How To Twitter
So, you're thinking of joining the Twitterverse
Wikipedia defines Twitter as: A website, owned and operated by Twitter Inc., which offers a social networking and microblogging service, enabling its users to send and read other users' messages called tweets. Tweets are text-based posts of up to 140 characters displayed on the user's profile page. Tweets are publicly visible by default, however senders can restrict message delivery to their friends list. Users may subscribe to other users' tweets-this is known as following and subscribers are known as followers.
Now that the formalities are taken care of, let's dive into the Twitterverse and find out how to Twitter!
Wikipedia defines Twitter as: A website, owned and operated by Twitter Inc., which offers a social networking and microblogging service, enabling its users to send and read other users' messages called tweets. Tweets are text-based posts of up to 140 characters displayed on the user's profile page. Tweets are publicly visible by default, however senders can restrict message delivery to their friends list. Users may subscribe to other users' tweets-this is known as following and subscribers are known as followers.
Now that the formalities are taken care of, let's dive into the Twitterverse and find out how to Twitter!
What is Twitter?
It's about time you asked.
Beyond the text book definitions of a micro-blogging social networking phenomenon, Twitter is used and thought of differently by many different people. Twitter is a way to connect with friends and family, a source of news, trends and gossip but most of all Twitter is THE most influential and important marketing tools of the 21st century. It doesn't matter what you are marketing, whether it's a multibillion dollar corporation, a local flower shop, start up band or yourself, Twitter will get your voice and opinions heard.
Why is it called a micro-blog?
Blogs are places to voice opinions, thoughts and share ideas. This is exactly what twitter does, yet it does it in short bursts of 140 characters called Tweets.
Why is it called a micro-blog?
Blogs are places to voice opinions, thoughts and share ideas. This is exactly what twitter does, yet it does it in short bursts of 140 characters called Tweets.
First time using Twitter
I won't waste your time explaining the basics of setting up a twitter account. I will assume you can find your way to Twitter.com and follow the simple step by step process to set up your own account (if you don't already have an @ccount).
That being said, setting up a Twitter account is a little different in the sense that you have to be real concise and short with your words. Take a look through these helpful videos if you are having trouble with the Twitter sign up process. Make a Twitter
I digress,
First time users can learn how to use twitter in a very short time. The best way to learn how to Twitter is to spend some time looking around the site. Spend a little time looking around before you worry about gaining any followers or filling out your full bio. This way there is no pressure. Check out peoples tweet and what they do, not so much what they say. Don't worry about their message, just what they are doing with it, since it will most likely not be relevant to you but it will be relevant to someone else. Click on their links, pay attention to how they are using twitter and after a few mins each day looking around, it will all make sense.
Most first time Twits have the same thought pattern.... "What is twitter and why is this pointless site so popular?"
That is a great question.
That being said, setting up a Twitter account is a little different in the sense that you have to be real concise and short with your words. Take a look through these helpful videos if you are having trouble with the Twitter sign up process. Make a Twitter
I digress,
First time users can learn how to use twitter in a very short time. The best way to learn how to Twitter is to spend some time looking around the site. Spend a little time looking around before you worry about gaining any followers or filling out your full bio. This way there is no pressure. Check out peoples tweet and what they do, not so much what they say. Don't worry about their message, just what they are doing with it, since it will most likely not be relevant to you but it will be relevant to someone else. Click on their links, pay attention to how they are using twitter and after a few mins each day looking around, it will all make sense.
Most first time Twits have the same thought pattern.... "What is twitter and why is this pointless site so popular?"
That is a great question.
8 Reasons Why is Twitter so popular
1. Simplicity - Twitter is simple. Simple as that.
2. Get your opinions heard - Everyone wants to feel part of something bigger and greater. Getting your opinions heard by others makes people feel part of the online blogging phenomenon. It is also a great place to pitch your favourite ideas or post comments about products or services.
3. Communication - What are you doing? It's frowned upon in our culture to call someone up just to let them know we are having a shower, or just drank the most amazing cup of coffee, yet Twitter makes this acceptable.
4. Connect - Not only can you connect, talk and share ideas with anyone in the world (who uses Twitter) you can also connect to twitter almost anywhere. With the latest smart phones and app worlds, there are more and more places you can log onto Twitter and check the latest trends.
