Posted by Gabe on August 2, 2009 under Ask Gabe, Social Media, Twitter, Twitter for Beginners | 
This is the first post from the Ask Gabe series:
I recently received an interesting question when I asked my Twitter “newbie” colleagues if they had any questions about Twitter.
“@KidsAreHeroes: I sent out a general tweet asking for a response and got nothing. Is there a trick to getting answers?”
That to me is a loaded question with the following correct answers: “Yes.” “No.” and “It depends.”
I examined this person’s profile and saw that she had 109 followers. The question she asked was definitely of a “nichey” nature. My response to her was that what she needed was more targeted followers to raise her chances of getting worthy answers to a question such as this. There are many factors involved when you send out a question.
1) How many of your followers are actually online at the time you asked it? There are many opinions as to what is the best time to tweet, but you can try it yourself by asking the question a few times at different times of the day to see which produces the best results. You must be careful not to be too repetetive or people may unfollow you. You must also consider your target audience. If it is global then you might also try a service like Future Tweets that will schedule the question in the middle of your night which is the day for many others.
2) How many people are following you? I think many new people still don’t realize that your followers and your followers only are likely to read your tweets. So if you have 100 followers, it’s the middle of the night for 50, 25 are awake but off line right now…you get the idea.
3) How many people are your followers following? If a person follows more than a few hundred people chances are that many tweets will be not be noticed at any one time. This is just simply the nature of the beast. To combat this you can retweet your own questions, but just be aware that overdoing it will be annoying to many.
4) Does your question appear to have a self-serving nature? If you have hidden agendas behind your tweets you are likely to turn people off. Here’s an example: “So-and-so said my web site was awesome! What do you think? http://spammylink.com” The number one thing you should remember about being involved with social media is the word “social”. If you connect with people they will pay more attention to you – plain and simple. I was perusing new followers’ profiles this morning and came across a particular person who had a few tweets that read something like, “New to this, bear with me.” Then he asked how to shorten a URL. So far so good. But then I saw some self-serving tweets that pointed to his web site. The sad thing is here that I don’t believe this person is a spammer per se, but he simply doesn’t know any better. Hopefully he will learn in time.
5) Who are you? That’s right, I said, “who are you?” To me you are just one of the eleventy-million people on Twitter until: a) I learn more about you in your profile, b) I read one of your tweets that interests me, c) You have engaged me in some way that wasn’t spammy. This is crucial to your success with Twitter. You must make your connections one at a time. And guess what? That takes work and it also takes time. But the time is incredibly well spent. There are no shortcuts to doing this properly. Oh sure, you can get sucked into the “16,000 followers in 90 days” scams but what do you have then? You still haven’t connected with anyone and the ones that you would like to connect with can tell that you used a program to gain followers so they won’t follow you. On top of that many people (includng me) unfollow when they see a tweet that advertises these follower schemes. Just for your knowledge here are a few relevant tweets from @spam which is the account to report spammy Twitterers to:
“If you give out your username and pw to a site claiming to get you more followers, updates often get sent out on your account.”
“Giving out your username and password to a 3rd party site promising you more followers: not a good idea! Please be safe!”
“Don’t believe the hype & sign up for ‘get followers fast!’ programs. They can be scams that steal your username and password!”
So, is there a trick to using Twitter? I wouldn’t call it a trick, just be genuine and connect with people – everything else will fall into place after that.
Posted by Gabe on July 3, 2009 under Twitter, Twitter for Beginners |
You might have heard that Twitter recently changed the way that direct replies are handled. It used to be that you as a subscriber had a choice to see the conversations going on between two people, regardless if you followed both of them or not. Now, that “feature” has been removed. So what that means is that if you @reply to someone, and the “@someone” is the first item in the tweet, the only people who will see this tweet are those that follow both you and @someone. Why are some people against this? It is because that is the way many of us learn about new people by learning how they interact with others. I also believe that if someone pays you a compliment or does something nice they deserve to be thanked in front of the largest audience possible.
There is an easy workaround to this and you may have seen others use it. If you preface the @reply with a period or exclamation point, everyone in your follower stream will see the tweet. So then “@KidsAreHeroes Thanks!” becomes .@KidsAreHeroes Thanks! Another way to do it is like this – instead of:
@KidsAreHeroes Thanks for the RT!
You could write:
Thanks to @KidsAreHeroes for the RT!
Happy Tweeting!
Posted by Gabe on June 11, 2009 under Social Media, Twitter, Twitter for Beginners |
Every once in a while when I think of it I like to solicit questions from my Twitter colleagues to see if there is any way to help the newer signups out there. I put out the call this morning and among others received this question: “What if I don’t follow back followers? Is it a contest to have the most? How can I ever read all those tweets?“ My answer is clearly that you do not have to follow back everyone that follows you. For some it is a contest, but for most it’s about connecting with people. And how do you keep track of all of them? The answer is that eventually if you follow enough people there is no way that you can. You end up with Tweetdeck or some such application that can help manage all the people that you follow.
Then there was a tweet pointing to a post about annoying DMs that come with spammy links. The writer mentioned that there should be no Twitter rules, but that he hates it when people DM these links after a follow (and so do I).
I have written a few posts on Twitter followers, but all this made me think of a new approach. Yes, there should be no Twitter rules, but I have some that I follow myself. I once came across a profile that said that this person doesn’t follow back if 1) There are few updates, 2) There is no conversation in their Twitter stream and 3) The person follows more than 600 people. Now I got past #1 and #2, but what about #3? According to her profile she wouldn’t follow me back just because I follow a lot of people. Hey, I’m a nice guy – she might be missing out on something. Then I came to the conclusion that these are her rules and she has every right to stick by them. As a matter of fact, I was very impressed with her putting them on display. I clicked the Follow button anyway, with the hopes that she would bend her own rules a little.
So, I am putting my own personal rules or reasons out there for everyone to see – feel free to pick them apart, agree or whatever. I reserve the right to deviate from them from time to time – after all, they do belong to me. ;)
Why I Didn’t Follow You Back…
1) Because you are a dude who wears no shirt in your avatar. No good reason – just don’t do it.
2) Because you have no (or very few) updates – especially if you are following a bunch of people. How can I tell whether I am interested if there’s no substance?
3) Because you didn’t fill out your profile, or said you were from the “Planet Earth”, “Cyberspace” or “Everywhere”. Where you are from and what your passions are interest me.
4) Because you do not converse with others. If I see no @ signs in your stream it means in my mind that you don’t “get” what Twitter can do for you and you just want to hear yourself talk.
5) Because you have an animated GIF as an avatar – one with blinking sunglasses or animals jumping around. Or also if you orient your picture sideways or upside down. Too much work for me to talk to you face to face. Your efforts to attract undue attention to yourself have backfired at least in my case.
6) Because all I see in your Twitter stream are retweets. Although it is very generous to retweet, I am looking for people who can also think for themselves.
7) Because most or all of your posts send out the link to your web site.
8) Because you follow WAY more people than follow you. Looks like you are spamming.
9) Because WAY more people follow you than those that you follow. Either you think you are a celebrity or you just want to hear yourself talk.
10) Because your profile pic is not updated, you have one tweet with a link, no profile…Really? Are you actually convinced that is an effective marketing method?
