Indra Gardiner is COO/President of marketing agency Bailey Gardiner in San Diego

This is a guest commentary courtesy of Indra Gardiner, COO/President of Bailey Gardiner in San Diego.

Been thinking about Twitter and blogs and which I prefer and why. Perhaps because I’ve done little of either this past week; a rarity these days. I’ve been wondering which matters most.

A few weeks ago, Todd Defren asked his followers on Twitter – if we had to choose one social media tool which would it be? That was easy for me – writing blog posts. But, evidently I was in the minority. Twitter won by a long measure. Which kind of surprised me.

Rumors started last summer about the demise of blogs at the claw of the Twitter bird. I believe these rumors are unfounded. Primarily because human beings love a good story. Through history we have been taught as children through stories, fables, myths and legends. And storytelling continues as we age, whether through books, magazine articles, rumors, plays, movies or dance – we escape, learn and laugh through story. Over the past 20 years we have certainly seen television news become increasingly packaged as entertainment, rather than hard news. It’s what we are viscerally drawn to. Much as I love Twitter, you really can’t tell a good story with it.

Look at some of the most ‘followed’ people on Twitter, and you will notice that they are regularly posting tweets that point to blog posts. In fact, that’s pretty much all @guykawasaki (and his band of ghost tweeters), with nearly 120,000 followers, tweets about is blog posts. In fact, this blog saw its readership triple in a 3 month period and we attribute that primarily to Tweeting out our blog posts. So perhaps they are symbiotic.

Twitter is terrific for:

• Engaging with a community – whether it’s your local “tweeple” (try twitterlocal) or those who share a common interest (try wefollow or twellow)
• Researching what people think about a brand name or particular topic (Tweetdeck is great for search)
• Connecting with customers – it’s become an essential part of customer service for some smart brands
• Keeping a pulse on breaking news and what’s on people’s minds

But, blogs allow us to fully explain our thinking, to reference what’s influencing us, explain how to create an ad, showcase art and share our stories. Perhaps some have abandoned their blogs for Twitter and I would suggest that is a natural culling of those who either really didn’t have the writing bug, or who believe they need to continually find the “next thing” and be a “ground breaker”.

Blogging has gone mainstream and to some that means the edginess or newness is gone. That doesn’t mean the value is gone too. Blogs will continue and those who provide value or know how to tell a good story will continue to have readers. Even if they are found through a Twitter post.