Can 140 characters drive traffic to your website?
Twitter can be a little confusing to get your head around at first. But once you know the basics it can become not only highly addictive, but also very effective at driving traffic to your website, Facebook page or blog. It also makes targeting the ‘right’ people quite easy and is a useful network to promote for free.
1. Know The Basics.
- How to Find Someone Specific: At the top of the page is a search bar. If you type someones name, it will give you a list of possible matches. This is handy for finding celebrities, but if you wanted to find someone you know personally it is better to get their username.
- How to Follow Someone: When you have found someone that you would like to ‘follow’ simply click ‘Follow’. This will be found at the top of their profile, underneath their picture and username. By following them you will receive their updates in your newsfeed. They will also be notified that you have followed them, which may result in a follow back.
- Choose a Good Profile Picture: If you are a small business, popping your logo up as your profile picture is really good as people will be able to recognise you instantly. People really don’t like to see a picture of an egg, so make choosing an appropriate profile picture a priority. If you hover over your profile, a little edit button appears and this will allow your to edit your profile and choose your picture.
- Create a Good Tagline: On your profile, there is a space for you to write about yourself. This needs to be short and sweet and allow people to identify with what you’re about. Be as creative as you can.
2. Communication is key! Networking is very important. ‘Follow’ people you’re interested in and interact with them.
- Mentioning Someone in a Tweet: If you wanted to mention someone in a tweet you simply type @ and then their username. This will then send a notification to them and will provide a link to their profile in your tweet. This is very similar to ‘tagging’ someone on Facebook. You can mention ANYONE. They will get a notification through and you may even get a reply!
- Replying to Someones Tweet: You can reply to ANYONES tweet and they will get a notification through. If you hover over someones tweet on your newsfeed you will get these options appear at the bottom. If you click ‘reply’ it will automatically come up with their @username and it will allow you to start a conversation. This conversation can be viewed by anyone, but it will not show up in your newsfeed every time you post. It is good to communicate with people using Twitter as it is very relaxed and fast paced. Some celebrities will reply, so the possibilities are endless.
3. Retweet! If you see something interesting that you want to share with your followers you can ‘Retweet’ a post. To Retweet someone, you simply hover over the tweet like above and click ‘Retweet’.
- It will come up on your newsfeed with a ‘Retweeted by @username’ underneath so that people know it’s a Retweet.
- The person will get a notification to let them know that you have Retweeted them and this may lead to them popping over and following you.
- People are more willing to help people who have helped them and it can help make your newsfeed more interesting, especially if you are trying to promote something specific.
4. Quote Tweet. If you see something interesting that you want to add to, or reply to, but still share with your followers, you can quote a Tweet.
- This means that the original Tweet will appear as a quote with the original Tweeters username, and then it will give you the opportunity to add something to the end.
- People may appreciate the addition and Retweet you, increasing your chance of being seen and potentially increasing your following.
5. Favourite A Tweet. If you ‘Favourite’ a Tweet, it goes into your ‘Favourites’ which can be found on your profile.
- This will allow you to look back on them at a later date
- It will also allow others to see them too from your profile
- If you Favourite a Tweet, it doesn’t come up on your newsfeed
- It is a little bit like ‘Liking’ a post on Facebook, but you have the option to see the Tweets in one place afterwards.
6. Send Direct Messages. With Twitter, everything is public apart from Direct Messaging. Simply go to the persons profile and there is a little people symbol underneath their profile picture, click this and the option to Direct Message should be there.
- To Direct Message someone, you have to be following them and they have to be following you.
- If you really want to speak to someone via a personal message, sending them a quick public tweet asking them to follow you because you want to send them a personal message is probably the easiest way to do this.
- This can bring great opportunities to speak to people that are usually difficult to get hold of.
- Twitter is relaxed and fast paced so, in some ways, people are more willing to communicate.
7. Hashtag! Hashtagging makes finding the right people much easier as it allows you to categorise keywords or phrases so that they appear more easily in a Twitter search.
- By simply clicking a Hashtagged word or phrase in any tweet, it will show you all the Tweets that have used the same Hashtagged word or phrase.
- A Hashtag can be used anywhere in the Tweet and as many times as you want.
- To Hashtag you simply pop a # sign in front of the word or phrase, with no spaces.
- Hashtagged words or phrases that become popular, often become ‘Trending Topics’.
8. Use Trending Topics. Trending Topics are the topics most discussed on Twitter at a given time.
- You can find these by clicking ‘Discover’ on the bar at the top of the page and then they will be in a box on the left hand side.
- If you have something interesting to say about any of the topics, Tweeting about them will put you into a category with everyone else that is also Tweeting about it.
- This is an easy way to gain followers and will also give you the opportunity to find followers that interest you too.
- Make sure you use the Hashtag in your Tweet to ensure that you’re put into the category.
9. Be Professional.
- Twitter is completely public.
- Whatever you write on Twitter can be seen by anyone, so consider what you are going to say before you say it.
- If you want to discuss something a little more personal, make sure you use the ‘Direct Message’ facility where possible.
- If you are mentioning people, be aware that they can see what you have said as well as everyone else knowing that what you have said relates to, or includes them.
- You can ‘Protect’ your ‘Tweets’ which means that only followers that you approve can see what you’re writing. But if you are trying to use Twitter to promote your business, you want to be reaching as many people as possible.
10. Let Your Personality Shine!
- Twitter is really fast paced and if you are a regular user, your tweets may only be seen by a small handful of people as most peoples timelines are moving very quickly.
- You have 140 characters to say what you want to say, so you have to keep it short and sweet.
- I wouldn’t say to avoid posting personal tweets, but remember to stay professional.
- People like Tweets that are funny and that they can relate to.
- Pictures are also really effective too. After all, a picture is worth 1,000 words and you only have 140 characters
Links and References:
https://twitter.com/AbyHerbert
https://twitter.com/WeLoveBath
https://twitter.com/xbuzzlikeabee
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