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Happy 2010! Here’s Your 2009 TwiTip Recap

admin — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 17:24:45 +0000

So I probably should’ve posted this yesterday, but here’s a recap of some of our most popular posts from 2009. Happy New Year, everyone! 7 Ways To Create A Professional Twitter Presence 8 Characters to Make Your Tweets Sparkle Who to Follow, and Not to Follow, on Twitter – That is the Question #followfriday Revolution What Did You Do The Day Twitter Almost Died? The Proper Way to Pitch on Twitter Why You Should Start Over On Twitter With A BRAND NEW Account What’s Your Biggest Twitter User Peeve? How to Grow an Interested Following on Twitter using RSS Should You Send an Autoresponse Direct Message to New Followers? 3 Ways to Recognize Bots and Spammers on Twitter How To Unfollow On Twitter With Class 10 Ways To Be Useful on Twitter 10 Reasons To Use Your Real Name As Your Twitter @Name Get More Followers by Spending Less Time on Twitter There’s a Better Way to ReTweet! The 90-10 Rule for Successful Twitter Networking To Follow or Not to Follow; that is the Question A Full-Time Job, a Wife, a Kid and Dial-up Internet: How to Keep up with the ‘Big Boys and Girls’ on Twitter Follow Me and Win a Prize – The Merit of Twitter Competitions 7 Ways to Be Worth Following on Twitter 8 Sure-Fire Ways To Tick Off the Twitterverse © 2008 TwiTip Twitter Tips . Happy 2010! Here’s Your 2009 TwiTip Recap

Content Planning to Add Value to Your Tweets

admin — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 15:32:57 +0000

When I first started tweeting I would post randomly throughout the day about something that had caught my attention at that minute. The problem I found was that my tweets lacked bite and were in danger of all sounding the same. It was also taking up a huge chunk of my time, flitting in and out of the twittersphere. So, I took an afternoon out a couple of weeks ago and set up a content plan. Much recommended for bloggers, I found that planning ahead really helped to provide posts which were useful and informative for followers. I did this by collecting and researching useful content – e.g. seo tips, geek jokes, quotes – and then sitting down and using a spreadsheet to book a time to tweet the info and to then pre-load the posts into my software. The benefit of doing this is that I now take time to seek out relevant information, knowing that I don’t have to tweet right now. Instead I make notes, add the tweet to the content plan and then schedule the tweet. I’m also able to add spontaneity when it feels right instead of posting lots one day and little the next, keeping a steady stream of interesting content running for my Followers. © 2008 TwiTip Twitter Tips . Content Planning to Add Value to Your Tweets

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Do’s and Don’ts of Twitter Contests — The Moonfruits and the non

admin — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 14:21:38 +0000

Twitter contests can be a great way of getting you or your brand noticed in the Twittersphere. Yes, they can be annoying when everyone is spamming retweets left and right, but who doesn’t love having the chance of winning a Macbook Pro or an LCD TV for 2 seconds of work? Explosive Twitter contest campaigns like the one launched by site builder Moonfruit (@moontweet) rocked the twitter world (the UK company used twitter to give out 10 macbooks over the course of 10 days). In fact, there was even evidence that Twitter censored the #moonfruit hashtag used for the contest because it was getting too popular for its own good! Till this day (months after the contest has been over), people are still adding #moonfruit into their tweets. Trying to emulate Moonfruit’s success, many other twitter users have launched similar contests. Let’s look at one of them right now: Business phone service provider OnSIP (@onsip) launched their own twitter contest a few hours ago, pledging to give out 2 Netbooks to those who retweeted about the contest. How many more followers have they gotten? I count 5. Not 5000. Not 500. Not 50. Just 5. Wait, are you telling me that only 5 people in the twitter world want a free netbook? That’s pretty hard to swallow… Well if that’s not the case, then what could they have done differently? Here are some suggestions and observations for their twitter campaign and any future twitter contests you may plan on holding. 1) Twitter contests rely on momentum. If you tweet something and its retweeted by active followers who also have active followers, then great–you’re already halfway there. If that’s not the case, then your contest can die extremely quickly, and you’re left in an awkward position wondering what went wrong. If you currently, don’t have a very active twitter follower base, then try to see if you can host your contest on the site of a friend who does have one. On twitter, one really popular tweeter makes all the difference. 2) Recognizable prizes. Moonfruit was a phenomenal success. Why? Well partially because they said they were going to give away 10 Macbooks. Pretty much everyone in the Twitterverse without one wants one. One misstep OnSIP might have committed is the decision to go with netbooks. A lot of the population may still be unfamiliar with the term. If you don’t have the funds to offer such lavish prizes, then I would suggest giving away something else you know your followers will value. For example, discounts or special offers for followers. A lot of contests also pledge to give out a bigger prize once a certain follower count has been reached. For example, @onsip pledges to give away another Netbook if they reach 1000 followers. 3) KISS. No–don’t offer kisses. KISS stands for Keep It Simple Stupid. Don’t make people jump through hoops to enter your contest. Moonfruit’s contest essentially consisted of asking people to follow their twitter, and add “#moonfruit” to their tweets. That’s it. Asking people to tweet you their social security number, mother’s date of birth, and favorite color is a no-no. So there you have it. 3 basic rules to follow. I’m not promising you you’ll get 100000 followers if you do just those things, but at least it will get you started in the right direction. And good luck to @onsip . Right now if you enter their twitter contest , you have around a 40% chance of winning a Netbook. © 2008 TwiTip Twitter Tips . Do’s and Don’ts of Twitter Contests — The Moonfruits and the non