11) You have 10,000 followers and only 5 updates. Your tweets aren’t that good!
12) Because your color scheme makes it so difficult that I can hardly read your profile and/or Twitter stream. Light pink on white and dark gray on black just doesn’t work, people!
13) Because you take the “What are you doing?” question literally and all I see are short posts on what you do throughout the day. Get over yourself.
14) Because your avatar is of a female chest shot in a bikini and you are going to show me how to make money filling out surveys all day. Really??
15) Because you tweet only sporadically – maybe once a week or so. How can I have a conversation with you?
16) Because you protect your updates and your profile is either missing or vague.
17) Because your avatar is disturbing. You got through every other criteria – you are social, profile is filled out, you are generous – I couldn’t imagine having to look at that avatar all the time.
18) Because I read in your profile a tweet that said “Get 10,000 followers easy using blah blah blah.” Your follower count: 147. Wow!!
19) Because your profile read “This is NOT SPAM!” If it takes that much of an argument then I guess it is.
Why I Unfollowed You…
1) Because you sent me a link of how I can get 16,000 followers on Twitter in 90 days.
2) Because you used profanity in your tweet. (I have a 10-year-old who is always looking over my shoulder.)
3) Because you stopped using Twitter. If you haven’t tweeted in a month that tells me you gave up.
4) Because you stepped over the line. You retweeted my tweet and I thanked you – then you asked me to retweet something of yours. That wasn’t cool.
5) Because you keep posting about how great you are and how we should see your web site.
6) Because you didn’t respond to my @replies. I see that you are still tweeting but after several attempts to connect with you I have received no response. No hard feelings – guess you are just not that in to me.
7) Because your posts are too much of a religious nature. I have nothing against religion but I personally don’t feel Twitter is the place to convert people. Let’s make a deal. You don’t try and convert me to your religion and I won’t try to convert you to mine.
8) Because you clogged my Twitter stream with too many posts in a row – either repeating yourself or sending out multiple links. I tolerate that to a point but be careful with it.
9) Because I saw the tweet “RT @garymcaffrey blah blah blah” in your Twitter stream about a pyramid scheme to get more followers. It benefits him more than anyone and you just damaged your own reputation by using it.
10) Because you keep begging for RTs, votes and/or followers. Believe me – it is great that you passed 100 followers but you are one of the very few who cares. The followers will come naturally. The RT’s will too as long as your tweets are interesting.
11) Because you asked me to join your mafia or be your spymaster. These are two games going around Twitter. If you are using Twitter to play games then you really don’t get what it can do for you.
12) Because you sent me an auto-dm with a spammy link and asked me to retweet it. WHAT?!?
13) Ok let me get this straight. I followed you, then you auto-DM’ed me back with: “I just gave you peace and happiness” plus a spammy link. If that wasn’t enough you added “You should send me a gift back.” Here’s my gift: UNFOLLOW.
14) So Donald Trump is going to make us all millionaires and you want to be the 500th person to tell me about it. You’re fired.
15) You sent me an @reply about how great a tweep I am. Now I normally would thank you for this, except I noticed you aren’t even following me. My reputation must be really awesome. I see in your twitter stream that there are thousands of other great tweeps like me. Do you really spend your day typing that stuff in??
16) You sent a #followfriday to me and others which was nice. What’s that I see? A spammy link in the middle? We are not stupid, spammers!
Why I Blocked You…
1) Because we have no relationship and you @replied to me with a link to your spam. Seriously??
2) Because your avatar and/or posts are pornographic or link to porn. Or if you have the word “Horny” in your Twitter ID.
3) Because your avatar is a pretty girl, your ID is cryptic, you are following a bunch of people and you have only one tweet that links to your spam.
4) Because you @replied to me asking me to do something that benefits you when we have no relationship.
5) Because you sent more than one direct message to me asking me to do the same thing. If I didn’t act on your request the first time, leave it alone. I get so many requests and can only do so much.
6) Because you followed and unfollowed me several times in the past 24 hours to try and get my attention – it worked – I blocked you.
7) Because I just discovered that you wrote a blog post a week later that was titled the same as mine and paraphrased my thoughts without any credit. (Happened to me regarding this post.)
8) Because you actually had the nerve to copy the text of someone else’s reply to me and and resend it with your spammy link attached to the end of it. Wow! I can’t wait to buy your junk!! Are you kidding me?
9) Because you @replied to me (and others) with the words “Free affiliate software…”
UPDATE: 06/14/10.: I have noticed that services like TwitIn and Huitter have now said that by providing a way to mass unfollow and/or follow they are violating Twitter’s new Terms of Service. I have noticed that, thanks to this effort, I have been getting fewer (if any) porn bots following me lately. (Thanks Twitter!) However the spammers will never give up — their new way to get at you is to reply to your inbox with their spam. I see this a lot which instantly triggers a “block and report for spam” from me. So please be very careful how you address people for the first time. A request to follow or retweet, without any history, could get you blocked.
Why I Followed You…
1) Because your profile is filled out with actual places, names and passions.
2) Because you have a good amount of updates that vary in substance.
3) Because your avatar is of yourself and you are smiling.
4) Because I see that you retweet, converse and also have thoughts of your own.
5) Because your tweets are (at least most times) interesting and informative.
6) Because I see we have a chance of connecting.
7) Because you promote others’ causes that interest you whether they be professional or non-profit.
8) Because you engage with other people.
9) Because you have a relatively even follower/following ratio.
10) Because you are not hard-selling everyone. You are promoting something but being social first is encouraging people to see what you do after they connect with you.
11) Because you left a thoughtful comment on one of my blog posts – because of that I looked you up and discovered you. I may have missed you when you followed me.
12) Because I studied your profile and your Twitter stream. You are a parent, an educator, a philanthropist or someone I think that might really enjoy our web site.
13) Because I can see through your tweets that you are trying to help other people – to lift them up – this is what Twitter is all about!
14) Because I feel that I can learn something from you. Whether it be cultural or otherwise, Twitter can be used as a personal enrichment tool.
15) Because you don’t pretend to be someone you are not.
16) Because you engaged with me in a friendly (non-spammy) way. Again, I might have missed you when you followed me.
17) Because you are a genuine person who supports others.
What many people don’t realize is that when you send a link to someone you’ve never contacted before, that is spam. That same link, if sent after you have connected with someone, becomes interesting and might open up new doors. Take the time to connect with people – you will be amazed at the results.
Ok – what did I miss? I’m sure quite a bit. If this is like my other Twitter posts I will be updating it from time to time as I learn more. Happy tweeting!
Just discovered this similar post by Lee Devlin. Might also be of help.
Posted by Gabe on May 1, 2009 under Social Media, Twitter, Twitter for Beginners |
Lately I have noticed a somewhat disturbing trend on Twitter, and that is the proliferation of people who are telling me about a great way to increase my followers in a short period of time. They are referring to a system that you pay for that becomes a short cut for increased followers. I will not comment on the value (or lack thereof) of said system since I did not purchase it (nor do I plan to). I am seeing these tweets in auto direct messages as I follow people (which immediately triggers an unfollow from me). I am also seeing them as tweets – also causing an immediate unfollow.
