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The Twitter Handbook: Tips and Resources for Mastering Twitter

[updated: Oct 16, 2009] 

Also see Bighow Online Journalism Handbook Bighow Social Media Handbook Twitter Handbook for Journalists Twitter Handbook for Education and Twitter Handbook for Business

If you want to share your Twitter tips, or a link about Twitter guides, use the tag 'twitter' when you submit.

Mastering Twitter

What is Twitter?

A free social networking and micro-blogging service where people post text-based messages of up to 140 characters in length.

What can I do with Twitter?
Send updates, ask question, share links, find people, arrange stuff, read interesting things...do more.
 

The first Twitter status update ever sent on March 21st, 2006 by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey.

How does Twitter work?
1. You create an account with twitter and start posting updates in 140 characters or less.
2. You find other people whose updates you want to follow.
3. You let other people know about your twitter account so that they can start following your updates
4. You build you network, watch as the conversations and updates start flowing, and jump in with your own contributions, ideas, reflections and updates.

How can Twitter Help My Business?
Dell used their Twitter account to send sales alerts to users and has claimed to generate over $1 million in revenue since 2008.

How can Twitter help my work?
As a professional, you can use Twitter to

- Network and share information with other people in your industry;
- Gain recognition among your peers for innovative ideas and insights;
- Attract potential readers for your blog or website;
- Research competitors;
- Create awareness;
- Build your brand.
- Search Twitter posts (aka "tweets") to see what people are saying about your business or topics you are interested in.

Twitter Basics

Your Timeline - shows tweets by all the people you follow. Also includes responses that people have directed @ you, including people you may not follow.
Public Timeline - shows tweets from everywhere.
Normal Tweet (Update) - Post your 140 character message.
Use @ + user name to send a reply or comment on others posts - it will show up in the users' timeline whether or not they follow you. The format is: @[Twitter member name] [your response]
Use RT + user name to share another user's post with your followers [aka Rweeting]. The format is 'RT @[Twitter member name] [text from original tweet] [URL if any] - [your comment]'.
Use Direct Messages (dm) to specific users that are private from everyone else. The format is "d [Twitter member name] [your response]".
Favorite - bookmark tweets you like and view later.

How Do I Start On Twitter?

1. Create your Twitter account: Claim your real name, brandname, company's name before others do
2. Complete your one-line Twitter bio (profile): Click on 'Account/Settings'. In 1 line, establish who you are, what you're into, and why you matter.
 

Tips for valuable profiles: a) add your Twitter profile link to your outgoing email and blog posts/comments, b) cross-link your Twitter profile to your business site, and vice versa.
3. Add your photo to your profile: Your actual photo is more credible than any cartoon avatar.
4. Customize your profile background: This is optional. Your profile page can easily reflect you and your brand.
5. Start tweeting.
6. Do not start following people immediately: Use search.twitter.com for people and updates related to your interests and only then make up your mind. When you find someone of interest, click the 'Follow' button on their profile to add them to your followers list and start receiving their status updates.

What Should I Tweet About?
The Golden Twitter Rule: Think before you tweet.
 

Don't answer, "What are you doing?" Answer, "What am I thinking?"
- Mathew Ingram @mathewi

"What do I want to know?"
- Steve Buttry @stevebuttry

Try not to answer the standard Twitter questions, "What are you doing?"
 

1. Try instead to answer this: "What is the most interesting article, related to your business or profession, that you read today?"
2. Effective Twitterers including @jayrosen_nyu pick on a hot theme in their industry (news industry) and then look for and then post an interesting summary of interesting articles or Tweets.
3. Pay attention to what the people you are following are talking about. Jump into the conversation if you have something to say. When someone asks a question, and you have an answer, be sure to respond.
4. Retweet interesting items posted by other Twitterers.
 

Following

Who Should I Follow?
Whoever looks interesting.

What should I do with my followers?
1. Bring real value to your followers.
2. Follow the people who follow you.
3. Verify users before following - avoid spammers and bots.
4. Welcome new followers with a personal, private response.
5. Interact with your followers - talk to them about issues - create a real conversation.
6. Don't be pompous

Angela Maiers' 70-20-10 Twitter Engagement Formula
- 70% of your tweets should share resources- sharing other people's voices, opinions, quotes, blog posts, articles, content and resources
- 20% of your tweets should engage in conversations with others, responding, connecting, collaborating and connecting with others.
- 10% of your tweets can be chirping, chitchat as Angela calls it, on trivial details or self-promotion.