Why You Should Consider Using Hashtags

cgseo — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 14:01:14 +0000

When I first started using Twitter earlier in the year, I didn’t really understand #hashtags. As a result, I didn’t utilize them. However, I’ve now started using at least one hashtag in all my tweets and my Twitter experience has improved drastically as a result. Hashtags as Keywords One simple way of thinking of hashtags is as keyword tags that help label your tweets. If you use a blogging platform like WordPress or social media sites like Flickr , you’re probably already familiar with the idea of using keywords to help tag your blog posts or photos. Keyword tags allow people to more easily find related content of interest. This is EXACTLY why you want to use hashtags — more people are likely to find your Twitter account as a result. How Hashtags Help People Find You on Twitter There at least a couple ways that hashtags help people find you on Twitter. The most basic is that in the Twitter interface, hashtags are hyperlinks. When people click a hashtag that interests them, say #twitter, they receive real-time search results of other tweets that have utilized that hashtag. Hashtags are also accessible via various Twitter APIs — there are a plethora of web apps that utilize the Twitter API like foller.me and the Twitter data visualization tool Mentionmap . Hashtags Will Improve Your Twitter Experience Utilizing hashtags not only allows other people to find you on Twitter, but also allows you to find other Twitter users who you many benefit from following. Given that many developers love playing around with the Twitter API, by using hashtags you’re also providing them with raw material to help build the next super-cool Twitter API-based app. These apps also provide yet another avenue for people to find you on Twitter. Twitip has many other neat articles on hashtags that are worth reading. For new Twitter users who may still be a little puzzled by hashtags, my hope is that re-conceptualizing them as keyword tags will help you benefit more from the one of the most interesting and useful social media tools available on the Web today. © 2008 TwiTip Twitter Tips . Why You Should Consider Using Hashtags

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Why You Should Consider Using Hashtags

