But a lot of companies fail to really get peoples attention, or more importantly, fail to get the right peoples attention (potential customers, subscribers, viewers, etc.).  Maybe you’re just a little startup company, how do you get heard?  As I said in the beginning of this post, Twitter is an open CONVERSATION, so you need to join the conversation.  If you sell toilets, you better be using http://search.twitter.com and searching “toilet seats”, “toilets” and any other variation to find out what people are saying about them.  Why?  Because these are the people who might actually care what you have to say about toilets!  You need to engage in this conversation, @reply people, give advice, and be genuine!  Also using http://wefollow.com, which is a Twitter directory which groups people by their interests, to try and find people who are interested in your particular niche can help connect you to the write types of users.

Anyone who ends up following you in response to your help or comment is a much more valuable follower than one of the random people that might follow from follow spamming.  Engaging in conversation and being genuine will make people listen and respect what you have to say.  Use the many Twitter tools out there correctly and you will be able to connect with more valuable followers who will actually be interested in what you have to say.  Because let’s be serious, 99% of those random users who follow in response to follow spam won’t give a crap what you have to say, especially if you sell toilets (no pun intended).