What is twitter and why should brides use it?  Twitter is a microblogging site that allows you to convey your thoughts in 140 characters or less.  It’s free of charge and easy to use once you get the hang of it.  If you’re planning your wedding, I’m sure you already know how many people want to help you plan your wedding – your parents, future in-laws, sisters, brothers, cousins, bridal party, friends, co-workers, etc… It seems like everyone has a say in helping you plan your wedding.  There you go.  140 characters or less to tell them what you’re up to.

Sign up for an account if you don’t have one yet.  It takes less than a minute to create one.

Click on the Find People button at the top of the screen and you can either 1.  Invite people you know by email, 2. Find them by searching for their business name or name, 3.  Enter your email address and twitter will pull up all your contacts and see who has a twitter account for you to follow.

Your tweets are seen by people who follow you, and your homepage includes a feed of the most recent tweets of people you’re following. It’s almost like an ongoing Facebook status update.  There are also programs to help you manage your social media life via downloads or iPhone apps.

How to use twitter.  It’s very simple.  Once you are following somebody, just type the “@” symbol in front of their username (@iwedding) and then your message.  Don’t forget – you only have 140 characters to get your point across.  If you are including a link, use bit.ly to shorten the URL.  That will give you more room for your message.

Your followers can jump into the conversation by clicking a “reply” button that appears when you put your mouse on the lower right hand corner of the message box.  When they click “reply” your username is automatically populated in the reply box.

If you see a tweet that you think your followers would like to see, you can “retweet” it by typing RT @username and then either copying and pasting the message (tweet) or by clicking on the “retweet” button that appears when you scroll over the bottom right corner of the message box.

Why you should follow wedding vendors.  A lot of wedding vendors are on twitter these days.  Follow them for special offers only available to their followers, for special announcements, links to their most recent blog posts or real weddings, or advice.

The most common things you’ll see and use on twitter:

If you’re interested in following us on twitter, our username is:  iwedding – Click follow and you’re done!