Now I am not against people having lots of followers on Twitter - I have made it clear that my goal at this time is to get as many followers as I can to spread the word about Kids Are Heroes. To get these followers I really have to work at it each day. So why should I “waste” my time working at getting followers when they can be purchased through one of many schemes going around these days? The answer is one simple reason – I want to control who I follow and who potentially follows me back. I look specifically for parents, philanthropists, educators and people that “get” social media and I also check out who my friends follow and their followers. I want to help make sure that my audience will be listening to me. I have said many times that followers mean nothing without connections. Twitter is what it is because of the people that built it – those who are interested primarily in social networking and not making money from being here. If it becomes all about making money then what do we have? Millions of spammers all spamming each other. Read more of this article »
Posted by Gabe on April 9, 2009 under Twitter, Twitter for Beginners |
I find numbers can be fascinating. Especially as to how they apply to Twitter. There are all kinds of postings and links telling you how to get more followers. I will admit that acquiring more followers can be intoxicating. People might say that they don’t care about followers – it’s the connections you make on Twitter that are important. This is absolutely true – followers without connections mean absolutely nothing. However you cannot tell me that a sudden onrush of followers doesn’t make you feel good. It’s simply human nature to enjoy the concept that people are interested in you. I will readily admit that my numbers are important to me. I crave them not for my ego, but for more exposure for Kids Are Heroes. When I embarked on this social media journey the fuel for me was to gain exposure for this web site because it is an application that works on a global level. And it is indeed working. So I do crave numbers – I said it. However, I will not utilize the methods of gaining them that do so in a cavalier manner. Just today I received a reply in Twitter from someone I wasn’t even following telling me about their free auto-follow program. You can even pay for a program that promises so many followers after just a few months. They claim they are “targeted followers”. I don’t use any of these pyramid schemes to get followers (and I immediately unfollowed the guy who sent me that link). At the time of this update I have over 9,000 followers. By the time I reach my six-month Twitter anniversary I will have reached 10,000. I say that not to be boastful, but to save you from paying for one of those “get more followers” programs. I am going to reveal the “secret” to you how I got my “followers” (I prefer the term “colleagues”). I get Twitter followers by 1) being active on Twitter,by 2) engaging and making connections, 3) maintaining an unreproachable reputation, and 4) effectively managing my following/follower ratio. How do I manage my ratio? By keeping an eye on who returns my follows. (See the tools I use for managing followers at the bottom of this post.) I have said in the past that I do not automatically follow people who follow me, but I do return the follow much of the time. (If you would like to see why I follow and unfollow certain people, see my post on this subject here.) This gets more difficult as time progresses because the more followers you acquire the more spammers you must weed through. http://twellow.com and http://wefollow.com are good sites to look for people to follow. I will also use the Twitter search feature to find new people to follow. I will search for hash tags such as #parenting, #education and #philanthropy. If I find someone I like I will check out their followers to see who else likes them – I might like them too. I also see who they follow – if it’s someone I know well I trust them to have already weeded out the spammers. I look at their profile to see if I might like to follow them and if so I do it. If after a week or so I see that they are not following me back, then I assume they are not interested in me. So I unfollow them. I have also said in the past that the best way to connect with people is if there is a mutual following there, otherwise at least one person isn’t listening. As your numbers grow over 2000, Twitter will limit the number of people you can follow to no more than 10% above the number of people that follow you. This is also a good way of maintaining the proper ratio.
Read more of this article »
Posted by TeamCharlie on March 31, 2009 under Gabe's Twitter Gems, Social Media, Twitter, Twitter for Beginners |
For some reason I awoke at 3:30 this morning. That’s usually not a big deal, I can normally get back to sleep until it’s time to get up. I started thinking about this new feature I am supposed to implement at work. I came up with the general concept and told myself I should remember it for later. Then I started thinking about a new blog post about the 10 top things I like about Twitter. That was enough to get me out of bed and start writing. I’ll do the work thing later.
#1 The Connections
When I started using Twitter just before the start of the year I had no idea what it would bring. Think about all the forums, bulletin boards, social networks, etc. that have existed in the past. I have participated, but usually only when I wanted a question answered. For some reason this 140 character thing that seems so simple is a great way to connect with people. I have honestly never seen anything like it. Young, old, male, female, all cultures, all languages, nothing seems to matter. If you use Tweetdeck, there is even a translate button that will translate the tweet into your native language. So there are really no barriers – you can connect with anyone on the planet that has access to a computer.
#2 Courtesy is Rampant
In the three months I have been using Twitter I have seen an abundance of professionalism and courtesy. I expected to see at least some bashing, arguments, hate language, etc. I have only seen one or two instances where there was a mild altercation between two tweeters, easily remedied by Block button. Even when a person perceives they may have offended an explanation or apology has already been sent. My Twitter stream is always full of retweets. This is another reason that makes the Twitter experience so pleasant. Maybe if every car on the road had the driver’s Twitter ID on their license plate there would be far less road rage. :)
Update: 4/23/09 I also wanted to add how great it is to see all the support that is prevalent on Twitter. As I write this we are in a contest to have our pitch produced as part of a video called “Pitch TV” that will be played on all of Richard Branson’s Virgin Atlantic flights as part of their inflight entertainment. I have found all the encouragement from people on Twitter to be overwhelming and I know I wouldn’t have a chance if it weren’t for you folks. The end result still has to be determined, but I do thank all of you who voted for us, blogged about us, interviewed us and sent us kind and thoughtful words. (Twitter is AWESOME!!)
Update: 6/05/09 The results of the pitch contest are in! Thanks to you all we are featured as the first pitch in Richard Branson’s Premiere Pitch TV Show. Check it out here!
#3 Marketing/Blog Promotion
Think about ways that you can market your business or non-profit for free. One way that comes to mind is email. And that isn’t even free because if you are serious about it you have to pay for email lists. What percentage of emails get through and even are read? Twitter on the other hand provides people that have already told you they want to hear what you say just by following you. Once you connect with them they will also market you via their respectful retweets. They might come across someone that could use your services and tell them about it. Twitter is all about each one of us lifting each other up – helping out each other’s causes. Be careful however – Twitter marketing isn’t just about telling everyone how great your product is. You must market yourself first by connecting with people – they will in turn discover your product and will be much more open to consider it and promote it to others. Blogging is another form of marketing. It shows your knowledge of a particular subject. Before Twitter I had very few readers of my blog since I was just out there hanging in the middle of cyberspace somewhere. With a tool like TwitterFeed, I can feed a link to my blog to my Twitter stream. Now I have exposed all of my followers to my blog. I have gotten quite an increase in readership which will only continue to rise as I keep tweeting.
#4 Philanthropy
This is the reason I joined Twitter – to promote Kids Are Heroes. Before I discovered Twitter I was able to get exposure in our local paper and a radio spot or two but that’s about it. Since I joined Twitter we have been featured in the Denver Post, completed one podcast and scheduled another, and invited to be guest speakers at a tweetathon. We are gaining new heroes from around the world because of this new exposure. I believe this is just the beginning. I get so excited when I think about where we will be one year from now or five years down the road. There are many non-profits that are thriving on Twitter. With this economy it is helpful to have another source of revenue.
