Question I'm bursting with: What to do with all those Social Media abbreviations?

While I certainly have plenty of strong opinions about writing (specifically) and communicating (in general), I am also bursting with questions. Let's call this the first in a continuing series.

I am ncmptnt at FB abrv8shuns!

See? As a language purist, all these LMAOs and OMGs and IMHOs and TTYLs really don't seem to fit in the world I know and understand. (How funny is this: I just had to look those up by Googling "Twitter Abbreviations"!) However, I am also a big believer in accepting and even embracing those things I cannot change or influence. And these things are here to stay.

So, as Jules says in Pulp Fiction "I'm tryin', Ringo. I'm tryin' real hard." I love the functional benefits that come with Facebook and Twitter and LinkedIn, etc., so fluency in social media abbreviations will happen. It's sort of like going to live in a foreign country; eventually you become fluent in the new language.

But so far, this has all been about choices that I make in my personal life. This question also impacts business. For marketers and advertisers, a presence on Facebook and Twitter is practically required in order to be seen as relevant. And the competent marketer must tailor the message to the media and the audience, so repurposing the message that went up on a billboard or a print ad is simply not good enough.

You have to be timely to the point of being immediate. But most important, you only have 140 characters.

Intuitively, a posting filled with abbreviations contains several bad connotations to me. First, it sounds like jargon that is specific to a narrowly defined group, and that means it has to exclude people who are not members of the group. Perhaps this is true, and the "group" consists of really cool people who consider themselves ahead of the curve culturally and technologically. If this is the case, then a good marketer can tailor the message to appeal to the "group" and that would seem to include an occasional Gr8 or TY.

I think what I'm struggling with is that it also comes across as a little sloppy or lazy to me. However, fessed up to being a "language purist" at the beginning of this post, so that may be something I am in the process of overcoming as I get used to this new environment.

So, I put the question to you, esteemed reader: Is there a place for social media abbreviations in marketing and advertising?