11 Websites to Schedule Your Tweets Online for Free

cgseo — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 14:44:20 +0000

Guy Kawasaki is a social marketing talent, he tweets every post of his blog three times a day, eight hours apart. Every time he gets hundreds of clicks. The tool Guy Kawasaki uses is Otweet , which is a paid web app that lets you schedule your tweets. Since Otweet is not free, you may be not interested, but luckily, there are some other similar and FREE web apps that let you schedule your tweets, among which, below 11 websites are the best for your reference: 1. CoTweet You need to register before you can use CoTweet, which lets you schedule the tweets and send them right now or in any specific time to one or multiple Twitter accounts. You can read, reply or retweet the tweets of the mention/direct messages, your friends’ updates and your twitter lists. If the URL is shortened by bit.ly, you can see how many times it has been clicked. 2. Dynamic Tweets You need to create a new account in Dynamic Tweets, then you can schedule the tweets and send them immediately, how many minutes/hours/days/weeks later, or in a specific time. You can add tracking code and spinnable text to every tweet. You can also send the tweet to multiple Twitter accounts at a time. 3. FutureTweets You can register a new account, or log in with your OpenID. Once your Twitter account is verified, select your timezone, input the tweets, and then schedule the publishing time. There are 3 funny things you can do with FutureTweets: add some funny images to the tweets, flip the tweets, and set the time by moving the clock needles. 4. HootSuite HootSuite lets you manage multiple Twitter accounts as well as your Facebook, your LinkedIn and your Ping.fm. You are able to attach pictures, videos and document to the tweets, to schedule and post the tweets to all the accounts at a time, to read, reply or retweet the tweets of twitter lists, and so on. 5. SocialOomph SocialOomph was called TweetLater before. You can register a free account or a paid account. For free account, you can schedule how many minutes, hours, days, or weeks from now on the tweet will be posted to one or multiple Twitter accounts, but you can only schedule 12 tweets per hour. 6. Taweet You need to sign in with Twitter OAuth and verify your email account, then you can schedule your tweets, post the tweet to multiple Twitter accounts one by one, read the tweets of your stream, replies, and direct messages, and so on. There will be a link added to every tweet you send from Taweet. 7. Twaitter You can sign in with Twitter OAuth or your username and password. Twaitter lets you schedule public tweets and publish them in any time. And you can reply, retweet, or favorite the tweets, see if the tweeple follow you, manage your multiple Twitter accounts, and so on. 8. Tweet-U-Later When you sign up, you will get an email address, to which you can schedule your tweets with Tweet-U-Later by sending emails. You are able to schedule public tweets as well as private massages, you are also able to schedule recurring tweets, but just don’t violate the Twitter rules. 9. TweetFunnel You need to create a new account in TweetFunnel before you can schedule your tweets, which also can be published right now or held in the draft. You can see the tweets of home stream, mentions, direct messages and reply, retweet, or favorite them. 10. Twittontime Sign in with Twitter OAuth, select your time zone, and then you can schedule your tweets. The Twittontime dashboard just looks like a calendar, you select a date, write down your tweets, and schedule the publishing time. 11. Twuffer Sign in Twuffer with your Twitter username and password, select your timezone, and then you can schedule the tweets by hours, which means you are not able to set a specific time like 8:30 am, but only 8:00 am or 9:00 am. Among the above 10 websites, HootSuite is my favourite, which one is yours? Or do you have any other nice similar web applications to schedule your tweets? © 2008 TwiTip Twitter Tips . 11 Websites to Schedule Your Tweets Online for Free

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11 Websites to Schedule Your Tweets Online for Free

8 Characters to Make Your Tweets Sparkle

cgseo — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 16:05:08 +0000

On Twitter, you have 140 characters to play with. Most people stick to the 26 letters, 10 numbers, half a dozen punctuation marks and currency signs. Fact is, underneath your fingers there are a treasure trove of characters to make your tweets more interesting, shorter & more colourful. By making your tweets stand out, you will get more people actively reading them because subconsciously your eyes are drawn to them. If your tweets are useful (and I’ve no reason to doubt why they should be), you should end up with more clicks on links, more retweets and generally more twitter love. Here’s a few of my favourite special characters that I like to put in Tweets. I explain how to get them on the most common form of keyboards – the US Keyboard Layout (which is used by the most of the western world). If different, I will also include the UK keycode, between them that should cover most of the keyboards in English speaking countries, but if English isn’t your native language, these may be different . The characters are there, but you’ll have to dig to find them. 1. The Ampersand How To Get It: Press Shift + 7 When Should You Use It? This character is very simple, as it shortens the word “and” to 1 character, saving yourself two characters in the process. 2. The “At” Sign How To Get It: UK Keyboards – Shift+’ US Keyboards – Shift+2 When You Should Use It? Used all the time in emails, the @ sign can also be used for events (for example, the show begins @ 7pm). Saving yourself one character in the process. 3. The Asterix How to Get It: Press Shift + 8 When You Should Use It? This is one I use all the time for emotions, verbs, basically what I am doing. If I’m writing **smiles and nods**, I’m smiling and nodding. This is great in conveying how I feel about things, as well as emotions that are difficult to convey such as sarcasm. 4. The Music Symbol (Joined Quavers) How to Get It: Hold Alt & Type 14 When You Should Use It? I’ve begun seeing this more and more when people are talking about music & songs they are listening to, particularly when using services such as Last.fm & Spotify . Often people will post music recommendations, followed with joined quavers, to show that it’s a musical link. It’s a great idea to do this, as it can be a text based warning to users, by saying “this link is a Spotify link, so a song will automatically play when opened”. This’ll stop users opening music links when they really shouldn’t be. 5. Hearts How to get it: Hold Alt & Type 3 When You Should Use It? The obvious place is by sharing a link that you love, or a twitterer you love, or anything you “More than like”. This negates the old