#5 Global Reach
“The world is your oyster.” Twitter makes it available to you. The URL shortener http://tr.im shows not only how many clicks a link has received, but where they originate as well. When we host our Friday Twitterthons, we usually try and promote them all week, so we use the same link. Here is an example of the reach that Twitter gives you. The link itself has been clicked over 1600 times and the following is the list of where people originated: US, France, Germany, Canada, Ireland, UK, Russian Federation, China, Australia, Republic of Korea, Singapore, New Zealand and Israel. If you use Future Tweets, you can also connect with people while you are sleeping. Now some might think this is an impersonal way of tweeting or it is tweeting by some form of trickery. I disagree. I use it regularly so I can be in front of someone when their time zone makes it convenient for them. I have learned that to get the most out of Twitter you must be active on it. Future Tweets lets me be active in the middle of the night. Currently I have five tweets I have set to run overnight. I space them out enough not to be obnoxious, but hopefully between the times that I tweet during the day and the automated ones at night I have everyone covered. When I looked at my Replies folder this morning I saw I had three responses to my tweets – one being a retweet. How I make that personal is by replying to them in the morning. Now I have connected with more people around the world. There is usually a window somewhere during the day that enables us to tweet live to each other. The “future tweet” made this possible.
#6 Newsworthy
Many people talk about how Twitter informs of all breaking news. Yes that is true, seemingly minutes after a major incident has happened, it ends up in my Twitter stream. The next person will post a video of the same incident. This is a great by-product of Twitter. But what goes along with this is learning about things in general. There are so many different interests and perspectives. You can learn about anything. My friend in Singapore taught me about the origin of numbers. Yesterday I downloaded a Powerpoint presentation that had photographs (not renditions, actual photographs) of our planet by astronaut Sunita Williams. Now you wouldn’t think that was such a big deal because we’ve all seen what the earth looks like haven’t we? We’ve even seen pictures. But this was different. It showed how night falls, what sand storms look like from space – it just gave me a different perspective that I was thrilled to share with my 10-year-old daughter.
#7 What do you Need?
I have a practice of asking people if they need anything. This might sound like a funny rhetorical question, but it’s not. If it’s something I can help with I do. If it’s something I can find for them I try to. If it’s something I cannot accomplish or tell them, I try and find someone who can. Twitter is like that. People are always anxious to help and offer free advice. Many times it comes unsolicited in an informative blog. A newbie recently tweeted to me how she loves the “collegial” atmosphere of Twitter. It was refreshing to her. That’s the way things should be.
#8 Searching for Godot
Google is great for searching. It is so great, there is now an accepted verb in the English language: to google. Sometimes when you google however you get too much back and it becomes hard to sift through the results. There are two ways to search on Twitter. One way is to use a search tool to filter the tweets. That method is powerful enough on its own. The second way is to simply tweet the question. Now you have people from around the world reading your question. The good news is that they understand exactly what you are after. Often times it is simple as posting a question on Twitter to get the answer you need.
#9 Education
Twitter is a great conduit where you can learn from other people. From news to different cultures to simply learning about each other’s passions. I have learned so many things from my colleagues on Twitter it is amazing.
#10 Tweet-Ups
Tweet-ups are when Twitter people get together to socialize in person. Make no mistake about it – Twitter is a social networking platform. It enables people to both forge new and strengthen existing relationships. But nothing can replace face-to-face networking. Twitter is a great way to facilitate these meetings. Thanks to @mjovel for getting one set up in our city. Regretfully I cannot attend this one but eagerly look forward to the next one.
Ok, I bet I missed one or two (or three) great things about Twitter. Please remind me of them in the Comments section. I’m sure I will think of more too. Best post this before another one occurs to me.
Posted by TeamCharlie on March 1, 2009 under Gabe's Twitter Gems, Social Media, Twitter, Twitter for Beginners |
Twitter is not rocket science, people. What I offer is common sense here. Twitter is a medium that connects people from all over the world. If you use it properly, you can connect with a lot more people in a very meaningful way. Having immersed myself in reading about and participating in the Twitter Universe the last few months, I came across a tidbit that says that posts that use “Top Ten This” and “Top Ten That” are retweeted more often. So there is a gem for you before I even get started. This list is purely my own, but I am sticking to it. I hope it helps.
One caveat: As I reread this it appears like I am dictating. I am just a guy who loves Twitter and enjoys connecting with people. I am not telling you to follow these rules. I put them forth as suggestions because following them has made for a very positive Twitter experience for me.
#1 Tweet Content
Don’t persist in spewing why I should buy what you are selling. This should be self evident, but there are many people who still think if they keep ramming their business into my Twitter stream I will buy from them. Just the opposite – you will be unfollowed at minimum. When I look at a person’s profile, if I see that the majority of their posts try and lure me to their commercial web site, or tell me why they are so great I simply don’t follow them. It amazes me that so many people still don’t get that.
Do ask about other people’s businesses. Find something you have in common and tweet them about it. The best use of Twitter is when you are engaged with someone else. Once you engage they will be more curious about what you do.
#2 The Retweet
Don’t keep asking us to retweet about something that will benefit you. That gets annoying fast and will cause an unfollow if practised too many times.
Do retweet others’ posts that impress or interest you. This is a common way of showing respect to those that you follow. Just last night I was retweeted four times regarding one tweet. Three of the people that retweeted I wasn’t following. Their interest showed me we have something in common so now I follow them as well. Sometimes you can connect with people just by retweeting them.
#3 Followers
Don’t ask for followers. I often see tweets such as “Please RT – I am at 986 followers – help me get to 1000!” When you think about this you should see how little sense it makes. It simply shows how self-serving you appear to be. If you do get that extra 14 followers as a result chances are they aren’t following you because they care about what you say anyway. “Empty” followers are worse than no followers at all.
Do ask what you can do to help someone else. Look for tweets that ask for something you can help with and respond. It shows that person you are listening to them and want to help. That’s how you engage on Twitter. Those followers will come naturally and that is really what you want.
#4 Recommendations
Don’t ask for recommendations. I often see tweets that say “Please vote for me! Please fave me! Please recommend me to Mr Tweet!” Think about this. If you were at a party would you go around the room with a petition asking people to sign something that says how great you are? (If you would you seriously need help.) :) It’s obnoxious, people!
Do recommend other people to Mr Tweet. Since you can only recommend one person at a time, this shows that person that you respect them, took the time out to care about them and hold their tweets in high esteem. They will get a notice that you did this and they just might return the favor.
UPDATE: 4/22/09 Ok I had to come back and edit this one because I have been asking for votes all week as we have a chance to be on Richard Branson’s Pitch TV. It is definitely out of my comfort zone but I am thinking of all the lives it can change (besides our own) if we win. So I still think it’s spammy to ask for votes, but use your own discretion and try and do it tactfully if you must. I will say that I did lose over 50 followers (some who had been with me for a while) when I did it a bit too much. So the concept still proves to be true.
#5 Testimonials
Don’t tell me how many followers you have because honestly I don’t care. Tweets such as “WOOT! I just reached 1000 followers!” are self-serving and annoying. It makes those of us that have fewer followers feel less important, and those that have more don’t really care.
