Twitter Book Desktop Latestmaterialbim.weebly.com/.../1/8/...your-first-1000-followers-on-twitter.… · Introduction 2. Creating A Twitter Account 3. How To Post A Tweet 4. Etiquette

Contents !1. Introduction

2. Creating A Twitter Account

3. How To Post A Tweet

4. Etiquette on Twitter

5. How To Increase Your Audience

6. Engaging With Your Followers

7. Posting Multimedia

8. How To Use A Twitter List

9. What Are Hashtags?

10. Staying Within The Guidelines

11. 5 Essential Tools For Twitter

12. Creating A Strategy

13. Next Steps

1. Introduction

!Ever since the founders created Twitter and Jack Dorsey sent the first ever Tweet, way back in March 2006, Twitter has seen an incredible level of growth. Along with Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube and Pinterest the advance of social media has changed the worlds landscape. We have moved from a world of control to a world of collaboration, from broadcast to engagement, from interruption to permission and from disconnection to connectivity. Connections we could never have imagined, and businesses with runaway valuations.

For many Twitter fulfills different roles. For some businesses it's a way to find new leads, for others a channel for their customer service. For others it’s a way to discover the latest thinking within their niche, and for others a place to watch celebrities. Twitter is a social nervous system, a pulsating hub of activity and provides us all with a constant flow of ideas. And we can help shape it. Why do you use Twitter? I use it to find new business, to learn from others and keep abreast of news, to track the latest trending news, and to connect with friends and those I’ve met.

However you use Twitter is not the focus for this book. For this book, I’m interested in helping you see how you can use its strategic potential to great effect. A starting point for many, is that people often want more followers. It has a validating affect. Some would argue the more Twitter followers you have, the more influential you are. Sadly, if they are the wrong sort of followers and you don’t nurture your accounts effectively, you may succumb to buying 10,000 followers for less than £10 and wonder why no-one interacts with you. That’s not influence.

We know from listening to our clients, that as businesses you want three things: more followers, increased traffic to your business, and more leads that turn into customers. Although I started by baulking at the thought of having a title like this one I’ve chosen to succumb. For me Twitter is more important than the number of followers you have, but it’s a bit like Maslow’s Hierachy of Needs, until you have 1,000 followers it’s hard to focus on some of the other benefits. That number may be far less for you, so 1,000 isn’t a magical number but it gives you an immediate focus before you can tap into what’s really important about Twitter. I realize that it’s more important to start with what’s important to may of you to start with. We’ll get into the juicier stuff later.

Through our social media agency we’ve seen our Twitter strategies help achieve outstanding results for our clients. We strongly believe that, if you follow the advice we provide you with as well as an increase in ‘followers’ you’ll also see a steady increase in your levels of engagement, your website traffic and over time, your bottom line.

If you take on board some of the advice in this eBook, you’ll find that you’re among a surprisingly small number of businesses who master how to strategically increase their bottom line through Twitter. I feel honored to start that journey with you and quite frankly want to help you both nail and love Twitter.

Let’s do this.

TWITTER CO-FOUNDERS

@jack

@ev

@biz

@noah

2. Creating A Twitter Account !A. Username

Begin by creating a @username that’s as short as you can make it, without detracting from your brand. When people Retweet one of your updates, they’re limited to 140 characters for the entire Tweet. Long usernames will reduce the space left for the message and so people might decide to remove your username altogether in order to use more characters. This means you won’t receive a mention for the hard work you put into creating share worthy content. So keep it short, relevant and tweetable.

B. Bio

The Bio on your Twitter profile is where people will head to, in order to find out who you are and what you do. Use this space carefully and consider how to stand out and what niche is yours to focus on. Set yourself apart from your competition while communicating your assets in the most digestible way possible. Be sure to include in your bio a link to a landing page on your website, so that people can easily find out more detail about your brand or business.

!

C. Homepage

Twitter’s homepage gives you a large and detailed canvas to display your interests and information. This is the page that people will land on when clicking your username. Therefore it’s useful to communicate what you want people to know.

You may display your brand name, logo, community event or interest. Utilise the space to your advantage and make it interesting. Change the design on your homepage to promote specific events, products or give-aways at relevant times.

Further to this, you can pin certain Tweets so they ‘stick’ to the top of your homepage. This is particularly useful if you have a tweet that’s gained a sizeable level of engagement, or something that helps position you.

D. Picture

Your profile picture or ‘avatar’ will follow you around wherever you tweet, follow or favourite something. A lot of individuals use their own logo to increase the consistency of their brand, however many people believe that it’s much more useful to use a real photo of yourself. People want to connect with people after all.

