I feel no indignity or remorse in saying ‘I love twitter’. I first tried my hand at twittering in July of 2008. I clearly recall the occasion. I was watching The Tour de France, I am a big cycling fan, and Jonathan Vaughters, directeur sportif of the Garmin–Slipstream Pro Cycling team, dropped the F-bomb on live television. Then following the incident, Jonathan apologized via twitter. There it was, I NEEDED twitter. I promptly set up my account, and then promptly forgot it.
Fast-Forward to January 2009, I am desperately working to grow my business. Once again, I am drawn to twitter. A friend of a friend on facebook responds to my requests for ‘twitter help’ Together we embark on a journey to learn twitter. I have no shame in saying twitter forged our friendship. She is now one of my strongest confidants, constructive critic, and friend. I have twitter to thank.
I now have three twitter accounts, one personal account and two business accounts. If I account for overlap of followers, my estimate is that I am reaching somewhere in the neighborhood of 5600 people. I have sent approximately (OK, I added them up) 5343 tweet and read thousands more. I may not be a twitter expert, but I am damn close. Here are my observations in a nutshell. I call them, How to become a twitter god.
1) Be interesting. If you are not an interesting person, fake it (I am kidding, everyone is interesting – just find your voice). Personality sells, and it’s no different on twitter.
2) Be engaging. If you have no interest in your followers, they will quickly lose interest in you.
3) Be an authority. You do not have to be an authority on all things, but be an authority on something.
4) Be likable. Everyone likes to be entertained, fun and funny works.
5) Be consistent. You cannot reach anyone if you do not show up.
6) Be yourself. Just like in real life (IRL) it’s easy to spot a fake on twitter.
7) Have fun! Relax and have fun. If you’re having fun it’s easier to keep it up.
Next, I want to address, How to gain the accolades of other twitter gods.
1) If you wish to be retweeted, count the spaces for RT @yourusername then do the math 140 characters less the number of spaces the retweet documentation requires. (Example RT @dalm8ton equals 12 characters, my tweets, that I want retweeted, need to be 128 or less) Do NOT expect that your audience will think your message is so special they will work to retweet it.
2) Do NOT just send a link. Tell me what the link is about; make me want to click through.
3) Explain what any link is (blog, map, video, song, etc). chances are I’m viewing this on my phone and I want to know if the link is going to require me to hard reset J
4) NEVER say ‘please retweet’. If your message is good, I will retweet it without the need for you to tell me I should. (Side note, nothing makes me not retweet like a please retweet message).
5) Do NOT just sell sell sell! If that is all you have…you are just SPAM.
6) Twitter works 24-hours each day, 365 days each year. Spread your tweets out over different times of the day, different days of the weeks, etc.
7) Remember the Golden Rule: Retweet unto others, as you would have them retweet unto you.
Lastly, I want to address twitter tools. There are many tools available enhance your twitter experience. My personal favorite are SocialOomph (AKA Tweet Later). I also use Ubertwitter for my Blackberry and Twirl on my desktop. I have friends who swear by Tweet deck, for me it was not the right option. I found that it used an extraordinary amount of memory, and it did not support multiple accounts. However, just because it did not meet my needs does not mean it will not meet yours. Twitter tools and applications are a varied as the people who use them. Part of the fun is finding what works for you.
Tweet me!
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