Do you know what Twitter is? If not, you should - it's one of the hottest web 2.0 things going right now! Twitter is a website that enables you to send out little "micro-blogs" of 140 characters or less to anyone that's following you (that's like friends in Facebook). You can let people know what you're doing at any time, and this can be pretty cool. These messages can be business or personal, and should be both.
If you're building a web-based business, some of your "tweets" should be business-oriented. For instance, if you post a new entry to your blog, let your twitter followers know. If you're watching a webinar that might be helpful to others, let them know.
But you need to find a happy medium. If you just post business tweets, people are going to think you don't have a life (and they may be right!). This is web 2.0, social networking, and you need to be social. Find something to talk about - anything - other than your business and you'll keep your followers interested for much longer.
Maybe you lost a bunch of weight. Maybe you're an aspiring singer. Maybe you like to bowl, golf, play poker, or walk your dog. Whatever it is, talk about it from time to time. If people realize you're actually a person, they'll be more drawn to you.
You want to be as organized as possible when you're expanding your twitter fan base. Here are 7 guidelines that I've developed to help me.
1. Follow lots of people. You can follow up to 2000 to start with, and more if you fulfill some criteria set out by twitter (what that criteria is, I'm not exactly sure, but I think it involves how many people are following you). Here's what I did that seemed to work: I found someone that was interested in the same thing that I am, attraction network marketing, and started following the ones he followed. Eventually, I got to 2000 and I couldn't follow any more. What you'll find out is that if you follow those people, a lot of them are going to follow you back. When they do, send them a short message, with a link to your blog.
2. When someone follows you, follow them back. Pretty soon, people will start to follow you that you didn't follow in the first place. (They probably found you the same way you got started). When they follow you, follow them and send a similar message to them as you did above. If you're already at 2000 people, go in and delete a few that aren't following you. I get rid of the ones that don't have a picture, because they probably aren't too serious about Twitter. Which leads to point 3.
3. Set up your profile. Add a picture. Tell about yourself. Put your blog link out there. Remember, we're trying to be social - even us computer geeks!
4. Go into your Facebook account and add the Twitter application. You're not on Facebook? Well fix that problem now! You absolutely must be on Facebook if you're serious about social marketing, it's that important. The way that works is when you make a post on Twitter, it will post the same thing on Facebook. Twice as many people will see what you're doing with the same amount of effort.
5. Try out twhirl. This is a desktop application that displays tweets from others without having to be on the twitter site. You can also post your own tweets there, and more. What I like about this program is that it has a url shortener built into it. If you want to post a long link in one of your tweets, you might run out of space because you can only have posts of 140 characters or less. Using twhirl, you can enter the url into a box and click "shorten" and it will give you a short little link that you can put in your post. Download twhirl at twhirl.com.
6. Twitterfeed, for blogs. If you have a blog, you might be interested in twitterfeed. This is a website where you can register your blog or blogs, and whenver you make a post it will automatically update twitter. If works off your RSS feed and checks once an hour to see if there are any new posts out there. You can set this up at twitterfeed.com - free!
7. Register your twitter username at ezinearticles.com. In your profile, you can enter your twitter info, and when one of your articles gets approved it will automatically send out a tweet. This is good, because sometimes by the time it gets approved you'll forget to post it on twitter.
So there you have it! Seven simple ways to put twitter to work for you. Go ahead and get signed up if you're not already, and put some or all of these ideas in motion and you'll rapidly increase your web of content and sphere of influence! - 16036
If you're building a web-based business, some of your "tweets" should be business-oriented. For instance, if you post a new entry to your blog, let your twitter followers know. If you're watching a webinar that might be helpful to others, let them know.
But you need to find a happy medium. If you just post business tweets, people are going to think you don't have a life (and they may be right!). This is web 2.0, social networking, and you need to be social. Find something to talk about - anything - other than your business and you'll keep your followers interested for much longer.
Maybe you lost a bunch of weight. Maybe you're an aspiring singer. Maybe you like to bowl, golf, play poker, or walk your dog. Whatever it is, talk about it from time to time. If people realize you're actually a person, they'll be more drawn to you.
You want to be as organized as possible when you're expanding your twitter fan base. Here are 7 guidelines that I've developed to help me.
1. Follow lots of people. You can follow up to 2000 to start with, and more if you fulfill some criteria set out by twitter (what that criteria is, I'm not exactly sure, but I think it involves how many people are following you). Here's what I did that seemed to work: I found someone that was interested in the same thing that I am, attraction network marketing, and started following the ones he followed. Eventually, I got to 2000 and I couldn't follow any more. What you'll find out is that if you follow those people, a lot of them are going to follow you back. When they do, send them a short message, with a link to your blog.
2. When someone follows you, follow them back. Pretty soon, people will start to follow you that you didn't follow in the first place. (They probably found you the same way you got started). When they follow you, follow them and send a similar message to them as you did above. If you're already at 2000 people, go in and delete a few that aren't following you. I get rid of the ones that don't have a picture, because they probably aren't too serious about Twitter. Which leads to point 3.
3. Set up your profile. Add a picture. Tell about yourself. Put your blog link out there. Remember, we're trying to be social - even us computer geeks!
4. Go into your Facebook account and add the Twitter application. You're not on Facebook? Well fix that problem now! You absolutely must be on Facebook if you're serious about social marketing, it's that important. The way that works is when you make a post on Twitter, it will post the same thing on Facebook. Twice as many people will see what you're doing with the same amount of effort.
5. Try out twhirl. This is a desktop application that displays tweets from others without having to be on the twitter site. You can also post your own tweets there, and more. What I like about this program is that it has a url shortener built into it. If you want to post a long link in one of your tweets, you might run out of space because you can only have posts of 140 characters or less. Using twhirl, you can enter the url into a box and click "shorten" and it will give you a short little link that you can put in your post. Download twhirl at twhirl.com.
6. Twitterfeed, for blogs. If you have a blog, you might be interested in twitterfeed. This is a website where you can register your blog or blogs, and whenver you make a post it will automatically update twitter. If works off your RSS feed and checks once an hour to see if there are any new posts out there. You can set this up at twitterfeed.com - free!
7. Register your twitter username at ezinearticles.com. In your profile, you can enter your twitter info, and when one of your articles gets approved it will automatically send out a tweet. This is good, because sometimes by the time it gets approved you'll forget to post it on twitter.
So there you have it! Seven simple ways to put twitter to work for you. Go ahead and get signed up if you're not already, and put some or all of these ideas in motion and you'll rapidly increase your web of content and sphere of influence! - 16036
About the Author:
Learn how to combine Twitter and Facebook at my web based social marketing training site. Visit my attraction and social marketing blog to get fresh, new ideas on how to explode any business on the internet today!
