Growth Lessons From Top 10 Twitter Influencers

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Growth Lessons From Top 10 Twitter Influencers

“The best way to engage honestly with the marketplace via Twitter is to never use the words

“engage,” “honestly,” or “marketplace” – Mary Louise Alcott

Twitter is an extremely powerful platform, but like everything in marketing, it’s all about targeting the right people. When you launch an ecommerce or SaaS website, getting traffic really isn’t that difficult, but getting the right people on your site is a bit more challenging.

It’s impossible to calculate how many quotations have been shared on social media platforms like Twitter, and how many quotes have become “quotable” because social media made them viral and famous.  Despite the relentless chatty, tweety, twirly noise that constantly emanates from it, when Twitter talks, Tweeters listen … and quote… and retweet… and the tweeters themselves find themselves positioned as quotable experts on social media, 140 characters at a time.

What follows are funny and inspiring quotable quotations about Twitter and social media and how it has changed the nature of business and customer relationships around the globe. The quotes are arranged in no particular order. The quote authors identified with “@” names are tweeters, who may be famous in the “real” world, famous in their virtual social media networks, or completely unknown in both the physical universe and the Twittersphere.

Since the first tweet was tweeted on March 21, 2006, social media in general and Twitter specifically  has not only changed the way the world communicates (frequently, and in short bursts), it has also changed the way customers interact with businesses (individually, and transparently). With 1.3 billion accounts, and 320 million active users, Twitter is not the most popular social media channel in the world, but it is undeniably the most powerful real-time communication tool, with the power to get employees fired, professional sports heroes dethroned, and governments overthrown. Social media is the great equalizer where anybody can be quotable because they are wise, or clever, or for no good reason at all.

aI think that people between the age of someone’s kid and someone’s parent have always being uniquely narcissistic but then social media, twitter and live journals has made it really easy to navel gaze in a way that you have never been able to before. This have created a lot of difference in being the most drastic repercussion in someone’s lifetime along with the phase of social media being so much influencive over time and efforts being too catchy with the most inclusive need of an hour.

However in terms of using social media for business I think influencers are the people and the companies that carry weight in your industry, and they should be your highest priority. Influencers will send you traffic and ultimately influence the buying decisions of others.

Typically, industry influencers have all of these:

  • Large following on social media
  • Engagement in social media through retweets, Facebook comments, etc.
  • Clear signs of engagement on their blog such as shares and comments

Here is the list of top 10 twitter power influencers and their 10 growth lessons.

1. Madalyn Sklar:

Follow: On Twitter

1. Stop Pushing:

So often, businesses promote themselves. And that’s all they’re doing. Just pushing, pushing, pushing.
They’re not taking the time to listen and implement valuable feedback, according to what their followers and community want.Often, they’ll put out the content they think their audience would want from them. Rather, they should take time to say “What do you guys want to know? What do you want to learn about?”

I’m always polling my community, asking for feedback and advice. I want to make sure I’m on track with what they want. Because if you’re not providing what your community wants, people will leave. They’ll unfollow you.

2. Handle customer service issues in public:

Here public means your social profiles like twitter. It shows everyone else that you take care of your customers. This will help you increase customer retention and brand loyalty.

3. Consistency. Listening. Engaging:

Madalyn Sklar explains “People find me because I put myself out there. And I do follow most back. My time is spent focusing my efforts on tweeting consistently, which is time consuming. I also listen to conversations, which is incredibly important. And I engage with people, which is absolutely necessary if you want to gain new followers.”

If you do these three things every day on Twitter, you will get amazing results.

4. One powerful way to gain exposure on Twitter:

Having a high profile person or company reply or retweet your post. Don’t be afraid to say positive or negative things about products and services you use. But be sure to get their attention by placing their @twitter-name in your tweet.

5. Attention Grabbing using #FF:

#FF stands for “Follow Friday.” It’s a smart attention grabbing tactic. Twitter users will tweet who they suggest others should follow on Fridays by tweeting with this hashtag. It’s a great way to get attention because you are mentioning them and they will see this through their notifications or the next time they log into Twitter.

6. Twitter features which are undervalued:

Utilising Twitter polls should definitely be number one, as it’s a great way to learn from your community. Number two is using Twitter videos. We all have the ability to, not only have a picture in our Tweets, but also put a video. Whether it’s something we’ve already made or creating it right on the spot.

7. Twitter Cards can help you get more leads – and at no cost!

How about making your twitter followers join your mailing list. Simply go to ads.twitter.com, fill out the form and activate Twitter cards. Now you can do you tweet that will allow people to option with an email connected to their twitter account. This will help you gain email without spending money on ads. After creating a lead generation card you can pin it to the top attract more of your followers.

8. Start using Twitter Analytics:

Check analytics regularly to see how your account is performing. It’s a great way to gauge your tweeting effectiveness. Check out the tweets which are getting lot of clicks to your website and try to create more of it.