E. Summary

After you’ve completed these steps, take a long look at your profile and consider it from a stranger’s point of view. Would you follow you? Does the person look appealing? Is it clear what the person stands for? If not, keep improving it until you get to a place where you’re satisfied. After all, first impressions last. And where decisions in Twitter are made in micro-seconds, it’s worth a few minutes to really get it right.

3. How To Post A Tweet !A. Length

As we mentioned earlier, a tweet is made up of 140 characters. That means you have a short space to get your message across. Learning to choose your words carefully and focusing on providing maximum impact is crucial. The optimal length is 120 characters of less, providing room for people to Retweet without having to delete your username.

B. Who Are You Tweeting It To?

When you post a tweet on Twitter, all of your activity is in the public domain unless you use the Direct Message system. This means that anyone can see what you’re posting and who you’re posting to. It’s worth keeping messages with sensitive information to DMs.

1. New Tweet. To tweet to your followers publicly click ‘Compose New Tweet’, enter your message and hit send. If you want someone specific to see this message, include their @username body, usually at the end of the tweet in order that they are notified.

2. A Mention. To tweet to one person non privately simply add their @username at the beginning of your tweet. This will send your tweet directly to that person. While other people who follow both you and the person you’re tweeting will be able to see this message, it won’t be visible in non-followers timelines. It can still be visible if people were to look on your homepage and look through past tweets.

3. A Direct Message (DM). To send a message to a person privately you’ll need to send a DM. This will only be seen by you and the person you are messaging. It’s a better choice for sharing information you don’t wish to be common knowledge.

4. A Retweet (RT). A RT is basically a duplication of another users update. It’s straight forward to do, simple click the RT button on any user’s tweet and this message will be copied into your own timeline. It’s a great way to show appreciation of someone’s content or to draw your followers’ attention to something you think is genuinely interesting.

5. Favourite. This is a simple star tool to say that you like a Tweet. It’s a good way to affirm others if used in moderation, and equally a good way to keep track of important tweets you may want to go back to at another time.

4. 10 Etiquette Rules On Twitter Etiquette on Twitter is the collections of unspoken rules that have arisen after a length of time. It's similar to many on any social network, though naturally people will have their different takes on it. Use the following 10 rules to guide you on the best way to behave in the twitosphere.

!1. It’s usually considered bad manners if you ask people to RT your content directly, unless they are a friend who wouldn’t mind or a super fan who will appreciate being asked. Otherwise it puts people in an awkward position if your content isn’t something they or their followers are interested in and most of the time, will lead to you being ignored.

2. Constantly following and unfollowing the same person in the hope that they’ll notice you is also a big no-no and is considered to be spam activity, especially if that person notices. If you’re desperate for them to follow you, try engaging them in conversation slowly first.

3. Similarly don’t follow a user, then unfollow them as soon as they’ve reciprocated. This makes it look like you’re only interested in increasing your total follower count. Every single person you’re interacting with, if you’re following the right people, could be potential customers, so treat them with respect.

4. There’s not really any set criteria on how and what to tweet. Everyone is different after all. But keep in mind why you’re tweeting and tailor your content to be interesting to the kind of audience you want to build. Long gone are the days where you’d discuss every asset of your personal life in a tweet. Unless it directly adds value to your followers, leave what you had for breakfast out of the public domain.

5. Remember to share other peoples content by RT’ing it to your followers. This is one of the best ways to draw your audience’s attention to something of value and is a great way to make new connections and gain valuable followers.

6. Try not to over or under Tweet. Different people have different approaches and strategies and there’s no rule of thumb, but if you’re throwing content at people without engaging it may be considered spammy, and equal if you don’t log on for a few days, people may wonder where you’ve gone. Consistency is key here and will give your new followers an idea of what to expect.

7. Ensure any link you include in your Tweets is correct and is working properly. It’s also useful to shorten your link using a tool like Bit.ly to create more space in your message and to enable you to track how often it’s clicked. It’s bad practice to send people to a broken link.

8. Refrain from clicking links that appear to be spammy. Sometimes it can be hard to tell if one is or not but generally it will be from someone you don’t know. If in doubt check that person’s profile. If they have no connection to you, are following lots but have few followers, and their tweets seem strange leave well alone. Equally if a DM sounds unusual and a ploy to get your attention (‘Did you really write this’ with a link), don’t be lured to click on the link.

9. Tweeting is like talking. It’s like emailing. It’s like writing. It’s all communication. People are drawn to the people they want to be around. Moaning or upbeat, critical or positive, nasty or friendly, boring or interesting, arrogant or humourus, self-obsessed or fascinated in other people, people will notice. What do you want to be known for?

10. Make sure you respond in a timely manner to your @mentions. This is even more important if you’re a brand or business and your Twitter account is used to answer customer queries. Remember, Twitter is a public platform and people won’t have any trouble voicing their opinions about businesses that offer poor interaction with their customers.