5. Voyeurism - People love to ease drop on conversations and know what is going on in the community. With twitter, a whole new world of gossip has opened up. Find out what the latest celebrities or even your neighbours are up to.
6. Popularity - Want more friends? Now it is easier than ever! Sit in your chair, start following some people and chances are they will follow you back! All of a sudden you have turned from Joe Nobody, to being friends with top A-Lister like Barrack Obama and Justin Bieber! Now all you have to do is sit back and bask in the glory of popularity.
7. Marketing - As I mentioned before, Twitter is one of the greatest marketing tools. Used correctly you can increase brand recognition, sell products or gain additional followers on your blog. Also known as backdoor marketing.
8. Slang - Since there is a 140 character limit, people get away with bad grammar, spelling and sentence structure. PRT Thx 4 that, just fab, now ever1 is going 2b even worse spellers than we woz b4. cr8tivity at its finest. BFN
2. Get your opinions heard - Everyone wants to feel part of something bigger and greater. Getting your opinions heard by others makes people feel part of the online blogging phenomenon. It is also a great place to pitch your favourite ideas or post comments about products or services.
3. Communication - What are you doing? It's frowned upon in our culture to call someone up just to let them know we are having a shower, or just drank the most amazing cup of coffee, yet Twitter makes this acceptable.
4. Connect - Not only can you connect, talk and share ideas with anyone in the world (who uses Twitter) you can also connect to twitter almost anywhere. With the latest smart phones and app worlds, there are more and more places you can log onto Twitter and check the latest trends.
5. Voyeurism - People love to ease drop on conversations and know what is going on in the community. With twitter, a whole new world of gossip has opened up. Find out what the latest celebrities or even your neighbours are up to.
6. Popularity - Want more friends? Now it is easier than ever! Sit in your chair, start following some people and chances are they will follow you back! All of a sudden you have turned from Joe Nobody, to being friends with top A-Lister like Barrack Obama and Justin Bieber! Now all you have to do is sit back and bask in the glory of popularity.
7. Marketing - As I mentioned before, Twitter is one of the greatest marketing tools. Used correctly you can increase brand recognition, sell products or gain additional followers on your blog. Also known as backdoor marketing.
8. Slang - Since there is a 140 character limit, people get away with bad grammar, spelling and sentence structure. PRT Thx 4 that, just fab, now ever1 is going 2b even worse spellers than we woz b4. cr8tivity at its finest. BFN
What Kind Of Twit Are You?
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How To Gain More Followers
1. Write short, provocative, creative tweets with big impact. Write about your passions. It will show. Questions work great to make people think and perhaps even click on a link. Share useful info and links that you yourself find interesting and you think others might as well.
2. Start following people you are interested in. There is a good chance they will then be interested in what you have to say and follow back. If you start following multiple random people, this is a great way to get a large amount of followers at one time yet the quality of the followers will be very low. They may not care about what you have to say or what you stand for. The followers at that point are just for show and not to "sell" them on anything, be it your product or opinion.
3. Create a Bio. Your bio is what people first read when they check out your profile. You have limited space here so make sure it is to the point, explains who you are and what you will be tweeting about.
4. Get a background. People have been known to start following someone just because they like the background they used or preferably made. This can be a difficult step since Twitter has recently changed it background format. How much of your background people see depends on the size and quality of each individuals monitor. Free Twitter Background Designer
5. Money. Money can buy you anything, including more followers. There are sites that will (for a nominal fee) add followers to your account. I do not recommend this since it is a sleaze copout and can be easily done free of charge. It just might take a little bit more effort.
6. Retweet.
7. Be active. Be part of the conversation. Talk to people following you and more importantly, people who aren't following you.
8. Add your twitter URL and @ccount name everywhere you can. Email signatures, business cards, websites, car window, anywhere your tweets collide with the real world. The more links to your profile, the more chances of gaining additional followers.
9. Don't over tweet. I can't tell you the number of people I have added only seconds later to realize it was a horrible mistake. My Twitter stream was blanketed with one person's tweets. It becomes hard to read the tweets you care about if you can't find them in a cluster of annoying Twitterrhea.
What Is A Retweet
How to retweet in twitter
Retweeting is taking a twitter message someone else has posted, and reposting that same message to your followers. Since tweets in your Twitter stream only show up from people you are following, this tweet may not have been seen by people following you since they are not following that individual.