9. Use the right tool:

Using the right tool will save you lot of time and be active at the same time. Hootsuite, ManageFlitter, Buffer and Key-holeco are few tools which Madalyn Sklar suggest.

10. Just Do It!

Of all the lessons from Madalyn Sklar this one is a charm. Believe it or not she has the tattoo JUST DO IT. Follow your heart and do whatever it takes to reach your goal.

2. Lisa Sicard

Follow: On Twitter

1. Don’t Over Tweet:

Know your limit for the number of tweets you churn out vs. how many followers you have. If you share too often you will see followers drop. You can see the unfollows via JustUnfollow or Commun.it to name a few programs out there. (There are so many programs that can do this!)

2. Interact!

This one is key. Don’t just tweet your own stuff and never interact with others on Twitter. Twitter is all about engaging with others. If you don’t want to engage you should be advertising instead, right? Learn from Twitter greats like Kim Garst, Sam Hurley, or Neal Schaffer.

3. Use More Images:

Images really do UP your Twitterness. You can do this with your own images, make them at Canav or usstickerse GIF images that you can pick right from Twitter. Twitter has a great selection of GIFS for you to choose from. You can also use the new Twitter Stickers to your own photos to give them some extra zing! See the puggle photo with a few stickers here as an example. You can get very creative with Twitter stickers to market your business.

4. Use Some Twitter Tools:

There are hundreds if not thousands of tools out there to help you with Twitter. Some help you to find other like minded Twitter folks, others help you see who unfollowed you or followed you. Just be careful not to use too much automation. A little automation is necessary once you grow your following. There is no way you could keep up with thousands of followers. That’s why those Twitter lists come in so darn handy! The latest Twitter Tool I’m testing is Social Quaint. More to come on this Twitter tool. So far I like it, have learned a few new things and they are not pushy into selling you their paid program. It has helped my Twitterness factor go up. Sign up for Nutshellmail. You can get daily email updates on who is following you and who has stopped following you. You can then un-follow them directly from the email. It also gives you info on your Facebook account too. This is a great FREE Twitter tool.

5. Check Your Twitter Analytics:

Twitter now has great analytics now that you can look at to see what is working for you and what is not. This will help you improve your Twitterness by looking at them monthly. You can see which tweets get the most re-tweets and which ones got the most engagement. It can also compare your audience to the general Twitter audience. I’ve learned my followers are not interested in entertainment as much as the mass Twitter audience is but they like business, tech and politics. (I was surprised to see politics in there.) Think how this could help you tweet better and share content that your audience craves. This knowledge can up your Twitterness quickly!

6. Become An Authority in Your Niche Using Twitter Now:

Sharing info about your niche can help make you become an authority. Be someone that others will follow and trust on the network. They know you are not just tweeting your own “stuff” if you use the 80/20 rule with 80% being others “stuff”. People then will spread your tweets into Twitterland and beyond.

7. Your Customers:

You can learn more about your customers too via Twitter. See what they are tweeting about and learn how they are thinking. Learn what interests them. You can then tweet about the things that your customers CARE about. They will want to connect with you and follow you. They will become your Twitter fans. Be sure to respond to to any customers requests. If they are sending really offensive tweets try to respond very professionally and/or try to take it to direct messages or via email if necessary. Ignoring such tweets will not make them go away. Fast response is key on the Twitter network. It’s expected!

8. Gain More Twitter Followers:

Follow some new Twitter folks weekly that have engaged with your or that Commun. it recommends for you. Be careful not to over follow, you can always put people in Twitter lists instead. You don’t want to lower your TFF ratio if you follow too many folks. Engage, Engage and Engage! Don’t just tweet out and be like a robot. Converse with others daily.

9. Competition:

You can keep an eye on competitors, what offers they are giving and new products they are putting out there.

10.Leads:

You can use hashtags in searches for leads in your niche. You can search for topics by hash tags in the Twitter Search field at the top of your Twitter page. Next you can follow people with similar interests. Search for the interests again in the search. Once you start following a few people, Twitter will recommend some similar tweeps for you to follow. Check them out. This is a twitter tip you will surely use. Now once you start tweeting your info; other on Twitter will love it if you can retweet their stuff and converse with them. You’ll see you’ll get many more followers that way.

3. Bonnie Sainsbury

Follow: On Twitter

1. Your First Impression Matters:

The first contact anyone has with your twitter profile is your bio. If someone RT’s you, #FF’s or is browsing through their recent followers, the first thing folks do is check out your profile and they make a snap judgement to follow you or not. Your bio is the most important. You have 160 characters to convince me to allow you to communicate. What’s unique? Father, cyclist and citizen of the universe doesn’t give me enough information unless you’re a cycling advocate or you own a bike shop. Be specific, even if this account’s prime purpose is business. At an event, business or not, one of the first questions folks ask is “What do you do?”. You only have 160 characters so good grammar is not necessary. A few phrases strung together in a logical way will communicate who you are effectively.