5. How To Increase Your Audience

!Here’s a quick question: do you want a whole heap of followers on Twitter? Don’t worry if you do? It’s not a trick question. Sometimes it can be a simple and swift way of deciding whether someone has any credibility or not. People feel, the more followers you have, the more people believe you’ve got something important to say.

But some people take their follower counts to the extreme and engage in purchasing random followers, simply to make their profiles seem impressive. The problem with this however, is that it’s really easy to find out if you’ve bought your followers. I’ve written a quick blog on it here. If you’re the one getting found out? Well, the trust people have in you just disappears.

!With that in mind, here’s a few ways you can increase your followers, without resorting to purchase power.

1. Be interesting! Tweet stuff that people want to read. Link to great articles that relate to the niche that’s important to you. Provide thought provoking updates that prompt your followers to think.

!2. Engage, engage, engage! When you’re mentioned by

someone, hit the reply button and start up a conversation. People don’t want to see a stream of self promotion and links. Break it up with conversation and reply to the mentions and comments.

!3. Create lists of people by topic and make it public.

Those people you’ve added to the list, will be notified and will most likely investigate. A great example of this is creating a list of people who share your content. It’s a way of expressing your gratitude and to affirm those connections.

!4. Try to keep the negativity to a minimum. People will

be drawn to you if you appear welcoming and compassionate. Be friendly and open with those you engage with.

!5. Join regular hashtag days such as #FF (follow friday)

and showcase some of the great people who follow you. This has the potential to draw in a larger audience.

10 Easy Ways To Increase Your Audience to 1,000 followers

6. Twitter’s Advanced Search tool enables you to explore the platform by keyword. So type in words that are relevant to you and your brand. Discover new people who share your own interests to reach out to and chat with.

!7. Don’t just use words, Tweet images! Images are

more important than ever and they break up the stream of text beautifully.

!8. Follow target customers or fellow professionals.

20- 40% of these will follow you back so if you’re following 100+ each day your up your followers. Make sure you don’t repeatedly follow, unfollow and then follow them again (known as ‘churning’). If you want to un-follow someone, as you’ve not struck up engagement, leave at least a weeks gap.

!9. Sign up to directories of Twitter users like Twellow.

Adding your details to these websites makes it easier for people to find you based on your interests and topics.

!10. You don’t have to follow everyone who follows

you. It’s usually a good idea to try and follow less people than the amount of followers you have. It then gives the impression that you’re not just following back every Tom Dick or Harry, just to boost your numbers.

6. Engaging With Your Followers !You’ve got people to follow you but your attempts at engaging on a deeper, more meaningful level with your followers, seems to fall on deaf ears. Try not to worry about this, it’s something every Twitter user will go through at some stage and it shouldn’t put you off from trying.

Remember communication only really starts when you start communicating with others. I’ve put together 5 strategies to help you overcome this engagement hurdle and to help you really connect with your followers without feeling like you’re being ignored.

A. Get to know what content your followers like to read. Put yourself in their shoes and then go and find (or create) that type of content.

B. Utilise the networking side of Twitter. Introduce users to each other and show them that you’re generous and willing to help people. Just like networking in real life, it’s of benefit to all involved and will help you get known for your selflessness.

C. Get stuck in to what people are tweeting about. Make an effort to join their conversations, favourite them if you like something and retweet if it resonates with you and your followers would find value in it. Check out profiles, follow links to their blogs and take the conversation there.

D. Dig in to people’s timelines and find old tweets of theirs that you like and you can retweet. It shows you’re interested enough in them to explore a little deeper and will help them to add fresh eyes to old content.

E. Tweet on a regular basis to your niche’s influencers. These people command their followers attention and drive a large community. You want to be on these people’s radar so set some time aside each week to engage with them individually.

6. Engaging With Your Followers

7. Posting Multimedia

!Images and videos have taken on more significance on Twitter. Twitter have taken a tip out of Pinterest’s book and cater to people’s desire to consume information in even quicker ways and images are perfect for this.

Stockpile a series of images you can use and reuse for social purposes. It might be events you’ve held, behind the scenes snapshots or even royalty free stock photos that you can edit to add more information. These will all help to drive user engagement.

8. How To Use A Twitter List !Twitter Lists are pretty essential. They help you to filter out the most important users and topics amongst the general Twitter chatter.

You can create two different types of list on Twitter: public and private. A private list is something only you can see whereas a public list, anyone can view and subscribe to. These can be particularly helpful in attracting new followers, and showing others who you’re aware of. If they like a number of people on your list, they’re likely to follow you or follow the list.

Once you begin to utilise lists, you’ll probably find that you hardly even look at your main timeline any more. Everything you need will be organised into neat little lists by topic for you to browse. When you get to this point, think about spending 20 minutes a day interacting with each list to drive extra engagement.

