Thanks for this post guys, it kind of answered a question that I have been thinking about: -If you're a company, it more effective to use Twitter under your own name (so people can relate more with the person) or use your company's name? 
 
I think the combination of a person with company name just makes you seem a bit more accessible for some reason as compared to just a company name. 
 
Looks like I messed up with having an underscore in my handle though (@neil_s) :)

Fantastic! Everyone I know has been looking for a resource like this. Great job on the Guide! My fave tip: page 18, “Make your tweets useful resources so people need you.” Amen to that. I'm tweeting AND blogging this! :)

Great advice on how to pick your Twitter name. I wish I had this available when choosing my name! I fall into the category of the AOL chat room name. If I were to change my handle to my full name, how would that affect my followers? Would you suggest that I just tweet to let everyone know that I have changed my name?

Great post and I love that people are finally starting to see the economic value Twitter brings to the table if you're creative. Twitter is such a flexible and even scalable tool with all the different 3rd party apps available. Looking forward to reading the ebook!

Bianca: If you've had the same avatar for a long time, people will still "recognize you" regardless of the name change. Also, I've known people who have changed their handles who also say the benefited from it.  
 
And sure, tweet to let people know. Perhaps do a blog post about it! No harm in that.

Good common-sense advice, which isn't common enough. But don't forget about alignment and continuity. No matter how goofy your handle is, if you're known by it on other networks, it's probably your best bet to keep it for your twitter handle.

Tracy: There is nothing wrong with underscores, but many people don't use them on Twitter.  
 
Why you might not want to use them? Two reasons: 
 
1) Think of it as joining a new high school, going to a party to make friends and wearing a really funny hat. There's nothing wrong with wearing a funny hat, but you might appear to be out-of-the-know or "unhip."  
 
2) It potentially puts you in the spammer-category.  
 
As a last point: As times and cultures change--and as long as social media continues to be an incredibly dynamic world--perhaps it won't matter one way or another if you use an underscore. But for now, they're in the minority.  
 

A name might seem random to you but have significance to the user and their circle of friends. I understand you're giving advice on using Twitter for business but there are valid reasons for people to shield their identity especially if they work in an industry or for a company which discourages or looks down on participating in social networks or if their circle of contacts is composed of close friends and not business contacts. 
 
Also some people have unique usernames that people already know them by and which have become their trademark. Just ask @garyvee!

Twitter is a great tool. It's simple yet extremely effective in building your online presence whether it's for business or fun.

In addition to good Twitter handles, business owners need to be mindful of their e-mail addresses. I have been seeing a rash of poor e-mail addresses lately. (i.e. anything@... aol.com, msn.com, hotmail.com)

I touched on this in my blog post Brand Yourself on Twitter (http://einfo.blogspot.com/2008/12/brand-yourself-on-twitter.html) 
 
 
 
If your full name does not fit within the 15 characters for the Username and 20 for the Name fields, consider adding it to the beginning of the Bio section. This way if someone is searching for your name your Tweets will show up.

Good advice!  
 
I would caution anyone new to social media against just leaping into Twitter. While it is fun to experiment, it really needs to be used in context of other social media channels.  
 
The best approach is to start with a social media strategy. Then your approach to Twitter will fall into place.

Hmmm...is my twitter handle "qutequte" considered stupid if my blog is MyQute.com ? >,<

Any thoughts on what to do if your name changes? I am getting married this fall but my current twitter handle uses my maiden name.

Perfect -- Just what I was looking for a few days ago! Many thanks for oyur leadership in getting this to us!

Leigh Anne Wallace - You could register your new name and post an entry referring people to your maiden name account.

Those are pretty good pointers. Twitter is a growing trend, so every respected businessman or company should utilize it. By following the tips in this post, twitter success is reachable...

I use "09" because I set up my Gmail first & if I want to brand myself, I should keep them the same. 
Funny story. I finally convinced a former colleague to join Twitter after, he too, was laid off. 
I strongly suggested he be @BradShaw & not @b_shaw....like you said, no name recognition & no one will say "and what is your first name again?"  
So he chose @BradShaw09 
Mocker. 
He said: "09 has to be better than 08". 
Funny...but people put it together immediately that we use to work together.

My pet peeve is people who will not use their real name online. I'll admit to using the underscore when I first signed up with Twitter but changed it later to @dpcrandall in order to reduce the number of characters I used.  
 
I'm less likely to follow someone when I see nicknames like the Tigerman example above. I came to Twitter to meet people, and I want to know the names of the people I meet.

nenhum