2. The Importance of Engaging with Current Customers:

Your customers are important to you. In fact, they are your business. So how do you make sure you engage your customer and give them a valued experience? Good question! ”You need to layer your customer’s experience”, but how do you do that? The best way is to build social objects that create a sense of community that operates like a hub. You have a center point and then everything flows out from there. This is a great way to re-affirm your brand relevance. Why? There are two reasons. 1.You connect consumers with other customers and create a deeper more meaningful experience on your brand and related subjects. 2.In doing that, you are able to resell. Two powerful reasons! This hopefully helps to make it clearer for you. Engaging with existing customers not only helps to keep them as an active customer, it helps you to learn more about this customer and how you can continue to offer them products/services under your brand.

3. Posting Frequency:

Is your audience local or international? If it’s international, post 24 hours a day to account for time zones.

4. Understand What Is Working:

Monitor your results and make small changes every day. You may need to alter your message, the time and frequency of your posts for the most engagement. Change one thing at a time, if you make too many changes you may never know what one thing or combination made the difference.

5. What Is Your Why?

What do you hope to accomplish using social media channels? If it’s for business, do you want to establish yourself as an industry leader? Do you want to stay connected with your current customer base? Do you want to do business research, to stay aware of trends? Do you want to watch your competition? Do you want to follow up with folks you meet at networking events or conferences? You notice I didn’t say anything about lead generation, selling product or services or advertising. If any of those are your why, go back and read the last paragraph. It’s social, not a newspaper advertisement or a press release. Write down your why and how that will benefit your business. Remember, it’s just that easy.

6. Me, me, me, me and me doesn’t work so well:

My tweets are 90% other people’s content right now. Curating great content that you know your followers are interested in. I doesn’t recommend just broadcasting your own information over and over again. Twitter being a communication channel and not just a “look at me” platform.

7. Tools For Automation:

Plume – for mobile use Commun.it – for finding influencers and analytics Manage Flitter Buffer Managing 100 000 followers is difficult for me, so i use lists to help make it manageable. I will also pick one follower and look closer from time to time. Use Commun.it for finding influencers in network.

8. Dream Big:

What do you want to happen? What’s your dream? You Passion? Allow yourself to DREAM BIG. Write your dream down. BELIEVE. You have to believe before you can make it happen. What does that dream look like? How will your dream change your life?

9. Start Small:

What do you need to make your dream come true? Make a list and keep adding detail until you have a detailed plan to achieve that dream. Then add dates. You now have the project plan to achieve your dream. Bump in the road? Keep drilling down to get past it. The reason people get stuck on start is that they don’t know where to start, or they become discouraged when they run into roadblocks. Having a detailed project plan you’re able to change keeps you on track. Use an organized vision board, or a mind map to keep yourself on track.

10. Test Whether You Are Successfully:

You create a marketing campaign, but do you know if it actually working or do you just go on a wing and a prayer and hope for the best. Here are few tips you can use to test whether you are successfully. Test the audience Test the content Test the depth of your content Test what the best time of day is Test each site individually That’s it in a nutshell. Five tips that when you put into practice can help you to ensure that you are engaging your customer is the best possible way and that you are maximizing your marketing to your existing clients and potential clients.

4. John Paul Aguiar

Follow: On Twitter

1. Use @ Sign To Tweet Someone:

When you want to message someone on the stream you just have to use @thiername to have them see what you said. NOW…this can be used for good and for bad. The Good, if you want to chat with someone or ask a question or RT their tweet. The Bad, when you use it to tweet them links to your crap that they may or may not want to see or share with their followers. This is Spam! “Most annoying of all twitter tips.” A much better way to share links is to DM that person with it, giving them the option to share or not to share.

2. Share Pictures:

When it comes to twitter tips, sharing pictures is a no-brainer, people love images. Now even though pictures are a great thing to share, they are not as helpful as a piece of well written content. So keep your picture sharing to no more than 2 -3 per day. The best pics to share are personal pics, funny pics, and motivational pics. Pics you share can be anything, things from your personal life, or something funny you see, just be creative and be careful. Remember this is the internet, so careful of what personal pics you share.

3. Scheduling With Follow Up:

I know this is a hot topic for people, to schedule or not to schedule. I say schedule schedule schedule. You see scheduling is not the issue, the issue is scheduling with no follow up. There would only be one difference between these two groups. Group A schedules and is there to engage after each and every tweet. Group B doesn’t schedule, but they look for tweets as they need and send them out and are there to engage after each and every tweet. What would the difference be? Group B would have wasted a lot of time throughout the day. How the tweet goes out doesn’t matter, what matters is what you do once the tweet is sent!

4. Have A Personality:

People connect with people they know, or feel they know. Same advice you have been given to build a successful blog is to write with your personality, can and should be applied to Twitter. If you’re funny, then be funny on Twitter. If you have a love for sports then share some of that on Twitter. Again here, a little bit goes a long way. For me, if you ever met me in person, you would see that I am the same guy I am on my blog and Twitter. Be Real, Be You.