There are 2 main ways to retweet:
The simplest way to retweet is to find the tweet you wish to share with your followers and find the button at the bottom of his or her tweet that sais "Retweet". This method has some downsides to its ease however. This method doesn't allow you to comment on the retweet and instantly kills the conversation.
The properway to retweet is to copy the tweet and then paste it as a new tweet. You then have to add RT (ReTweet) before the post. Following the RT you must give the person who originally tweeted credit by inserting their twitter address @Username. You can then add a quick note about the tweet and why it is relevant at the end. Should look something like this:
Original Tweet - Original message here - www.originallink.com
ReTweet - RT @Username: Original message here - www.originallink.com - Great tip
There are 2 main ways to retweet:
The simplest way to retweet is to find the tweet you wish to share with your followers and find the button at the bottom of his or her tweet that sais "Retweet". This method has some downsides to its ease however. This method doesn't allow you to comment on the retweet and instantly kills the conversation.
The properway to retweet is to copy the tweet and then paste it as a new tweet. You then have to add RT (ReTweet) before the post. Following the RT you must give the person who originally tweeted credit by inserting their twitter address @Username. You can then add a quick note about the tweet and why it is relevant at the end. Should look something like this:
Original Tweet - Original message here - www.originallink.com
ReTweet - RT @Username: Original message here - www.originallink.com - Great tip
Beginner Tips and Tricks
As with anything that is new, there are always a lot of questions and concerns. I know one of the things I was worried about was who would actually see my tweets and what they would actually see when I did tweet? I learned quick....Twitter Stream
Your Twitter Stream or home page is the place where you will see all of the tweets from the people you are following. People who are following you, yet for some reason you are not following them back, will not show up here. Your personal tweets will also show up here, as they would on someone else's Twitter Stream who is following you.
Reply
If you see a tweet and wish to reply to it, you can either click the reply button located within the tweet you wish to reply to or type the person's @Username into a tweet. They will be able to see this tweet easily since there is a @mentions tab at the top of everyone's home page.
@mentions
This tab allows you to see tweets which have included your personal @Username. This is the easiest way to track a conversation that has been happening between you and another Twit.
Direct Messages
Direct messages or DM's are private messages only visible between you and the recipient. This message is still limited to 140 characters which is a benefit since 60% of the people you will follow have automated DM's that clutter your messages "inbox".
What do others see?
When it comes to general tweets, they will show up on everyone of your followers Twitter stream. Replies or any tweet starting with a @username, will not show up on any of your followers Twitter streams. They will however be visible to anyone if they decide to visit your profile. It would take a lot of time and effort to piece together a conversation between 2 random people, yet it is possible. Direct messages, as always, are private yet are rarely used due to the spam rate.
How To Use Twitter Like A Pro
How to build followers and see who is following you back
Want to build up your followers fast and not have to deal with bots or programs? Twitter allows you to follow around 1000 Twits a day. Just go to someone's page that you are following and add all the people who are following that person. This takes a bit of time and is repetitive yet is brainless. The formula is that around 40% of the people you follow will follow you back within 24 - 48 hours.How to see if someone is following you back
You can use sites such as Friend or Follow
Or
If you are using the "New Twitter", go to your profile and click on the Following tab to bring up a list of your followers. Click on someone's box and their profile should show up on the right hand side. In the middle of the screen (to the right of the green Following button) should be a "message" button, that would allow you to send a direct message to the person.
Hint: DMs can only be sent to people who are following you back.
Therefore, if you click on a person box and in their profile there is no "message" button, it means they are not following you back. You can then go ahead and unfollow them.
[see twitterquette for unfollowing etiquette]
If you are using the older version of twitter the same concept applies. Go to the Following tab in your profile. On the right hand side of every person's box you will see a button that gives you multiple options. Mention, block, report but the important one will be the "Direct Message" option. If it is missing then person is not following you back and if it is present then they are following you back.
You can then combine this knowledge to add 1000 people a day, wait 48 hours and unfollow the people who are not following you. Twitter doesn't let you add more then 1000 followers so you must unfollow people to allow for more room.