How The New Retweet Feature Changes Marketing On Twitter

admin — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 14:21:53 +0000

The ability to retweet on Twitter was already available and has been mostly of use to those in business situations who could take advantage of their followers retweeting their promotions. This has been drastically changed with the retweet feature now being in a simple to use button under any of your feeds tweets. You may ask yourself why you would bother retweeting more often just because of a button, and you are right to do so. After all you are just making the ones you follow more exposed to the tweeters who follow you. However this works both ways. Your tweets can also be retweeted by your followers. The new feature doesn’t just place a simple RT in front of the retweeted tweet on your profile. By being retweeted your profile picture and username appears next to your own tweet, on someone else’s page! For example today I retweeted @johncmayer and his photo and link appeared on my profile. For him this means that now all of my followers (who otherwise may not have seen his tweet) have been exposed to his content and may choose to follow him and/or retweet it again creating a ripple effect and sending his message to an entirely new audience. By being promoted by other twitter users one could potentially gain thousands of new followers. Which we all know translates to twinfluence. For social users who hover around 100-200 followers this provides an avenue for increased twitter success. It should be noted however that without interesting tweets you are unlikely to be retweeted in this new fashion so although the features are useful, tweet-quality is still king in what determines your networking success. The new feature also gives even more power to those with staggering amounts of followers already. For example @aplusk who is almost at 4 million followers could choose to retweet a message and give that person’s content access to the gargantuan amount of followers he has. For tweeters who promote their own blog or product this could be the best free advertising campaign that they ever get. Even television commercials won’t receive upwards of 3.5 million views in a matter of seconds. The sidebar on twitter now includes a section appropriately titled ‘retweets’. Within this selection there are 3 mini-sections. The 1st of which is ‘Retweets by others’ which shows what the people you follow have been retweeting. This again will give added exposure to those lucky enough to be retweeted by someone like @biz. The 2nd section is ‘Retweets by you’ which is as simple as it sounds; it lists all the tweets that you have retweeted and gives you the option to untweet those messages. The 3rd and most important section for you is the ‘Your tweets retweeted’ section. This section allows you to follow which of your tweets have been retweeted and by whom. This allows you to track your tweets and observe the spread of your content and username which is ultimately the thing that will make this feature useful to you. All of these sections also show who else has retweeted what you have. For them it means they are being exposed to others who have similar interests and for you it means that you are also being exposed to others with similar interests, others who could potentially become your newest followers. As you can see the retweet feature will change how we network and how we make connections with others on twitter. The button doesn’t guarantee twitter success but it does make it easier for those with interesting things to say. © 2008 TwiTip Twitter Tips . How The New Retweet Feature Changes Marketing On Twitter

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14 Ways To Fight Twitter Burnout