5. Being Active:

The best way to get results from your efforts on Twitter is to be there, be active. Now the question is, how much do you need to be there? I don’t really know But I do know the more you’re there the more you will get out of Twitter. But tweeting twice a day or spending only 10 min a day on Twitter really won’t cut it. At the same time, being there all day or sending tweets every 10 min 24 hrs a day won’t cut it either. I recommend a tweet every hour or so in chunks. Meaning, tweet a few messages in morning then a few in afternoon and then a few at night. That way you get in front of the most people thru the day. You don’t want to be a spammer, but you need to show activity, people will connect with you faster if they see your active daily.

6. Be The One They Think Of First:

You want to be the ONE they think of first when they want or need something in YOUR niche. Your goal here is to constantly share helpful on target content that fits around what your business is or does so that you are constantly in their feed, in their face on there mind. You want people to come to you and follow your feed because they know they will get great information on a daily basis. Once they are following you, then they will start to not only see the content you share from OTHERS, but they will start to see YOUR content as well.

7. Promote In A Smarter Way:

Most small business owners come to Twitter with a mindset of sell sell sell, and that is not a smart move. You have to be smarter with the way you promote, you have to learn how to promote through content. How do you do this? If you manage your stream correctly and follow the tips I shared above, then you won’t have to do much “promotional hard selling” stuff. But when you do want to do harder push promotions for new products, or holiday discounts or whatever. Keep it fun and relevant and your promotions will be seen in a positive way and not a negative. The fact is, if you just keep a well managed feed by following the tips I shared above, you will have customers and followers LISTENING to you and ACTING on what you share.

8. Follow Targeted People:

I have always been and still am a big promoter of people actively looking and following people that fit what they are doing online. Following new targeted people is a quick way to get out a Twitter slump and start to see new interactions, conversation, retweets and traffic to your blog. Stay on a 80 – 20 rule, 80% highly targeted people and 20% softly targeted people. Example: highly targeted follower for me would be other bloggers. A soft targeted follower would be a real estate broker. The real estate broker should or may have a blog so there is some interest in my blogging and social media advice.

9. Learn To Give:

To build a strong brand on Twitter you will need to give back as much as you get. How? If people share your content, then at some point you will want to share theirs. If someone does something you like or respect, then share that and mention them and what they did. Share what you know for free either by answering questions or doing a Twitter chat. Offer something for free to your followers. If you’re a company, then offer coupons or discounted pricing just for your Twitter followers. No matter what you decide to do, you have to know that strong brands are not all about themselves and are available and helpful.

10. Don’t Forget To Show Your Appreciation:

Each day the people that follow you have 100’s if not 1000’s of things and people they can choose to retweet to their followers, so when they choose to share you, make sure you let them know you SEE them. Show your appreciation, acknowledge what they did to help you and at the very least say Thank You, or kick them back a tweet once in awhile. I’m not saying retweet every person that retweets you on a tit-for-tat pay plan, but when you see someone tweeting you on a regular basis, then give them one back. On Twitter you live and die by the people that surround you, share you, mention you, so you need to respect them, and help lift them up if you want to continue to benefit from all their support.

5. Samantha Kelly

Follow: On Twitter

1. Who are YOU following?

No point in following Beyonce and Justin Bieber and such celebrities unless you want engagement. Yes they are cool, but the likelihood of them engaging with you is very low. So follow your peers, other business owners who, like you are on Twitter and will support you as they understand the challenges and will understand your musings. Endorse industry leaders or colleagues in your industry. Share their content, they will notice and probably do the same for you someday.

2.Take part in Twitter chats:

There are plenty of hashtag Twitter chats out there. E.g. #Britishbizparty #Belfasthour and one for almost every county in the UK too. Take part. Jump in and say hi! Your followers will start to soar.

3. Customer Engagement and Building Relationships:

Both are the most important aspect of social media marketing. Especially on Twitter. But lots of companies are not doing this at all. Social media is ‘Social’ not about selling. The secret is to build up relationships with other so that they do your marketing for you. Is your company engaging with your audience? Do you know who your followers are? Remember people always remember how you made them feel. If you retweet others tweets they will be delighted and will usually Thank you for it. If they do, continue the conversation. Keep the engagement going and have a chat. Create a list of active or favourite tweeters so you can keep an eye on what they are up to and not miss anything.

4. Show yourself as the expert and ‘go to’ person for what you do:

Tell people what you do, write articles that will draw us in. Ask questions, ask your customer and followers what do they want. What do they fear, What is their biggest obstacle. Then write a blog post about it, giving them a solution. You will stick in their heads as the ‘go to’ person so when someone asks ‘Do you know a good financial planner’ your name will be the first one they think of. Oh and by the way, don’t be afraid to experiment on Twitter with your Twitter handle (The @ in front of your name) You could call yourself ‘The Financial guy’ or ‘Finance Lady’ you can have much more fun on Twitter by changing your name slightly.

