Twitter is one of the best ways to build your brand, build authority, and connect with your target audience. That’s why I’ve made Twitter my primary social media site I’m being active on right now. Sure, Facebook, LinkedIn, and even Google+ all have a lot to offer, but my approach to social media marketing is to focus on one at a time.
I wanted to take a second to give you some quick tips to help jump start your Twitter account, and really build some solid connections. I’ve made a lot of mistakes while trying to build my audience, and missed out on a lot of opportunities. These tips will help you avoid those mistakes, and take advantage of some of the things I wish I knew when I first got started on Twitter.
You’ve seen the basic tips like build up your profile completely, pick a good profile picture, optimize your bio, follow influencers etc. But these are some techniques and strategies that don’t get talked about enough, but have helped myself and a ton of other tweeps get the most out of Twitter.
1. Get Involved In Twitter Chats
This is something that absolutely nobody was talking about when I first got started with Twitter. If there was one thing I wish I knew about Twitter years ago, it would definitely be Twitter chats.
Twitter chats are scheduled group chats on Twitter, usually held by a company, blogger, or some type of collaboration. It’s not just a bunch of random conversations going on. The host will asks questions, and people respond to the specific question, and some great discussions start to develop. There’s typically a #hashtag that makes it easy to track which tweets are a part of the chat. For instance, SEMrush uses #semrushchat for their weekly Twitter chats.
Here’s how Twitter chats help you. They give you a chance to voice your input on an industry related topic. You really have an opportunity to add value to all of the people participating in the conversation, and be seen as someone who actually knows their stuff.
Second, they give you a chance to connect with new people that you know are interested in your industry. I’ve connected with a ton of new people through Twitter chats that I would have otherwise never have known. Instead of doing advanced Twitter searches to find people in your industry, just join in on some Twitter chats in your industry. I’ll go more in depth on how to find Twitter chats, and how to make the most of them in another post. But for now, search Google and Twitter for chats related to your industry. And if you can’t find one, start your own!
2. Tweet @ People
I’ll admit I was pretty nervous about starting up conversations with people on Twitter at first. I didn’t know if there was a certain etiquette I should follow, or what the “rules” were. I didn’t want to come off as spammer just filling up people’s Twitter streams with garbage. And of course, good old imposture syndrome started to kick in and I thought to myself “nobody’s ever going to reply to me, I’m an unknown in this industry!”
Eventually, I got over all of that and realized, who cares? It’s a social network. People register on Twitter in order to connect with other people. So what if you ask someone a question or reply to one of their tweets and they don’t respond. There are millions of users on Twitter, there’s always someone else to connect with.
Don’t take that as an excuse to go spamming people about your new blog posts or your latest products. The point is to connect, not spam. Here’s a good way to start. Reply to peoples’ tweets. That usually is all you need in order to start building a rapport and spark something up. Also, tweet out their blog posts and @mention them in it with a comment. If you do that, and follow the person, you’ll have a good chance of them following you back and replying to you, which starts a relationship.
Be bold, and get out there and connect. Worst case scenario, they don’t respond and the whole Twitter world will see that you just got totally ignored and laugh you, then shun you from society. Or something like that.
3. Craft A Special Piece Of Content Around Trending Topics
A Twitter tip that you’ll see a lot is to tweet about trending topics. But just shooting out a tweet isn’t enough anymore because everyone’s doing that. You want to make sure that your tweets stand out and get noticed. That’s where this technique comes in. But the trick is, you have to be quick.
Here’s what you do. When a topic is trending on Twitter, start thinking of a creative way to implement it into a new piece of content. For me, the easiest and quickest way to do that is by making a graphic. I did this recently with a trending hashtag #unlikelyparentingadvice.
Stop spending so much time outside. #UnlikelyParentingAdvice pic.twitter.com/BjiTyVhVop
— Dominique J. (@djthewriter) April 15, 2015
It got a few rewteets and some favorites. If I just would have tweeted the text, it wouldn’t have gotten any engagement at all.