Add Pictures To Your Tweets
Pictures say a thousand words
140 characters just not enough? Why not add a picture with Twitpic? There are multiple programs that will allow you to add a link to your photos yet this is the most popular by far with twits. If you have a Twitter application on your cell phone, this process is made even simpler. Just take a photo with your camera in your phone, click share, then Twitter and its instantly attached to a tweet! 8 Twitterquette Tips
1. Don't drink and tweet. Dweets can be the leading cause of mistweets.
2. If you follow someone and they decide to follow you back, Do Not unfollow them. This shows that you want to talk but don't want to listen.
3. Profanity is frowned upon but is still present
4. Only follow people who line up with the reason you joined twitter.
5. Do not post more then 4 tweets an hour. This takes away from others tweets and can become annoying.
6. Do not use DMs to spam people. This will lead to people unfollowing you or you getting reported.
7. Do not have an auto reply thanking people for following you. This is annoying at best and does not make me any more happy about following you. (That being said, I got a DM thanking me for following with a link and a helpful hint relating directly to my last tweet that gave me hope for the Twitter World. Personal touch goes a long way)
8. Be polite
2. If you follow someone and they decide to follow you back, Do Not unfollow them. This shows that you want to talk but don't want to listen.
3. Profanity is frowned upon but is still present
4. Only follow people who line up with the reason you joined twitter.
5. Do not post more then 4 tweets an hour. This takes away from others tweets and can become annoying.
6. Do not use DMs to spam people. This will lead to people unfollowing you or you getting reported.
7. Do not have an auto reply thanking people for following you. This is annoying at best and does not make me any more happy about following you. (That being said, I got a DM thanking me for following with a link and a helpful hint relating directly to my last tweet that gave me hope for the Twitter World. Personal touch goes a long way)
8. Be polite
Twitter definitions:
Twionary
Twitterer - A user of Twitter. [also sometimes refered to as a Twit, Tweeter or Tweeple]
Tweet - [noun] a message sent on twitter.
Tweet - [verb] The act of posting on Twitter
Twitterzine - A magazine published through Twitter.
Tweet Pushers - Content writers for a twitterzine.
ReporTwitters - A bunch of journalists publishing "real style"tweets in conjunction with their articles.
Twoosh - A full 140 character Tweet.
Twitter Stream - A collection of Tweets, usually belonging to one user, in a chronological order.
Friendapalooza - A scheduled burst of friend-adding on Twitter and other social networks.
Dweet - Tweet sent while under the influence of alcohol
Tweetaholism - continued use of Twitter to the point of addiction.
Twittcrastination - Procrastination which is facilitated by the use of twitter.
Mistweet - A tweet which one later regrets
Twitterrhea - The act of sending too many Twitter messages
Tweeple - Twitter people, members or users
Tweetln - when a group of Twits agrees to get together at a set time to use Twitter
Twitterati - a glamourour A-list Twitterers everyone wants to follow
Twitosphere - the total community of Twitterers
Twitterness - a person's contribution to the twitosphere
Twitterage: rage at a twitter post.
Twitterphoria: the elation you feel when the person you've added as a friend adds you back.
Co-twitterer: a partner that tweets on your Twitter account.
Drive-by-tweet: a quick post inbetween tasks
Neweeter: a new tweeter
Occasionitter: an occasional tweeter
Politweeter: a political tweeter
Politweet: a political tweet
Qwitter: a tool used to catch twitter quitters- UseQuitter.com
Sweeple: sweet twitter people
Twadd: to add/follow someone to your Twitter account as a friend.
Twaffic: Twitter traffic.
Twaiting: twittering while waiting.
Twalking: walking while twittering via text.
Twapplications: Twitter applications.
Twead: to read a tweet from a fellow twitterer.
Tweetsulted, tweetsult: what do you think it means, you dumb twitterer?
Tweetup: when twitterers meet in person - a Twitter meet up.
Twitter VS Facebook
Which Social Networking Site Is Truly The Most Useful?
Twitter! Without a doubt! I can find way more information in a shorter time on a wider range of topics from around the world!
Facebook! Clearly! I can find my news on TV! Do Not limit my opinion to 140 characters!
crosscreations says:
The two so close and similar in many ways, however FB is in lead. I'm thinking that's likely due to all the teenagers on this planet who live on FB mostly.
by Dave_F
I am a degree graduate who is passionate about all things marketing.
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