Folio: blogger Dan Blank has an interesting post this week about how several Reed publications use Twitter to improve their brand and connect with their readers.

The varying uses fall in a few broad categories that all publishers can emulate:

• Announcements
  Using Twitter to post about new columns, or give a heads up on new coverage. This is the most obvious, and perhaps the most over-used, use of Twitter.
• Reputation Building
  By contributing responses and original “tweets” to the topics they cover, reporters can increase their reputation as experts in those topics. If those in the niches know they’re actively covering those topics, they’ll likely be notified of anything newsworthy
• Conversation and Feedback
  Using Twitter to get readers involved in the content of the magazine can increase loyalty, as well as help shape future coverage of similar topics. Asking specific questions to your niche followers can lead to stories and angles you wouldn’t have discovered on your own.

  Library Journal Managing Editor Heather McCormack….. [ Twitter] allows her to interact with her audience in small ways each day, even though she is actually sitting in a gray cubicle in New York City.

• Primary Source for News
  While Twitter should not be used as the basis of a news story without collaboration, it is a way to get a heads up on online happenings quickly.

  The recent battle over e-book pricing at Amazon is a good example. I heard about Amazon removing the buy buttons from Macmillan titles on Twitter first and we were able to respond quickly with our own story. — Calvin Reid, Publishers Weekly

Read the full post here.