5. Know Your Why Is it to raise brand awareness?

Build relationships? Get sales? Twitter does all of these but be careful. Don’t just start pushing your product or event. No one is listening to you yet. You need to build up relationships first. Build a community who likes you and wants to hear what you have to say!

6. Share your knowledge Obviously don’t share everything!

But let people into your world also. Let them know what works and what doesn’t. Be friendly and willing to help others who are just starting out. Content and storytelling is an opportunity for you to show you are the expert in what you do. Give tips, share knowledge.

7. Use Images Visual storytelling is very powerful:

Us irish people are great storytellers!! Tell your story. Put a pic up of you preparing for work, meeting your customers, doing that charity walk! Show us the team. We like to see that your staff are happy to be working with you.

8. Use the search bar on Twitter to find customers:

All you have to do is put the phrases in that match what you do or what your customers would be searching for. e.g. if you are in the wedding business, search for the phrase ‘Getting married’ you will find anyone on twitter who has mentioned that phrase. Fine tune it by putting in ‘Ireland’ to find potential customers in your country. If you are a financial planner, try putting ‘not good with finances’ into the search box. Even if you don’t find leads, you will find other articles that might interest your followers to tweet out. Always give credit to the person who wrote the article though.

9. Interact Interact Interact…..

For example, if you see someone is having a bad day, ask them about it, or just simply say. ‘Aw sorry to hear you are having a hard time, sending you a hug’ or something like that. (Ok Lads, I know you won’t be saying that but something similar would be something like ‘hang in there’ or ‘tomorrow is a new day). This makes the person feel like you care and makes them feel less lonely and understood. Believe me, there are a lot of people out there that just want to be heard.

10. Are you taking shortcuts?

Have you auto dms set up? Get rid of them. Is your Facebook linked to your twitter account? Disconnect it. No one on Twitter wants automation. We want to connect with real human beings and build relationships and be social.

6. Keith Keller

Follow: On Twitter

1. Use Twitter to drive people to your website or blog:

  • This is probably the number one benefit of Twitter actually.
  • It is extraordinary for driving organic traffic to your website or blog posts.
  • It can also be used to promote your You Tube videos or your podcast series.
  • It’s an amazing resource so it well worth taking the time to learn it’s secrets.

2. The “Twitter 30-30” Method:

This is one of my favourite techniques for gaining targeted followers on Twitter and developing quality relationships.

Follow 30 People Per Day For 30 Days. Rinse & Repeat.

  • Follow people that you find inspiring and most importantly follow their followers.
  • Chances are if you find them inspiring, and you’re tweeting similar things they will follow you too.
  • I’ve had robust success with this strategy, so try this one for yourself and let me know how you go.

3. Follow People First:

This one really picks up where the last idea left off. Following first is a terrific way to take the initiative here and find great people to connect with.

4. Thank People Often:

This one can not be overstated. Don’t take anything that people have done for you for granted here. A simple thank you makes all the difference.

5. Tweet Daily:

This one may seem challenging at first but you would soon get into the swing of it. Tweeting regularly is one of the best ways to build and maintain a loyal following.

6. Be a Resource, Not a Salesperson:

  • Twitter really is the Information Network and people love getting information about what is going on.
  • Some of them can be yours of course but you should build a community and share other people’s work to the interest of your audience.
  • Unfortunately, many people are really tarnishing their brand and annoying their followers by trying to sell their products before building any trust or authority.
  • Your potential clients don’t want to commit to buying your products or services straight away.
  • They want to know that are confident and competent before even considering buying from you.
  • They want to know that you are a nice person and by being a resource you give your clients a chance to get to know you better, as well as building that much need trust.

7. Write a Strong Bio:

Write a strong bio that will inspire potential clients and joint venture partners to follow you.

8. Add a photo or company graphic:

Add a photo or company graphic. There is significant evidence to prove that people who do this get more followers and retweets.

9. Share, Share, Share:

This really is Twitter 101. Share great articles and interact with your followers. This is the essence of how Twitter works.

10.Remember the 80/20 rule :

It’s not all about you, 4 out of 5 tweets should be of value to your followers and not sales related. Only 1 out of every 5 tweets should be a sales related message. 1 out of 10 however is a far better ratio if you can manage it.

7. Mark Shaw

Follow: On Twitter

1. Customer Service Tool:

Good customer service is not just about quality of product/sale or after sale but also about listening to the needs of your market share, their ideas, their concerns, their opinions, being accessible to them and talking to them. Engaging with your customers is good customer service, whether it is offering your expertise, solving their problems or addressing their concerns, it is all engagement and in line with good twitter usage more importantly it is good customer service that adds value to your business.

2. Discovery:

Twitter has its own search engine and in my view is the place to go to discover things. Most people on Twitter spend very little time searching for anything on Twitter, but that folks is the goldmine. You can search on real people talking about real things right now and in real time. The ability to search and find targeted business leads, potential customers, people who have a need or a want to buy something, change something, get something is incredible for you and your business. Discovery and more importantly targeted discovery is the number one thing that Twitter does best.