Do make us laugh or retweet something that makes you laugh. Be entertaining. I read once that a good Twitterer is one that makes other people’s lives just a bit better for that day. One recent tweet that sticks out in my mind is “I’ve always disliked the word ’nougat’. Just saying.” Now I can’t tell you why that is funny to me but it just is. In writing this I even had to go back and research who wrote it so I could give him props, so @jleveille thanks for that! Turns out he’s a local. Who knew?
#6 Information Dissemination
Don’t hold back information. Being coy with what you know will get you nowhere.
Do be generous in what you give out. I would even go so far as to recommend that you Google information that other people are looking for if you don’t know it. There is no better way to engage someone than to solve a problem for them.
#7 Another about Followers
Don’t follow people for the sake of getting return followers. This does work if all you want are numbers following you. And numbers following you are just that – they could care less about what you have to say. These people are easy to spot. They are following 2000 people (Twitter’s limit unless your followers are proportionate) and have far fewer followers. I never follow someone when I see this in their profile because they are only after the numbers. Guess what else is going to happen if they have followed you? In order for them to reach the 2000 follower mark they will have to continually unfollow and follow others. So chances are they will unfollow you anyway.
Do be diligent in uncovering your target demographic. When you look at a profile, see if you have anything in common with that person. Make sure that they engage with others - this increases your chances of engaging with them. Followers come naturally from this type of behavior. People discover that you are engaging so they want to follow you as well.
#8 Stop the Profanity
Don’t swear in your tweets. I might be a tad biased about this one because my 10-year-old daughter is on Twitter as well and I would rather not have her bombarded by vulgarity. But in my mind ther’s more to it than that. It is simply about acting professionally. Being on Twitter is like being at a crowded party. The only difference is that on Twitter your voice is MUCH louder than it is at a regular gathering. It is so loud that everyone can hear you. Would you climb up on a table and yell profanities at a party?
Do respect that there are people in the room that may be offended by this sort of behavior. This will only reflect back on you in a positive way.
#9 Update your Bio
Don’t hide who you are. How can we find something in common with you if you don’t tell us about yourself? The more information you give us the better. Another of my pet peeves is people who attest their location as “Everywhere” or “Planet Earth”. I really want to know your town and state or province. That makes you unique. I can ask you about what it is like to live there.
Do put as much information in that section as you can. People are interested in you and your bio is part of what makes you interesting.
#10 Spam
Don’t spam. People who do won’t be reading this so I go no further as to why.
Do report spammers. @spam seems to be the place to report spam on Twitter. Follow @spam and they will follow you right back. They ask that you DM (Direct Message) them details. (Note – they are also a good follow warning you of the latest scams going around.) Please use this properly. The last two nights I have received many new followers with the same name of “Sale Today” or “alwayslearning24″. They have one update with a link to their spamminess. I reported them. I ask that you do not report someone who is new to Twitter and is sending out too many spammy tweets just because they don’t know any better. In this case I recommend educating them or unfollowing them.
I hope you have found a gem or two in this list that helps you. Feel free to leave others that I missed in the comments section.
Update – “The Extended Dance Version”
Because I can’t just keep to ten and I keep seeing more do’s and don’ts in my Twitterstream, I wanted to share more, so here goes:
#11 About Yourself
Don’t tell us how many emails you have in your InBox. I have seen a rash of this lately. “Oh I have 250 emails to get to – how to find the time.” Guess who cares about this? Not me. It tells me that you are trying to point out how important and/or popular you are. Yawn.
Do share something about yourself that draws me to you. If you don’t appear boastful it might help someone make a connection. Here’s an example of something I saw yesterday that connected with me. @AlaskaArtist tweeted the following: “Today’s Alaska Photo: http://tinyurl.com/aeaxxx.” I have been to Alaska and I love it there. So of course I am going to click on the picture and it was beautiful. She even sells the photos and I didn’t feel her approach was spammy at all. There are many ways to send out enticing tweets – this is just one example.
#12 Third One re Followers
Don’t pay for followers. Another trend I am seeing is “I will donate $xxx.xx dollars if I get to XXXX followers by March 5.” Somebody please explain to me how this makes sense. First of all you don’t seem to care who the followers are so you are announcing to everyone that you are just looking to bump up your numbers artificially. You are trying to make that OK by making people think that you will donate money as a result. I also never see tweets that say “I just got my XXX followers by XXX date and here is a twitpic of the receipt that proves that I donated.” The accountability is hedgy at best.
Do get followers naturally by engaging with people. If you want to donate to a charity, just do it – the world doesn’t need to know about it.
#13 The Direct Message
Don’t automatically direct message (DM) me after I follow you. It insults not only my intelligence but all the others that you are sending them to. There is no personal touch to it and if you pay attention to Twitter most people hate them. Putting a link to your “whatever-you-are-selling” inside the DM makes it even worse and will more often than not cause people to unfollow you.
Do send @replies to people. This is a much more personal way of communicating, and people realize that you formulated a tweet that was meant just for them, so they are much more apt to respond. One of the people I follow, @AlexKaris, has close to 19,000 followers at the time of this writing. Every time I have @replied to him he has responded. That to me is amazing. Now I don’t do it often to him because I respect how difficult it might be to manage that many followers, but the fact remains he makes an effort. All the “uber-twits” on Twitter should use him as a model. Regardless of how many or few followers you have, please respond to these @replies because if people went to the trouble to contact you about something you should return the favor.
#14 Your Ego
Don’t ask certain people for a follow. It is presumptuous and can put them in an awkward spot. This goes along with don’t feel bad if someone you think should follow you doesn’t. Both have happened to me. I asked someone to follow me who I thought would thank me for giving them my Twitter ID and they never followed me. What’s worse is that a few months later they did and in a day or two unfollowed me!! Hey folks, guess what? This happens. Not all people are in to you. ;)
Do enjoy the people that are following you. Get to know the people that you don’t know. It is so much fun. In order to force myself to engage more I am starting up a new trend for myself. Each Friday I plan to post the “Top Ten New Connections for the Week”. These are people who I feel I have connected to in a small way for the first time. It may be with just an @reply or two, but the next time I see their tweet there will be just a bit more familiarity with the person behind it. I encourage you to try this practice. If you don’t have a blog just keep a record of them and try and get at least 10 new connections per week. This really pushes me to seek out tweets I can relate to and respond in kind. I would love to hear about it if you start this habit yourself.
#15 Getting People’s Attention
Don’t @reply someone with your great business deals or acumen. Boy is that one ever obnoxious. I had never experienced that until a few days ago when I got a reply saying something like “@KidsAreHeroes Come check out our web site – we’ve got GREAT deals!” I said to myself, “Well that was annoying.” but let it go. About a day later I got another similar reply from the same person. Sorry guy, but I had to block you. I do not block people without giving them the benefit of the doubt first. The only people I block are out and out spammers. I think the person behind this was not necessarily a spammer. I think he just didn’t know any better but he left me no choice other than to block him.
