There’s lots of talk about the Twitter Effect and how it can make or break a movie. When it came to Bruno & GI Joe – thumbs down! In the case of Inglorious Basterds and District 9 – thumbs up! If Twitter has this effect on improving movie ticket sales, do we even need critics anymore?

The Twitter effect is the latest example of online viral marketing, and just as real as the old-fashioned word-of-mouth marketing, but enhanced and magnified by technology. Where in the past a person might have told a few friends and co-workers their positive or negative opinion of a new movie, influencing their friends’ or co-workers’ decision about whether or not to see it, today that same person can tell hundreds, or even thousands, of people instantaneously, via Twitter and other social media tools like blogs, Facebook and MySpace. And they can use other interactive media, such as YouTube, to post videos praising or mocking a new movie – or your new product or service or campaign.

You can’t stop the Twitter Effect, or control it, but you can make it easy for your customers, clients, supporters and fans to use social media to your benefit.

Your challenge as the owner of a business or leader an organization or campaign is to market your services, tell your story and communicate your message to the right audience using the right media formats and the right social media tools. The first step we recommend is to ignore simplistic headlines that declare that certain groups of people do or do not use or consume any certain medium or technology. There are teens who Tweet and adults on MySpace, and senior citizens who use Skype.