3. Be committed:

Add a good photo, perhaps a bespoke background, your website URL and an interesting bio. Try and differentiate yourself and make sure the bio contains keywords so others can find you.

4. Be consistent:

Show up each day, and tweet, even if time is short. It’s more important to do a small amount each day, than lots one day and then nothing for a week or so. Use images in your tweets. You can have up to four, and they stand out. So try being creative and use them to tell a story. You can also add up to 200 seconds of video to a Tweet from your mobile. Use it to make an announcement or show them behind the scenes. These get the best engagement levels from followers.

5. Be interesting:

Try and tweet three types of messages: social chit-chat; the sharing of resources, links, tools, info, ideas and opinions; and tweets that answer questions which demonstrate your knowledge. Aim for a good balance. Pin a Tweet which will stay at the top of your profile timeline. Select one about an event, your podcast, or a product you’ve just launched. And remember you can change it whenever you need to.

6. Be interested:

Engage with others by answering questions and joining in. Find conversations to enter into via search.twitter.com and Retweet (RT) other people’s messages if they are of interest to you and your followers. It’s not about selling things but it is all about building your brand and credibility.

7. Be authentic:

Do not turn into a presence without being present; be yourself.

8. The Hashtag Mistake:

A hashtag in a bio, to show you’re interested in #Marketing, is clickable remember. Therefore, you’re sending them to a search page full of other marketing people, and now you’ve lost them. However, it may be effective to create your own hashtags. When you use a hashtag only you use, you will be the main result which comes up should a user click the link. But when you try something new, remember to test it.

9. Know What Works:

Work out what you will measure to know if your efforts have been successful. Don’t look at follower counts, but instead look at website traffic and sales generated.

10. Your greatest friend is the Twitter Trend:

Every minute of everyday topics are trending on Twitter. A trending topic on Twitter is when a huge volume of people start tweeting about a specific topic. This has nothing to do with your followers. You need to make the Twitter trend your greatest friend. You want more exposure for your business. You want to join a room where there are thousands of people all tweeting about the same topic. You then want to join into that topic if it is appropriate and relevant to you or your business.

8. Ian Cleary

Follow: On Twitter

1. Use the Right Hashtags:
Did you know that tweets containing 1 or 2 hashtags have 21% higher engagement than those with 3 or more? It can be tempting to squeeze every hashtag you can think of into a tweet to attract attention — but it seems that’s a really bad idea! This means you have to be careful and narrow down your hashtag choice to 1 or 2 per tweet (if you were using more than this).

If you don’t use any hashtags, maybe this is the time to start. They are great for visibility and getting your tweets in front of more people. But how do you choose which hashtags are best?

Ritetag is a tool that will help you to identify the right hashtags to use. Enter a keyword related to your industry and Ritetag will provide you with a long list of relevant hashtags.

2. Get Your Twitter Cards Set Up:
When you create great content on your website, make sure you include a nice image.
When someone shares your content on Twitter, you want that image to be shared too.
The way to enable this is to add Twitter Cards to your site. This means adding some information to your site and getting it verified with Twitter.

3. Use Twitter Lists to Manage Your Contacts:
As you follow higher numbers of people, your timeline might feel overwhelming. If there are people you really want to keep track of, and whose tweets you don’t want to miss, add them to a Twitter list and follow that alongside (or instead of) your main timeline. Tools like Hootsuite and TweetDeck allow you to set up columns to follow tweets from your lists easily.

You can make these lists public (so the people on the list know they are on it) or private (so they don’t know). Or you can subscribe to public lists that other users have created.

Here are a few easy tips to find lists created by other people:

  • When looking at an influencer’s Twitter profile, click through to see if they’ve built any public lists
  • Look more closely at the Twitter lists you’ve been added to over the years
  • Go to Google and search by typing in this thread – site:twitter.com inurl:lists <insert search term>

4. Analyze the Best Time to Post Your Content:
When do you get the most engagement on your content? It can be different, depending on who your target audience is, the times zones they are in, their work patterns and more. It’s therefore important to analyze and change the timing of your tweets.

Buffer did an analysis of the best time to tweet and found that tweets sent in the afternoon tended to do better than those sent in the morning.

5. Use Twitter Ads to Target Your Email List:
Your email list is made up of people who have chosen to hear more from you, so they are great people to target with your ads. They have already shown you that they’re interested!

When setting up your ad, use Tailored Audiences and upload your email list. Twitter will match those email addresses with registered users and target them when you have something to promote. This is another great way to use Twitter to grow your business.

6. Use UTM Tracking for Campaigns:
Imagine if you created a campaign for an online event and were running some Twitter ads.

When you look at Google Analytics, do you know which traffic was generated from organic tweets and which was generated from Twitter ads?

You can’t tell.

But if you use ‘UTM tracking’, you can.

