Twitter is that quirky website where it asks "what are you doing now?", and then gives you 140 characters to respond. It takes only a few seconds to register, and another few seconds to post your latest activities.

Lately, marketers have been discovering how powerful Twitter is for marketing things online. People like Mike Filsaime and Seth Godin are 'twittering' now, and building a following of people who get every update they ever post.

Now, no one wants to hear what you have had for breakfast, or any of the other hundreds of boring things we all do each day. Yet there are a growing number of people who have learned how to post very interesting things on twitter, and have in turn developed a following of thousands of people who actively track what they say. Obama Barack is one such person who uses twitter to announce his public appearances and speaking engagements. Doing this has grown his fan base, and increased the number of people who learn about him, and now support him. In short, twitter is a powerful marketing medium when you use it right.

Here are 4 secrets to get you started marketing with twitter:

1. Refrain from posting what you are doing right now! That's right, don't post everything you do, but rather just the things that are interesting to others, or things you want others to see. It could be something in the news, or an event that is happening, or an offer you are making - just anything that could benefit someone else and not bore them. It sounds interesting, but it becomes a little challenging to do when you get excited or angry. So be sure to ask yourself the question "is this useful to my followers?" and only post if the answer is yes.

2. Find interesting people and follow them. To do this, you simply search twitter for something that interests you (anything, really), and then look at what others are twittering. After a while, you will find some people that have interesting things to say, and when you click on their username, twitter will show you a button called "follow" that lets you follow that person from now on. By following a person, everything they post will go into your personal timeline - the thing you see when you login to twitter. If you decide you do not wish to follow someone any longer, simply click on their name and then on the "unfollow" link.

3. Go to quotably (a free website) and search for stuff posted on twitter. Quotably shows you everything in conversation mode and lets you reply to peole simply by logging in with your twitter details. In short, you can enter the conversations of others at that site, and find other interesting people to follow.

4. Use a twitter agent to have all your essential twitter information at hand at all times.

Twitter is a powerful tool, and more and more people are learning how to use it to develop their contacts and business. Now you can, too.