What to retweet Wondering what to retweet?
According to Dan Zarrella (@danzarrella, four types of posts that are commonly retweeted:
1. How-tos and instructional stories or videos
2. News, especially breaking news
3. Warnings (like a scam or virus that is circulating)
4. Freebies and contests Those are all pretty easy to figure out.

Besides, you will find many funny and witty one-liners on Twitter.
 

How to tag topics

If you know social bookmarking and Del.icio.us you will the value of tagging in arranging information. To organize the constant stream of information, you can use Hashtags.oeg to assign tags and track latest updates on Twitter

Fight spam
Twitter spam comes in two primary forms: random @messages and random direct messages.
 

If you receive an @message from somebody you do not know offering a link to a site that "will make you feel better" or a direct message suggesting that your ultimate happiness is just a click away, you have been spammed.

Follow Twitter's spam account, http://twitter.com/spam. After they have followed you back (which happens right away), DM them the name of any spammy accounts you 137 encounter.

You can also send email to spam@twitter.com with details of the spam tweet you received. Block the spammer. Just head over to the spammer's account page and look on the right side for the Block link.
 

When you block an account, it can no longer send you messages or see yours. In addition, Twitter keeps an eye on blocked accounts to see if theyare spam.

Unfollow the spammer. If you are following the account, now is a good time to unfollow it.
 

Go to the spammer's account page, and in the upper-left corner, under the picture, click Following. That opens a box where you can click Remove to unfollow.

Do not spam anyone

Do not auto-DM
Auto-DMs are generic direct messages some people send when you follow them are impersonal, disruptive and almost never spark a good conversation.

Unfollow graciously
To unfollow somebody, head to her account page. Under her picture, click the bar that says "Following", and then in the box that opens, click Remove.

When via is better than RT
Think before you retweet, and write a note that tells the world what this link means to you. Then use via to tell the world who showed you the link in the first place.
(Via is also great for giving credit when you got a link from a source who is not on Twitter.)
 

How to get great followers
A small number of great followers is much more valuable than a herd of uninterested people. Drawing smart followers involves three key pieces:
1. Be interesting. The best way to become popular on Twitter is to post messages that other people want to read, retweet and respond to. In the next couple of chapters, we show how plenty of people are interesting and witty in 140 characters.
2. Be conversational. Engage with people, whether they are already following you or not. People like it. Plus, when prospective followers hit your Twitter account page, they will see you are a friendly, thoughtful person.
3. Follow relevant people. If you follow somebody, there is a good chance she'll follow you back.

How to Pick Up Followers on Twitter
Follow the "smores (social media whores*)".
Send @ messages to the smores.
Create an effective avatar.
Follow everyone who follows you.
Always be linking.
Establish yourself as a subject expert.
Incorporate pictures and other media.
Use the right tools.
Repeat your tweets.
Ask people to follow.
- Guy Kawasaki

Where to promote your Twitter account
1. Email signature
2. Personal/corporate website
3. Blog homepage + posts
4. Email newsletter
5. Presentations
6. Business Card
7. Article writing / guest blog posting
8. Networking on Twitter: By using the "@" symbol and either retweeting or communicating with other people.
9. Promotional products: E.g. Twitter account URL on T-shirts

The Art of Writing Great Twitter Headlines
Brian Clark of Copyblogger fame writes that a  quick review of The 100 Greatest Advertisements by Julian Lewis Watkins shows that 95% of the most effective headlines from the early years of magazine advertising were eight words or less.

Brian's advice: To make sure your headlines always offer a compelling reward is to use the 4-U approach. Your headlines must:
1. Be USEFUL to the reader,
2. Provide him with a sense of URGENCY,
3. Convey the idea that the main benefit is somehow UNIQUE; and
4. Do all of the above in an ULTRA-SPECIFIC way.

The 80/20 Rule of Headlines

On average, 8 out of 10 people will read a headline, but only 2 out of 10 will go on to read the content.