This means that, when you are sharing out a link, you add some additional information to the link that identifies the campaign, the source of where you are sharing it and the type of link.

In Google Analytics, this can be tracked.

For example:
Campaign = Online Training April 2015
Source: Twitter
Medium: Twitter Ad

7. Reshare Evergreen Content:

When you create great content that doesn’t go out of date (i.e. evergreen), when should you stop sharing it?

How about never?

Why you should share older content:
a) You have new followers who never seen the content before.
b) Most of your existing followers have never seen the content before.
c) Existing followers may have seen it but forgotten about it.

There are many valid reasons!

8. Analyze Your Competitors:
Maybe your competitors have a more successful Twitter strategy than you? Maybe they get more engagement, more retweets etc. Well then it’s worth doing some analysis of them.

Twitonomy is a good tool for doing a detailed analysis of your competitors.

9. Reach Out and Find Those Influencers:
There are people in your niche who are very influential. They typically have a large following, but even more importantly, their audience listens to them.

When they tweet, their audience pays attention and shares those tweets. You want some of that audience! To get it, you need to work hard and build relationships with the influencers. Twtrland is a great tool for finding those influencers.

10. Use Twitter Analytics to Analyze and Optimize:
Twitter Analytics let you see how many views and how much engagement your tweets get. When you look at your analytics in detail, you can learn what your audience responds to the best (image posts? Videos? Links? Hashtags?) Tweet more of that. You need to constantly work on building your engagement levels. Studying your analytics will help you do this.

9. Jason Houck

Follow: On Twitter

1. Establish thought leadership:

Humans in a company; CEOs, managers and even salesmen, get the opportunity to step forward as niche experts and build influence through conversations. The give and take, back and forth nature of exchanges on twitter (any social media) allows your brand’s personality to come through, which facilitates the trust-building process.

2. Using Twitter Search:

Use Twitter’s search to find and follow a few people with interests and location relevant to your business. This alerts them to your presence and encourages them to follow you back. Find tweets with content relevant to your business and respond to them. This builds rapport and helps others feel appreciated. Search for questions relevant to your business and answer them.

3. Post Valuable Content:
Posting valuable content ensures people will continue following you. Some of your followers will engage with your valuable content and start a conversation with you. Many people talk about the importance of posting valuable content. So what’s with the asterisks? It’s important to remember that the content you define as valuable and the content your targeted audience defines as valuable may be two different things. I have read several articles about running faster, but I never tweet them out. I think those articles are valuable, but my targeted audience wants valuable articles about digital marketing or motivation. That’s why I exclusively tweet content related to digital marketing or motivation.

4. Reply Each Time Someone Replies To You:
Part of getting more engagement on Twitter is extending the conversations you find yourself in. Ask questions during the conversation and add insights that make the conversation continue. I have had some conversations with my Twitter followers that have lasted for several days. I got to know those people especially well. When it comes to conversations on Twitter and in real-life, it is better to have one meaningful and fun conversation than it is to have 10 “conversations” that only last a few seconds each.

5. Target The Right Users:
It is well known that one of the easiest ways to increase your number of followers on Twitter is to follow other people. Yet, at the same time, it is important to make certain that you are following the right Twitter users who can increase your exposure, boost your reputation, and improve the effectiveness of your marketing efforts. Locating those users who are most likely to benefit your marketing efforts is not always easy, but these steps can help:

  • Ensure your presence on Twitter is visible by linking to your Twitter account from LinkedIn, Facebook, your blog, email signatures, etc.
  • Keep your tweets on topic and focus on adding real value.
  • Use themed hashtags to ensure new followers find you.
  • Use searches and hashtags to develop a strategic plan for following new people.

6. Leveraging Trending Topics:
Using a hashtag search tool, such as Hashtagify.me can provide you with insight into currently trending topics. By tailoring your content to currently trending topics, you have a greater chance of ensuring that your content will be shared. Take care to ensure you fully understand a trending topic before you attempt to leverage it.

7. Character Limitations:
There is no denying that the 140-character limit imposed by Twitter can make it incredibly difficult to communicate marketing messages in an effective manner to targeted consumers. Even so, it is necessary. Those companies who master it have a significant advantage over competitors who do not. The following tips can help you to write more with less and still tap into the power of Twitter:

1. Shorten your words, condense your ideas, and ensure that your message sticks to the heart of what you want to say.

2. If your idea cannot be expressed in 140 characters or less, consider writing two tweets, but only do so if it is absolutely necessary.

3. Write a blog post and then add a link to it for more detailed information.

8. Give Credit To Your Sources:
When you share a link on Twitter, always remember to include the original source by typing “via @Twitterhandle” (where “Twitterhandle” is the username of the original poster) at the end of your tweet. This includes your source in the conversation, and also encourages them to retweet your tweet, especially if your tweet involves some sort of interesting comment or observation that relates to the link you’re sharing.

