Marketing works when it’s accompanied by elements of learning. Twitter recently unveiled Twitter101, which answers the question:

How can your business use Twitter?

Does it get any simpler than that? I think not. Contemporary business speak is maligned with jargon, fancy words and phrases that frankly, mean nothing. Anamitra Banerji has distilled this message to its core.

Mr. Banerji opens the piece with a concise explanation of what Twitter is and how it works. This opening, positions the tactical capabilities of Twitter front and center. The real value of the piece is in the business stories that impart how the tool is used to:

Share information
Gather real-time market data and feedback
Build relationships with the customers, employees and partners

Providing this type of focused, real world use case information creates a buzz which; reinforces Twitter’s focus on ‘real’ business challenges and sets the stage for bundled services that will be unveiled at a later date.

So, where’s the learning activity?
It’s all around you, stupid.

Twitter101 educates and emphasizes

Who Twitter is.
Why Twitter is relevant.
What Twitter does for the individual.
What Twitter does for the organization.

Isn’t that marketing? Yes
Isn’t that learning, too? Yes

There isn’t an associated quiz. There’s no form to fill out. There’s no portal to log into either. Quizzes, forms and portals don’t transform marketing activities into learning activities. Whether or not you learned something makes it a learning activity. In short good marketing is founded in learning and compelling learning has its basis in smart marketing.