Twitter 101: Part One (The Basics)

[Meghan]

I want to be cool and know what Twitter is, help me!
Twitter is a real-time information network powered by people all around the world that lets you share and discover what’s happening now.

Why use Twitter?
1. Gives immediate look on news, events, what people are talking about, often before any news outlet shares it.
2. Marketing tool. Whether you are a big business owner, small business owner, or want to use it for personal use only to keep in touch with friends, family, or your favorite celebrity. Most people are on twitter! This makes it easy to connect with them to help spread the word about your site, your creations, thoughts, ideas, and keep in touch with family/friends.
3. Twitter can be your "water cooler" (I didnt create this metaphor, but it fits great!) It gives me a chance to break and chat with people anything and everything. Sometimes its serious, sometimes its marketing to help get the name of my site out there, sometimes its just to chat.

How to get started on Twitter?
1. Go to www.twitter.com and sign up. I have two set up. One for myself and one for my site/business. (Note: Grab your names before someone else does, even if you dont plan to use it for a while).
2. Set up your profile. There are all kinds of ways to personalize it in "Settings". (Note: Make sure to include your website and info about yourself since people on Twitter like to know these things).
3. Upload a photo of yourself or your business if you're setting up a business account.
4. Build Your Network: Twitter will allow you to import e-mail lists, contacts from instant messaging services, and you can find your friends on their search engine. The best way to build a list of interesting people is to go to the Twitter search engine at search.twitter.com and plug in your interests.

What does it mean to "follow" someone?
“Following” someone is the same thing as adding them as a Facebook friend, except that they don’t see your updates unless they choose to follow you as well. Generally the best way to get followers is to add people based on your interests, as most people will follow you once you start following them.

Once you start following someone, their updates, or “Tweets”, will appear in your “timeline”, or your Twitter feed. If you find someone is getting on your nerves with too many senseless Tweets, go ahead and remove them by going to their profile page on the Twitter site; you may do this by clicking on their name. Click the arrow beside “Following” just below the top of their profile page and then click “Remove”.

To post your messages, or “Tweets”, go to your profile page and type your tweet into the box provided. Applications like the ones referenced here make the process a bit easier and remove the need to visit the website to make your updates.

How do I get more followers?
Use the search tool to search for people with similar interests as you (digital scrapbooking, blogging, traveling, cooking, photography, etc)

(NOTE: The more you tweet, the more followers you'll get.). People love to hear from you and people love to connect. I try to aim for a few tweets per day at least.

What do I tweet about?
Ask yourself this question: "Do I find this interesting, or would I?" If you say yes, then tweet about it. People dont really want to know that you're at McDonalds for lunch.

Tweet Accomplishments Sparingly: If you went live with a new site or posted an article on a blog, that is exactly what Twitter is for. If you have over twenty new posts a day on your site, tweet only the more interesting one.

Don't Tweet Confidential Stuff: Tell someone that you’ll go “off-Twitter” if you need to talk about something that you don’t want the world to know about. Remember that your tweets are searchable unless you have locked your account.

Snip Your URL's: Use TinyURL to shorten your lengths to something more manageable. Most Twitter users snip their URL’s regardless of their size just to keep them readable. You can also set up many of the Twitter clients available (google: "twitter clients") to automatically snip any URL that is entered.

Profanity: Two words..."Just don't"

Ok-now what questions do you have? I'm here to answer. I'll post another tutorial in a few with the "glossary" of Twitter.

[krystalhartley]

This is fabulous! TY!

[Meghan]

sure! glad you read it!

if you have questions or want a specific explanation written out, let me know.

[sczos911]

I wanted to add that Mashable.com has a Twitter Guidebook - http://mashable.com/guidebook/twitter/.

I'm pushing social networking for my company & some just don't get it (and get it. and get it!) & I have referred them to the guidebook numberous times.

[Sari]

Thanks for this! I'm hoping to use Twitter to market my business.