Georgia Tech’s football program is light years ahead where it was this time last year with a Twitter presence.

Coach Paul Johnson has been a rising star on Twitter in the college ranks sine he began actively tweeting last March. He's a must-follow, especially with his witty and candid comments (in the offseason) at @GTPaulJohnson

Most of Georgia Tech’s assistants are also on Twitter.

Twitter is arguably the most powerful tool in recruiting, outside of a personal contact, because just about every elite prospect has a Twitter account. Many of them stay on Twitter throughout the day, and are regularly exposed to positive comments (or Tweets) by the college coaches they follow.

Twitter is also rapidly growing in popularity as the way for college coaches and prospects to communicate with each other via Direct Messages.

“It’s a way to get ahold of kids but you could always email them and do that kind of stuff,” Johnson told the AJC. “The correspondence has changed so much that most of the time they’re either calling you or hitting you up on email or stuff like that. I think if you talk to our assistant coaches, they’d tell you that they probably get hit up on Facebook more than anything else.

“But it’s a way of texting with Twitter, with Direct Messages. There’s not a lot of difference between that and texting. It works really good for that.”