Last Monday (4/21), the inimitable Sam Whitmore of MediaSurvey published this handy list of Old- and New-School media types who are active on Twitter. 

I’ll re-publish a condensed version of Sam’s list below, but first want to pontificate on the shocking headline of this post: am I seriously suggesting that a PR person MUST become an active Twitter user if they want to have a meaningful career?  Even though Twitter is supposedly still a below-the-radar service?

Well, yea, kinda.  But for more – and more varied – reasons than you might think.

First: personal branding.  There is no question that the managers and HR reps at savvy PR agencies and corporations are in the twitterstream.  We have hired more than one new employee that we either recurited via Twitter, or, who had a leg-up in the process because we knew and respected the way they handled themselves online.

Next: knowledge.  If you’re “following” and interacting with a bunch of smart people, you will learn more stuff; you will be “in the know” before peers, competitors, and clients.  You’ll get first dibs on the coolest Web 2.0 applications.  While your friends wonder about “that tweety stuff” you’ll already be twhirling and utterzing: this isn’t just cool-for-cool’s sake – these are the apps that will be discussed in the History Books of this era.  Five years from now, you won’t be able to hold your head up in a newbiz meeting if you can’t claim to have been on-board from the get-go.

Also on the “knowledge” front: with your personal community established, I can’t emphasize enough how valuable Twitter can be when you need a hand – an idea – or, reactions to an idea.  Twitter is an instant focus group, on-call 24/7, and comprised of some of the most brilliant and thoughtful people you’d ever want to meet.

Last but not least: relationships.  Take a look at the list below.  Twitter may not be mainstream, yet, but it’s well-known to the influencers and fellow practitioners with whom most PR people interact.  Why wouldn’t you want to know what Marshall Kirkpatrick or Harry McCracken are up to today?  Thanks to Twitter, you might know anything from “what they had for breakfast” to “how PR pros screw up” to “what article they’re writing.”  With such knowledge, you will become a better PR pro, period.

Please note that I am NOT saying, “You can use Twitter to stalk the media!”  No, no, no!  I am saying you just might be able to forge a true relationship with these folks by interacting with them regularly, and in a purely social, “human” way. 

If you want to keep track of our own twitterati, we’ve consolidated SHIFT’s twitterfeed using Yahoo Pipes.  Check it out: over time you’d see that, yes, we interact with media contacts on Twitter – we’ll even throw out a “twitpitch” now and again – but, we also act like undercaffeinated goofballs a lot, too.  (Cuz we’re human, and that’s finally cool again.) 

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