9. Develop An Effective Campaign:
What is it that you hope to accomplish through marketing on Twitter? For most companies, the ultimate answer is to increase profits, but there could be many different ways of going about it. Do you wish to create a direct path to customer purchase? Are you interested in creating buzz about a new product? Whatever it is, the following steps can help you to accomplish your goals:

  • Establish objectives. Determine what it is that you want to get out of your Twitter campaign.
  • Identify a topic that is meaningful. Ensure the topic you use is meaningful and relevant to your target audience, as well as consistent with your company’s brand positioning.
  • Select a hashtag that is compelling, catchy, short, and relevant.
  • Consider partnering with other Twitter users for greater exposure. Ensure the partners you choose are relevant and complementary to your business, but not competitors.
  • Offer incentives. Contests and giveaways provide incentives for followers to become engaged in your campaign.

Although it may be challenging to develop an effective marketing campaign on Twitter, the exposure and rewards are certainly well worth the effort for businesses of all sizes and from all sectors.

10. Measure Your ROI:
According to Ragan.com, there are several components involved in measuring social media marketing ROI. The key; however, is understanding what each of those elements actually means. For instances, “follows” are obviously important, but what do they mean for your brand? Engagement. The more follows your brand has, the more potentially active and engaged your total customer base could be. Using tools such as GroSocial and Brandwatch can assist you in measuring the success of specific hashtags and keywords.

10.Gary Loper

Follow: On Twitter

1. What to tweet?

Determine your mission on why you are on Twitter, stay on course.

  • Sharing recipes as an insurance rep sends a confusing message, and we all know that a confused mind will not buy.
  • Don’t sell until you have 2K followers and tweets – earn the right.
  • Keep politics, personal, and all other non-business issues off of your business account.
  • Be a resource for valuable information.
  • Suggest links to media.
  • Retweet quotes generously

2. Profile Information:
Who you are and what your purpose is in being on Twitter. Referring to that 4 to 10 second impression window, we have to tell the reader what they are expect to see in your tweet stream and determine if you are follow worthy.

Many people are not aware that your Twitter profile is searchable by all the search engine spiders. Filling your profile with your web site’s keywords and the niche you serve, will help a long way in making it easier for people to find you through both Twitter searches and Google/Bing queries. You are limited to 160 characters in your profile, remove unnecessary words, (ex: I like to, I this or that).

Focus on how you want to be found in a creative charming way. Ditch the Pitch, it’s social media – Be Social.

3. How much one should be on Twitter:

A person should be active on Twitter 2 times a day for about 20 minutes. I suggest that a new Tweeter with a purpose of building their community and business post 20 messages a day. It is really much simpler than you think.

4. Create a list:

As your following grows, you can’t watch everything that people tweet. Put people on lists. Examples would be great tweeters, industry leaders, authors, etc. I put people on lists that provide good content, that have valuable resources then I do not have to spend a lot of time creating new content or curating tweets. I can scan the list and find 5 to 10 messages to retweet. Then simply click ‘retweet, retweet, retweet’.

5. Use keywords in your Twitter profile:
Our profile is your name tag or business card, and creates an opportunity for people to ask or comment on your profile. Your profile is indexable by the search engine, and should contain the same keywords you have chosen for you website. Remember, you only get 160 characters in your profile to share your services or passions.

6. Become the Most Valuable Tweeter:

Search out people asking questions that your services can provide a solution. Start a conversation using their name without pitching, to build trust and rapport. Allow them to discover naturally what you do, and how you will be able to serve them.
Go boldly into the Twitterverse, and create even better relationships by remembering and referring to the people you are chatting with by name. When you give respect and validation first, you’ll be amazed on how much more will be returned to you from unexpected people, at unexpected times.

7. Get on Chats:

Twitter Chats are mini communities that meet regularly to have a group conversation usually surrounding a theme of the day with several questions spaced out over an hour. You can answer each question to join the chat be sure to include the hashtag of the group, so others in that conversation will see your answers.

8. Seek Out Your Mentors & Influencers:
Twitter has been around for a while now and there are probably already several thought leaders in every niche imaginable. Again, searching in Twitter will help you locate those people who already have an audience of people you share your interests, or may eventually be interested in what services you have to offer. Engaging & RT-ing these leaders and the most active people in those conversations will help establish you as someone to take notice of provided you’ve applied the other Keys in establishing your Twitter presence.

9. Best way to reach the world:
Build attraction. Focus on relationship building and delivering real value. Your tweets should contain one or more of these four elements, called Gary’s 4E’s: Entertain, Educate, Enhance, and Engage.

10. Promote Others:

Everyone loves to see their name mentioned by someone else, and it has deeper meaning for them if you are seen as Twitter Hierarchy as your list grows there is a sense of credibility that is bestowed upon you by the followers you’ve attracted. Share their blog or an article or Facebook message they posted or a simple RT.

This post is a part of a blog series on Marketing Success by ReportGarden, an ad agency client reports & dashboards automation software.

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