[Tweet “Use visuals to help your tweets about trending topics get more attention”]
If you really want to get crazy, you could even create a blog post about a trending topic, or even a video. Again, the key is being quick about it because Twitter moves VERY fast. You don’t want to tweet out a graphic about a topic that was trending two days ago.
4. Use Twitter Lists
Oh how I wish I knew about the wonders of Twitter lists a long time ago. Not only do Twitter lists help you stay organized, but they’re also a way of building up a community within your own Twitter account.
There are two types of Twitter lists:
- Public
- Private
The beauty of the public lists is that when you add someone to it, they get a notification that they’ve been added to “your list name”. There’s something cool about seeing that someone added you to a Twitter list. It makes you feel special, and honored to be a part of a list of a select few members.
Here’s a tip for getting more out of Twitter lists. Don’t name them something generic like “Customers” or “Bloggers”. Remember, the people you add to the list will be able to see the name of it. Come up with something that stands out, and makes the people on the list feel special for being on it. For example, I have a list called “Bloggers That Rock”. Imagine looking at your Twitter notifications and seeing that you were just added on a list of “Bloggers That Rock”. It’s a compliment to the people on the list, and it stands out a whole lot more than just a generic “Bloggers” list.
Start by coming up with ways to separate the different people you follow into groups. Then think of eye-catching names for each list that will really grab people’s attention (in a good way), and intrigue them enough to follow up with you.
5. Tweet….. A LOT
If you follow me on Twitter (shame on you if you’re not!) then you’ll probably notice I tweet a good amount throughout the day. Why? Because like I said, Twitter moves lightning fast. The lifespan of your tweets is shorter than the content you publish on any other platform, even Facebook.
That means that unless you’re a celebrity, in order for your content to be seen, you have to consistently tweet throughout the entire day. How often should you tweet? There are a lot of different opinions on that. Buffer did some research into the topic, and found that 3 tweets per day was the sweet spot, but recommended 5 times a day.
My opinion is that there is no “magic” number. If you’re tweeting out valuable content, then why limit yourself to just 5 tweets per day? When you start putting caps on how many times you want to tweet per day, you’re limiting yourself.
In order to be more efficient with your tweeting, use a social media dashboard that lets you schedule your tweets ahead of time. As you probably know already, my personal preference is Sprout Social. Schedule your tweets throughout the day or week so that you always have content being pushed out, even if you don’t have access to Twitter at the moment. The more you tweet, the better chance you have of people seeing and engaging with you.
Jump Start Your Twitter Account!
There you have it. Now that you have some of my personal tips and tricks, what are you going to do with them? Start putting these techniques into action and jump start your Twitter account.
Do you have any Twitter marketing tips that have helped you get started? Let me know in the comments or tweet me!
Hello Dominique,
These are some great tips on how to get started with Twitter. Myself, I’ve stayed away from Twitter chat because I’ve not understood how to use it or the value that it offers. That’s likely to change in the next few days.
Just a thought, how do you maintain tweeting a steady stream of content when the amount of tweets you need to send is going to be greater than the amount of content you’re actually building?
I got to do some research and writing on Twitter use recently, and found that curating content is actually a really helpful way to keep sharing engaging material with our followers – not just creating content, but curating relevant information for our followers as well. It’s a great way to engage the audience, especially in the digital age, where we need to be aware of our contemporaries as well.
Best,
Brooke
Thanks Brook,
Twitter chats are extremely useful, and I actually plan on doing an article about how to use Twitter chats effectively, so that might help you. As far as consistently tweeting, like you said, curating content is helpful. Check out my twitter account. A majority of my tweets are curated content from other sites, not my own. It’s something that many of the most popular social media “gurus” use, and it’s effective. Glad you enjoyed the article!
Thanks Dominique,
I’ll stay tuned for further developments on Twitter chats. It’s surprising how useful the social media tool can be in connecting with others and sharing ideas.