Four Twitter Tips I Learned by Trial & Error
I’ve been spending a lot of time on Twitter lately. The more I use it, the more I discover about it. The more I use it, the more I learn how to use it more effectively. I have recently figured out a few little tricks that make Twitter a more productive tool for me, so I’d like to share them with you!
My particular goal on Twitter is to learn everything I can about Internet Marketing and Social Media and then share what I learn with my followers. I am always really concerned that my followers (and my potential followers) can easily understand what I am tweeting about.
So, if you have the same or similar goals, here are 4 tips that just may make your Twitter activity more productive.
- Leave Enough Space for the Link: When you RT (the ultimate form of flattery) a post that has a URL in it, leave enough space so you don’t run out of characters and wind up losing part of your tweet. Add-up the character count, i.e. RT @bevisible (that’s 12 chars right there) and even a shortened URL is at least 8 chars. If you run out of space, go back and find places for abbreviations or symbols in the original tweet to open up space.
- Same Goes for your “Native” Tweet: If you want people to re-tweet your tweets, try to follow the same rule (I break this one all the time :0( ). Try to keep your tweet as short as possible so when someone RT’s your tweet, they don’t have to worry about character counts.
- Don’t Get Too Personal: I am particular about who I follow. I use Twitter as a tool to be a better consultant, so I follow a lot of people who are in the Internet Marketing and Social Media arena. So, when someone follows me, I take a look at his or her profile before I follow back. If all I see in their tweets are snippets of conversations that mean nothing to me, I will most likely not follow them. So, take a look at your own profile from the point of view of a prospective follower every now and then. If you are engaging in a lot of one-to-one conversations with no reference points for an outsider, consider sending direct messages to them instead of clogging up your profile with tweets that only you can understand.
- Complete the Thought: When you are messaging back and forth with one of your followers about a link or an idea, repeat the link or idea in your tweets. For example, I will use this: “It was great to meet you at the Gravity Social Media Summit, www.gravitysummit.com” instead of “It was great to meet you.” Make sense? This way your followers know what you are talking about, and potential followers will be able to decide if what you are saying has value to them.
- Explain Why you Tweeted It: If something is interesting enough for you to tweet about, sometimes it’s great for your followers to know why. For example, if you read a blog post that you think is brilliant, when you tweet about it, tell your followers that. For example: “Just Blogging Isn’t Enough – You Have to Blog with Purpose, http://bit.ly/18EAYP, really good stuff here.”
Got some tips of your own? Would love to hear them.
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