cgseo — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 14:31:42 +0000

By Karl Staib of Work Happy Now! Follow him @workhappynow . Twitter only allows 140 characters. There is an infinite amount of things you can say, but only so many ideas to pull from. It’s hard to keep people entertained with your tweets. The best way to keep from burning out and giving up is to have a brilliant plan that will allow you to reach your goals and meet amazing people. 1. Stay Creative Tweeting looks so easy, but we all know it’s not. There is a lot of thought that goes into each tweet. Penelope Trunk of Brazen Careerist ( @penelopetrunk ) has each tweet reviewed by an editor before she sends it out. Well that’s what she told us. You need to find new ways to get onto other tweeters’ radars. Don’t be afraid to switch around words. Tweeting is an art and sometimes you need to stand out by being different. Don’t be afraid to disagree. Don’t do this too often, but every now and again you can spur on an exciting conversation. It’s the routine that kills the most tweeters. All they do is link back to their blog and they wonder why they aren’t meeting cool people and having fun connecting with other tweeters. 2. Find a Brilliant Quote to Share I love finding really cool quotes and posting them on Twitter. It’s amazing how many people will retweet a good quote. I posted a quote from Gandhi that said, “Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.” The CEO of Zappos ( @zappos ) liked it and retweeted it to his billion + subscribers. I gained over 200 subscribers in one weekend. I was lucky, but any of you can get lucky too; you just have to keep tweeting stuff you believe in and people will want to follow. 3. Just Listen When I first got on Twitter I wasn’t very active. I just read and listened to others. I began to see what I liked and what I thought would work well for me. After a little while, I jumped in and began tweeting. I learned the value of just listening to other tweeters. Instead of just getting on there and posting my tweet and leaving, I hang around. I notice when some people are jerks or humble or fun. It’s during these ten or fifteen minutes that I become more attached to the people I’m interacting with. You’ll burn out quickly if all you do is broadcast your stuff and you don’t listen to the other brilliant people out there. Believe me, there are some smart people using Twitter. 4. Ask a Question You may want to know what it feels like to stand at the top of the Eiffel Tower, or if anyone has a long commute to work and how they pass the time. The questions you can ask can be crazy, fun, or serious. I would suggest that your question stay in the theme of the tweets. People like routines and expect to receive a certain type of tweet from you. If you shake it up too much, they may not stick around. I’ve put out plenty of questions that were never answered. Don’t sweat it. Just post it again in a few hours. If you still don’t get a response, move on and try a different question in a few days. 5. Top 5 Tweeters to Follow Darren wrote an excellent post about creating niche lists of tweeters that you should follow. For example, “top 5 marketers on Twitter” or “top 5 most interesting people on Twitter.” When you send out some tweet love you might get a follow from a really cool person. I know that I would love to be included in the top 5 tweeters in the business category. Don’t be afraid to give other people attention because it’s all about Twitter Karma. The more you give the more you will eventually be given back. The more people who love your style of tweeting, the more motivated you will be to connect with other tweeters. 6. Take a Break and Recharge There will be some days when you just don’t feel like typing even a tweet. Then take a break and just let everyone else tweet their hearts out. Stress occurs when we push too hard to accomplish something we aren’t ready for. If you don’t feel like tweeting then don’t. It’s better than sending some big sour puss of a tweet out there and everyone reading it and thinking “Man he is having a bad day.” That’s when people decide to unfollow you. 7. People Will Unfollow You Some people aren’t going to like your tweets. Just like every guy or girl doesn’t think you are hot stuff, there will be tweeters that just don’t like your personality. Don’t take it personally. Your thoughts are not everybody’s cup of wisdom. Even Kevin Rose ( @kevinrose ) has people who stop following his tweets. He is in a position to add way more people than he loses, so his numbers keep growing anyway. 8. Be Yourself Don’t try to be like @problogger because you’ll fall flat. I fell into this trap when I first started blogging. I tried to be like @stevepavlina . I only started succeeding when I let go of trying to be someone else and let my true personality come out. I’ve taken a lot of great ideas from fellow tweeters, but always incorporated them into my own style. You have to trust that your interests will excite other people. As long as you are authentic, people will catch on. I promise. 9. Copy a Leader To step on my own advice, I’m going to tell you to copy a leader and his/her style for a day. See what happens. Are you getting more attention? There is nothing wrong with learning form the masters of Twitter, such as @guykawasaki , and trying to incorporate their style into yours. Be very careful of taking this too far though, because in order to get people who want to follow you and stick with you, you have to be you. 10. Retweet Great Tweets Retweeting other people’s thoughts is a great way to connect and share with your readers. I retweeted a @lizstrauss tweet and she sent me a thank you note. The more that you connect with talented people, the more likely they will be able to help you in the future. If you’re not sure exactly what you are trying to accomplish then you must ask yourself, “Why am I doing this?” When you figure out the answer, avoiding burn out will be much easier. 11. Know Your Goals When you know what you want to accomplish with Twitter it’s much easier to justify using your time and energy on it. If you have a blog, static website, or an offline business you can define your goals and start to make your dreams a reality. I want to be the one person everyone thinks about when they think about work happiness. Twitter is just another tool that I can use to leverage my expertise. The best part is that it’s easy to see what is working and what isn’t. If you are sending out the tweets and no one is following then you have to change strategy. If you are only on Twitter to pass the time and only want to make friends then that’s your goal. Understanding your needs is the most important way to avoid burning out and giving up. 12. Start a 30 Day Challenge The more compelling the story you tell, the more likely people will want to follow you. One of the best ways to get people involved in who you are and what you have to say is to challenge yourself to become a better person. I created a “No Complaining” challenge that lasted for the whole month. I blogged and tweeted about it. Fellow tweeters gave me advice and empathy. This is when my tweeting became more personal and more compelling. People want to know how the situation makes you feel. The Twitter society on the whole is very caring and supportive. So let them know what you are trying to accomplish and let them help you succeed. 13. Remember Twitter is Supposed to be Fun Twitter should never feel like work and when it does then you know you need to change your habits. I’ve seen some tweeters adding new friends by the hundreds, just trying to get as many friends as possible. They burn out quickly because it stops being fun. They are more worried about how many people are following them instead of the value they are giving and receiving through Twitter. Let your personality come out because that’s the person people want to see. At first Twitter can be daunting and confusing, so find the right tools that fit your needs. Darren has plenty of them on this blog. I would suggest Tweetdeck to anyone who hasn’t tried it. It organizes all the tweets making the experience much more enjoyable and less overwhelming. 14. (What would be your number 14? How have you avoided burn-out or overcome it and came back better than ever?) I’ve posted over 1,500 tweets and I feel like I’m just grasping the art of tweeting. The more that I tweet the better I get and the more fun it becomes. I felt close to burn out a few months ago, but I realigned my goals and I’m back to tweeting up a storm. © 2008 TwiTip Twitter Tips . 14 Ways To Fight Twitter Burnout

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14 Ways To Fight Twitter Burnout