Do retweet. Do you want people to notice that you exist? Retweet the posts that are interesting to you. But be careful, if I see someone’s profile and all they do is retweet then I don’t follow them. They are trying to be falsely generous and people can see through that. Make sure you retweet only the tweets that move you in some way. So, what is retweeting and how do you do it? Retweeting is simply reposting someone else’s tweet to your followers. The format is as follows: If I tweet this: “I just ate a Twix bar with a fork!” the retweet would look like this: “RT @KidsAreHeroes: I just ate a Twix bar with a fork!” A newer method that has surfaced recently is this: “I just ate a Twix bar with a fork! (via @KidsAreHeroes)” I’m not a big fan of the latter as it uses more characters. (Hint: If you want your posts retweeted more often, leave enough space for this to go in front without editing: ”RT @YourID: “.)
Another way to get people’s attention is to @reply them with an open ended question, or a compliment on their tweet. Say something to them that beckons an answer. That’s a good way to keep on people’s radar screens.
#16 Managing your Profile
Don’t only talk to yourself. Remember that when people decide whether or not they will follow you, the crucial thing they look at is your profile. There are three things that are important here: your picture, your bio and your tweet content. Even if you are not posting your link each time and not bragging about how great your business is, it is a turnoff if you are not engaging with people. I want to see plenty of @replies in your profile so that I know you are conversing with people. That is the reason to be on Twitter - to engage with others.
Do @reply to people – even if you don’t know them. Or should I say especially if you don’t know them. That is the key to being successful on Twitter and that is to connect with new people. You can’t do that by talking to yourself.
#17 Your Brand
Don’t keep changing your brand. A brand takes time to establish. Many people do not even consider it. There are several things associated with your brand, but what I am specifically referring to here are your picture and your Twitter ID. I would take some time to choose them both in the beginning and stick with them. I recently blogged about a Twitter friend and linked to his page so people could follow him. He had a cutesy acronym for an ID. He decided after I blogged that he wanted a different cutesy acronym. Now my post goes to a dead link. Try this: Go to Google and search for ‘Twitter’ and your Twitter ID. Depending how much you update you should see plenty of hits. If you change your ID they also will all be dead links. Changing your picture doesn’t have as much of an impact, but it does have some. The more times people see your picture the more it breeds familiarity. Familiarity is what people are comfortable with. Keep changing the picture and you lose that familiarity. Sometimes I look through the pictures of people that I follow to find someone specific. Maybe I cannot remember their ID specifically but want to find them. I look for the familiar picture. If they keep changing it I may not find them.
Do be consistent with your brand. Select a picture, Twitter ID and background carefully in the beginning. Once you have settled on something, stick with it!
#18 The Retweet (part deux)
Don’t retweet someone’s post and then as soon as you get a thank you ask them to retweet you. This puts the person you retweeted originally in an awkward position and could cause an unfollow. It tells the person that you were never interested in the tweet in the first place, that you are more interested in getting your own posts retweeted.
Do retweet others’ posts that impress or interest you. Period. Ask nothing in return. Create posts of interest so others will likely retweet. If you are not getting retweeted, there might be a reason.
#19 Games on Twitter
Don’t play games on Twitter unless you expect to be unfollowed…a lot. Now I am totally against the Spymaster, Mafia140, “I gave you bla blah so you should give me a gift” type activities on Twitter because they clog my stream with noise and they are often part of auto-DMs. But I cannot equivocally say don’t play them. If that’s what you enjoy then go for it. But don’t expect people to take you seriously as a professional. To use the networking event example again, if you were attending one, would you bring out a game of parcheesi?
Do engage with others by starting conversations. Period.
#20 Ranting
Don’t rant on Twitter. Or at least keep ranting to a minimum. If I see a heated discussion between two people regardless of who started it and who I think is in the wrong, I usually follow neither of these people. Now I know that Twitter is a GREAT place to rant and I admit I’ve done it once or twice but the rationale here is that people have their own issues and are not likely to want to be saddled with yours.
Do write tweets that are positive. These will attract a lot more people to you than those rants.
Ok that’s it for now. Hope you all are benefitting from these. Again – feel free to tell me what your do’s and don’ts are in the comments section.
Posted by TeamCharlie on February 27, 2009 under Gabe's Twitter Gems, Social Media, Twitter, Twitter for Beginners |
Update: 6/17/09: I received an email this morning from dad of a family of heroes. The McKay family is recognized on our site for collecting food for local food banks. He wrote: “Hey Gabe! I just joined Twitter. How does it work? How do you use it?” Great, I thought, I’d send him the link to the post I had written back in February on the subject. Then I read it and thought it wasn’t that good so I am now rewriting it. Thanks, Mark! ;)
Ok, you are convinced that you would at least like to try Twitter. Let me say this: If you do not give it enough time or if you go about things in the wrong way, you will probably leave feeling you have wasted your time. Twitter is an incredible platform that allows you to connect with an unlimited (0k – it is limited to millions – sorry!) number of people around the world and it doesn’t cost a dime. It can be used for personal enrichment and/or as a conduit for you to do some professional networking.
How Do I Start?
1) Go to http://twitter.com and register yourself by clicking “Join the Conversation”.
Once you have registered and you are at your “home page” you will see that zero people are following you and you are following zero people. It doesn’t make sense to jump in just yet because no one is listening. You may want to leave one “tweet” such as “Just getting started!” so that if people discover you they will know you are active.
2) Choose your Twitter ID (Username) wisely.
This is critical that you do this. First off, you don’t want it to be too long because people don’t like to type and it will also “crowd” tweets. Remember tweets can only be 140 characters and you’ll find that real estate can be precious sometimes. When you get retweeted your tweet plus your user name must fit in the 140 characters or people will have to edit your tweet to rebroadcast it. People don’t like doing that and will only do it if they really like the tweet. So keep it as short as possible. Also I do not recommend underscores or dashes. It just lengthens the user name unnecessarily. Eventually you will be able to search your twitter user name on Google and if you are trying to establish your brand you never want to change your user name. I have written blog posts about people on Twitter, gave their user name so that others could follow them. Later they changed their user name and now these links are dead. I trust you get the picture.
3) Fill out your profile.
This sounds trivial but this is an extremely important step. How you present yourself is what will help feed the decision of whether people follow you. I have a lot of personal opinions as to what should (and should not) be written in your profile. But let me at least suggest to make sure you write your city, state and country, spelling out at least the city and state. I say that because I was once discussing with a Twitter friend from Australia where each of us is from and he didn’t know what Frederick, MD meant. So I changed it to Frederick, Maryland, USA. Remember, you have a global audience now. Also I have found that most people want to see your real name and what your passions are. It is certainly OK and expected of you to put a web link that promotes you in some way. When writing your bio give as much information as you can but if it’s too spammyor self-promoting it might turn people off.
4) Add your picture.
I know my profile doesn’t follow my own advice but 9 times out of 10 it is best to put a picture of smiling self as your avatar. When I look for people to follow I instinctively look for people, not companies or groups with an agenda. In my experience many others are the same way. Don’t doctor it to make it cute or stand out, and please don’t put it sideways or upside down. Some people do that to attract attention and it works – I avoid following them. Click the Picture tab and upload your picture. Hint: Make sure the pic is as square as possible when you upload it. Also it is ok (and even recommended) to upload a picture that is bigger than the box it appears in. Twitter will reduce it automatically but people can see the original size of your photo by clicking on your profile then your picture.
5) You can protect your updates (or not).