To find people to add to your lists, it’s usually a case of searching your follower base and choosing the most interesting people based on their profiles and look at their lists. You can however follow pre-made lists from places like Twellow and WeFollow to make the process a bit quicker.

9. What Are Hashtags? !A hashtag is the ‘#’ sign followed by a line of text. Hashtags are generally used to create a conversation around a specific theme or topic and when clicked, you’re able to view any Tweets and conversations that have arisen around that particular hashtag. As an example I might run a webinar on Twitter Marketing and create a hashtag called #AskCaleb. (Want to try it out? #AskCaleb and see what happens). Anyone who then clicks that link, will be able to see any tweets by anyone using the same hashtag, and I’ll be able to respond to those questions.

Hashtags can also arise at different times or on certain days, e.g. #FF (Follow Friday). This is one used every Friday as a way to recommend specific twitter profiles.

One thing that is particularly useful to take note of is the left hand sidebar of your Twitter page. Here you’ll see a list of the World’s trending hashtags and it can give you a really quick overview on the hottest topics of the day.

10. Staying Within The Guidelines !Keep in mind that Twitter has their own rules and guidelines on how to use their platform, including the amount of people you can follow in a day and what they consider to spam. Take a read of the Twitter Rules and make sure you follow them, in order to avoid any complications.

11. Four Essential Tools For Twitter

1. Hootsuite

Hootsuite is a great tool if you manage multiple Twitter accounts. It’s especially useful if you have a team of people managing content for these accounts as it allows you to assign team members and to collaborate. Schedule your tweets, manage your accounts and monitor your activity all from one dashboard.

2. Buffer

Buffer is pretty awesome for bulk scheduling in advance. You can set-up Twitter, Facebook Profiles, Facebook Pages and Google+ Pages as accounts in your dashboard and then paste in content ready to go out on a schedule. The scheduling is flexible. You can add your own posting times and your links will automatically be shortened as they are sent out.

Buffer have a content suggestion tool based on some of the best content that people have shared. They curate this content for you to share and it’s perfect if you’re stuck for ideas.

3. Flipboard

If you’re looking for good content to share, use Flipboard. It enables you to find stories via any RSS feeds that will be relevant to your niche and therefore interesting to your followers. You can automatically add the content into your Buffer or Hootsuite queues, making it easier to keep your schedules topped up.

4. Feedly

Similar to Flipboard, this is a classic RSS reader. Discover great blogs around a niche and then line the tweets up to publish via Buffer or Hootsuite or immediately through the channels itself. Additionally if you’re a fan of Evernote you can save the articles into your Evernote account for future reference.

12. Creating A Strategy As with all social media strategies it is essential that you have a good content strategy, and whilst its one thing to curate and share other people’s content, to have greater influence you need to create your own quality content too.

Spend time thinking about what your audience would want to read, share and what would make their lives easier. Then create some content to help them with that. It may be a time investment, but it’s fundamental for you to serve your followers. It’s become a cliche but it’s still true that Content is King.

You may be concerned that you don’t have someone within your team who can write, create videos, podcasts or other content and if this is the case than get people to help you. Shameless plug as it is, but that’s what we do as an agency, and we’re got pretty good at it, so please shout if you may need help.

Create a calendar of content that you wish to create, and align this having understand who your target customers are. Tweak the content accordingly based on the reaction you get from your followers. You want to make sure that what you create is what your community wants and needs. If you’re not sure, ask them with an incentivized questionnaire. You can use surveymonkey to ask people what’s important to them.

13. Next Steps So there it is. This is a simple series of steps you can follow and only scratches the tip of the iceburg. Twitter is a great tool and way to reach people you’d never normally be able to reach. It’s perfect for keeping your finger on the pulse and enables you to learn, grow and influence the people that matter to you.

Now’s it time for you to roll your sleeves up and get your hands dirty.

I’ve almost finished my long-awaited Twitter Course, which aims to be the most in-depth and extensive training material for Twitter. Where this eBook just scratches the surface this Twitter Course will give you everything you could possibly need to know in order to know how to master Twitter.

As always, tweet me @calebstorkey. I’d love to hear how you’re getting on. Please don’t ask me to RT anything for you (rule 1). Instead and more importantly, tell me what your goals are and what you’re hoping to achieve and you’ll find I become a huge encourager for you. Anyway I can help (#AskCaleb), and I’d only be too delighted to do so. And if you need any help with your Content Creation, Community Management or how to make Social Media Produce Results, please be in touch. Drop me an email [email protected] and I’ll come back to you pretty pronto!

Big loves to you gorgeous people and I look forward to speaking with you soon!

!Caleb Storkey

calebstorkey.com

@calebstorkey

@calebstorkey

[email protected]

+ 44 7547 671201

We’d love to help you…?