In the Account tab there is a check box at the bottom that, if checked, will protect your updates. This means that anyone who looks at your profile cannot read anything you say unless they request to follow you and you approve them. I protect the updates of my daughter (who is 10) so that spammers and porn bots can’t just follow her automatically. Those types of accounts don’t bother to send requests or are unable to. But unless you have a really good reason I do not recommend protecting your updates. It’s hard to read a person whose updates are protected so I am less inclined to follow them.
6) Change your background
On the Design tab you can add a theme or add a background image. Depending on what your goal is and what you want out of this experience, you can simply choose a theme or you can pay someone for a professional Twitter background. There are also things in between that you can do. I recommend that for now you choose a theme and when you discover that you really want to invest your time in Twitter then decide what is best. Also note that free background images can be acquired from several places, including http://www.twitbacks.com/.
7) Add your Devices
Click on the Devices tab to add your iPhone, Blackberry or whatever device. I am not an expert on this since I don’t use my phone to tweet, so I am going to defer to Twitter’s own help on the subject.
8) Get People to Follow You
Ok, now you are ready to start tweeting. But wait! No one is following you. That means that no one will read what you are saying. You need to get followers. This is a bit strange because it is sort of a chicken and the egg situation. People who see you have few tweets are less likely to follow you but why would you tweet if no one is listening? The answer? To get people to follow you. This to me is the most difficult time, because you haven’t figured out yet what Twitter is all about, you have no followers and you are not sure what to do. My answer here is to go real slow. This can be a bit tricky if you do not know anyone on Twitter, but I will give you a bit of a boost if you like. If you follow “KidsAreHeroes” (Go to http://twitter.com/KidsAreHeroes and click the ‘Follow’ button) and send me a message that you read this blog I will follow you back. (I may follow you back anyway.) If you would like my assistance always feel free to ask I will gladly answer your questions if I have time and opportunity. But Twitter isn’t about just making one connection – it’s about connecting with a lot of people. The easiest way to get followers is to follow people. They see they have a new follower, read your profile and decide if they want to follow you back. There are many web sites that offer suggestions as to who to follow. One of my recommendations is @AlexKaris. He is always offering interesting tips to newbies. Once you are at his home page you can see who is following him. You can see their profiles, see if you like the things that they say, and follow them if interested. More often than not they will follow you back and that’s really how to get started. You may also want to check out Twitterholic.com to connect to the big players on Twitter. http://wefollow.com and http://twellow.com are great resources that classify Twitter users by category so you can follow people with similar interests. Here are some other quick recommended follows: @TheRyansWell, @Isipho, @ChloeMaxmin @LexxiSaal @AlanasAchievers and @HeroHugsOrg (all “heroes”) from our web site. And of course let’s not forget the cofounder of Kids Are Heroes, @MM4Animals.
Remember, if you have very few tweets people will be less likely to follow you until they can see some substance. So be patient. Follow just a few people at first and test the waters – get used to how things work. As you tweet more then you can try following more, and so on.
We have now set up your Twitter account and you are ready to start tweeting. Before you actually get started you will want to know some things that are germane to Twitter.
1) What’s with the ‘@’ Sign?
When you tweet about another person on Twitter you always should preface their Twitter ID with the ‘@’ sign. This tells Twitter that people can click on that user name within the tweet so they can check that person out if they wish to. Here’s a great example, if you wrote: “Hey all, you should check out @KidsAreHeroes because they are doing great things!” When someone reads this tweet and is interested in checking out KidsAreHeroes they can simply click on the link you provided because you supplied it properly inside your tweet. Also, when you want to address one person in particular, you begin your tweet with the ‘@’ sign followed by their identity. Something like “@moelib Tell me more about your editing service!” is appropriate. (Shameless plug for my sister in Canada.) When you do this it ends up in their “Replies/Mentions” folder which makes it much easier for them to track things directed at them. Although be careful – even though it is addressed to them it is plainly visible by others to see it. To send a message only viewable by you and another person you need to send them a “direct” message.
2) The Tiny URL
One common method of communication and exposure on Twitter is to send links to websites whether it is for marketing purposes or just to point to a funny YouTube video. You would be right in guessing that a typical link could take up a lot of precious real estate when you are restricted to just 140 characters. Services like http://snurl.com, http://budurl.com. http://bit.ly and http://tinyurl.com will “shrink” these long addresses for you down to a manageable size. When users click on these short links, they will be redirected to the original sites automatically. Note: The most compact one of these I have found is http://tr.im.
3) The Retweet
A common method of flatteryand respect is the retweet. This is repeating a tweet that impressed you in some way so all of your followers can read it. You also give credit to the author. Be careful, if you do it too much it will be seens as disingenuous. Here is how to do it. Say you read a tweet from me that said: “Wow! I just ate a Twix bar with a fork!” Now I know I would never tweet like that and I especially hope you don’t retweet it if I did but it’s just used as an example. Here is the retweet: “RT @KidsAreHeroes: Wow! I just ate a Twix bar with a fork!” Please pay close attention to the spaces and lack thereof. If done correctly the person who you retweeted will see that you did so and hopefully will thank you. A newer method of retweeting is by doing it the following way: “Wow! I just ate a Twix bar with a fork! via @KidsAreHeroes”. Although preferred by some I am a bit old school and like the former method because it takes up less space. UPDATE 12/11/09: Twitter now has its own version of the retweet. You will see the option underneath the tweet to the right. All this does is repeat the tweet verbatim to your followers – you cannot edit it. Alos as of now when you do this the person you are retweeting will not be notified that you have done so. The old way will end up in your mentions folder. That’s why I prefer the older method.
4) Feed your Blog to Twitter
When I discovered you could feed your blog posts to Twitter I was really excited. I knew this would help me increase my readership dramatically. Before Twitter I would write and write with very few people noticing it. Now I get regular comments and retweets. You can feed your blog to Twitter by doing it manually – shorten the URL as described above – or automatically through a service such as http://twitterfeed.com.
Ok I Think I’m Ready – So How Do I Do It?
There is a plethora of tools out there that interact with Twitter. In the very beginning when you are just starting out I recommend you just use your regular browser. What’s nice about this is that no additional software needs to be installed. Go to Twitter.com and start “tweeting”. Don’t forget to refresh your page every minute or so to see the new messages – they don’t pop up automatically. Engage people in conversation. Send out open-ended questions and see what comes back to you. You will see the replies directed at you on your home page but you can also see them at any time in your @Replies/Mentions folder. The reason why it appears on both is because if you are not monitoring Twitter at the time they are sent, the messages directed at you will not get lost in the mix of other messages you are subscribed to read. When you log back on you can simply check your Replies folder to see if anyone sent a reply to you. Direct messages can be sent to you by people you follow, and in this case they can be viewed by no one else. These only show up in your Direct Messages folder. A reminder: From what I’ve experienced, newer people tend to forget to look in their “@Replies” folder for messages directed at them when they sign on. Please check it often and respond in kind. And be warned, Twitter can be addictive!!
I have written many posts on Twitter that I hope are helpful to people just getting started and people who have been doing it for a while. After you have digested this one and get your feet wet a bit I hope you come back to read some other posts. My favorites are my “Top 10 Do’s and Dont’s” as well as “To Follow or Not to Follow“. To see all of my Twitter related posts, simply click here.
Feel free to ask questions and/or leave your new Twitter user name in the comments section here. Are there any experienced Twitterers out there that wouldn’t mind helping out a “newbie”? Please also tell us about yourself and leave your Twitter ID in the comments. Happy tweeting and good luck!
Posted by TeamCharlie on January 27, 2009 under Gabe's Twitter Gems, Twitter, Twitter for Beginners |
Twitter Gem #3 – Rome Wasn’t Built in a Day
As one starts to see the value of Twitter one imagines what would happen if an “uber Twitterer” (one with TONS of followers) liked one’s message and “retweeted” it. One would think that’s the ticket to more followers, more business than one can handle, etc. This is not necessarily true. For my @KidsAreHeroes identity I have been chasing those uber-twits since the beginning. At the moment the KidsAreHeroes identity is trying to promote the Kids Are Heroes web site as well as MaryMargaret’s Music for Life program. We have quite a bit of funds to raise, so we have to get creative. I always imagined that one “tweet” from an uber-twit and that would be it – we would get many more followers and raise quite a bit of money in a very short time. Well we got our “uber-tweet” but the results were a bit different.
Yesterday I read a request from a gentleman that asked for someone who was capable with graphics to superimpose his head on another’s body as a joke for one of his blogs. In return he would give a free gift of some sort. I looked at this guy’s profile and saw he had over 15,000 followers! That was my ticket. I told him I wasn’t a graphic artist but I felt I could do it, so he gave me the opportunity. He liked the result and asked what I wanted in return. The almighty tweet of course was what I was looking for. He gladly obliged. Here is the text of the tweet: PLEASE RETWEET – HELP KIDS WITH CANCER http://tinyurl.com/bfcb34 (for more info >> @KidsAreHeroes) He actually did this twice.
The link points to a web page where people can “tip” us money and all of that goes to the program. We suggest small amounts to make it easy for people because we want a lot of people to donate just $2.00. With that tweet from a guy with over 15,000 followers one would think that would be a home run – wouldn’t you? I counted and a total of 58 people retweeted this tweet with a grand total following of just over 58,000 people! I was one of the top three people to be retweeted at that time according to RetweetRadar which is quite an accomplishment based on the total size of Twitter. Since that happened (which was last night) I have gotten a handful of new followers (no more than I would have gotten anyway really) and the total donation count from that session was $19.00. One would think that would be discouraging but it wasn’t. Twitter, at least to me, is not a platform of instant gratification although it surely appears to be. This just underlines my original feeling that it takes time to develop relationships and build up a following of people that care about what you have to say. Rome wasn’t built in a day.
This also illustrates another gem:
Twitter Gem #4 – Twitter is a Platform Where we All Help Each Other
I’ve heard it said, “You have to give something to get something” which is basically the same thing. But I would rather think of it a bit differently. If you see a need and you can fill it, do it. This is regardless of what you may get in return. If you see an opportunity and you can help that person, jump to it, regardless of the number of followers they have. This is the way I intend to link with people. Just by having done that one thing for that “uber-twit” he now knows me rather well, at least comparatively. He has sent me another task which I gladly did. You never know who is the next person that will help you achieve something.
Twitter Gem #5 – Seek out Experienced Twitterers for More Info
One could argue (and rightfully so) that why should I listen to someone who has less than 200 followers and has only been “twittering” for one month? That is up to you whether or not you agree with my postings or feel that they have any merit. I have read many other blogs about how to get more followers on Twitter. None of those in my mind were worth repeating until I found one yesterday. Kevin Rose is an amazingly successful young man with over 90,000 followers on Twitter. He founded Digg.com and Pownce among others. It is not this reason alone why I recommend listening to him. It is because what he says makes sense to me. Here are some practical tips on how to gain more exposure on Twitter. I plan to utilize them myself. Enjoy.
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/01/25/kevin-rose-10-ways-to-increase-your-twitter-followers/
Posted by TeamCharlie on January 25, 2009 under Gabe's Twitter Gems, Twitter, Twitter for Beginners |
This is the first in a series of posts that will include my take on how to best leverage the use of Twitter. In the interest of full disclosure, I have three Twitter “identities” so far. One is @TeamCharlie, which is my outlet for all things related to Wags for Hope, dogs, and anything else I would like to tweet about. My second personality is @KidsAreHeroes, which I usually post all things related to the Kids Are Heroes web site. The Kids Are Heroes identity is also trying to raise funds for MaryMargaret’s Music for Life program, so it was suggested to create a separate ID for that which is @mmsmusicforlife.
Now among all three identities as of this writing I have a total following of 249 followers, some of which admittedly are duplicates. So with that relatively small number of followers why should I be considered an expert on the subject? I probably shouldn’t. I have seen my KidsAreHeroes identity almost double from 82 to 154 in just the last few days, however. (I will discuss how that happened in a later gem.) I have discovered in my relatively short but intense relationship with Twitter that there are many people with lots more followers than I that claim to be experts but they are not either. If you search the web you will find thousands of tips about Twitter and how to get more followers. What I have also figured out is there are no definitive answers. You need to decide on your own what is the best course of action when planning your Twitter Empire, based on the experiences and ideas of others AND your own.
Twitter Gem #1 – Don’t Get “False” Followers
I listened to a gentleman speak about how he got over 1000 new followers to a new account in just two days. His solution was rather simple – follow as many people as you can. Twitter has an upward bound of 2000 followers – you apparently cannot follow more than 2000 people above the amount that are following you. This is their effort to prevent “Twitter Spammers”. So his way was to simply follow as many people as he could in hopes that they would follow him back automatically. Although this effort was successful for the gentleman who did it, I will not use that advice. When I see a distinct difference in followers to “followees” with the heavy part being on either side I do not follow them. The first scenario is when someone has many more followers than those he is following. Here is a guy who thinks he cannot benefit from the ideas of others. I don’t follow him because he is someone who obviously likes hearing himself talk. Then there is the opposite case – a person who has way more people that he follows than those that follow him. This is a person who is looking to beef up his following without making the relationships first. I don’t follow them either, because I call the people that would follow this person back “false followers”. Just because someone follows you doesn’t mean they care about what you have to say. I would rather have one person follow me who is listening that a thousand who aren’t. I like to get followers by building relationships. These people (usually) care what I have to say. If they care enough they will “retweet” or even suggest to their followers that they follow me which has happened to me a few times already. The people I follow usually have a reasonable ratio of followers to followees, regardless if the number is 25 or 25,000. These are the people that engage with others. I look at their profile first. If I see that we have any interests in common, or if they seem interesting I will follow them.
Twitter Gem #2 – Don’t Follow Everyone Who Follows You
I have read blogs that say just the opposite – that it is courteous and/or fruitful to follow everyone who follows you. The argument was something along the lines of “Hey – they think you are cool enough to be followed, so why not follow them back?” When someone follows me I look at their profile. I use the same logic I just spoke of if their following ratio is not relatively even. If I see that they engage with others then I will follow them if I think they are interesting. This turns out to be most of the people that follow me, but not all of them. If I see that they have very few updates and are following a lot more people then that really raises a red flag. Their few updates usually relate to the item they are trying to hawk. Sorry, not interested.
(To be continued…)
Ok that’s my two cents. What’s yours?