- Anon.

Headlines tip: Persuasive / descriptive headlines with adjectives
eg. 10 awesome...

The Twitter Posting Rule: Short headlines, shorter URLS.

Use Profile of a Top Twitterer
Guy Kowasaki, who has more than 36,000 followers, has a tweeting frequency of almost 36 tweets a day and he distributes them evenly over a period of time

Create Memes
It can be easier to get on the radar if you wade into an existing conversation, especially if you say something new, or have a wild opinion, or add value to what has already been said.
 

You can seed your post as a reply to a Tweet by a top Twitterer or the top Twitterer in your industry.

Five Interesting Twitter Facts

1. Tuesday is the most popular day for Twitter activity, accounting for 15.7% and you Tweet from 11am to 3pm (of course this was expected, who wants to tweet on Monday)

2. Men comprise 45% of Twitter users, while women represent 55%

3. 1 out of every 350 visits to a Website comes from Twitter as a source

4. Among Twitter users, the median number of lifetime tweets per user is one. This translates into over half of Twitter users tweeting less than once every 74 days
5. The top 10% of prolific Twitter users accounted for over 90% of tweets. On a typical online social network, the top 10% of users account for 30% of all production. In this way, Twitter is mostly a one-way, one-to-many publishing service more than a two-way, peer-to-peer communication network
Source

The Twitter Glossary
Tweets: posts made by twitter users, which must be under 140 characters
Follow: subscribe to a particular users' Twitter posts
Unfollow: unsubscribe from a particular users' Twitter posts
RT: Retweet: tweeting content posted by another user
DM / direct message: send a direct private message to another twitter user
Tweetback: a backlink tweet for a blog article
Favorite: a post on twitter that you mark as favorite to find it quickly when you need it
Followorthy: a twitter user who is worthy of following
Followspam: The practice of following another twitter account, usually to prompt a reciprocol follow in order to boost follow count, or to encourage the followee to explore the profile fo the follower, whereupon they inevitably see some form of advertising or come-on.
Tweetup: meeting a twitter user/s in the real world
Failwhale: The cartoon graphic of a whale, held up by birds, that indicates Twitter is experiencing technical difficulties.
Tweeps: slang for friends on twitter
Tweople: slang for people who tweet
Twammer: Twitter + spammer: someone that follows many people and post updates with links to web sites akin to those found in spam e-mails. Internet marketers mostly.
Qwitter: a tool used to catch twitter quitters - Use Quitter.com
Reportwitters: reporter style twitterers
Tweetaholic: someone addicted to Twitter, so much so that it may be an actual problem.
Tweetup: when twitterers meet in person - a Twitter meet up.
TwinkedIn: inviting friends made on Twitter to connect with you on LinkedIn.
Twitosphere: community of twitterers.
Twittastic: fantastic, wonderful, superb.
Twitterati: The A-list twitterers.
Twittercal mass: a community that has achieved a critical mass of twitterers.
Twitterfly: being a social butterfly on Twitter evidenced by extreme usage of @ signs.
Twittermob: an unruly and ragtag horde of people who descend on an ill-prepared location after a provocative Twitter message.
Twittermaps: a mashup technology that lets Twitter users find each other using google maps.
Twitophant / Twitophantic: Twitter version of blog comment spammer. One who repeatedly tweets the Top 100 in an attempt to gain more followers.
Tweetjacking: Hijacking someone's tweet by switching their link for your own and retweeting it, piggybacking on their authority to drive traffic to your own target page. Done by Internet marketing people.
Twitterpacks: Public lists of other people's followers.

 

TweetMyGaming - A real-time feed of video game conversations happening on Twitter
Sportytweets - Sports news aggregation

Twitter bots for productivity and fun
Timer - receive a future reminder through Twitter.
GCal - Update your Google Calendar on Twitter
Wordbot - Help with Crosswords and Scrabble.
TwitterSecret - Have your secret posted to Twitter anonymously
iwantsandy - personal email assistant
Twrivia - Daily trivia quiz on Twitter

Twitter for Advertising
Twittertise - Advertise on Twitter
Twitterad - Monetize your twitter profile
TwitterCard - Place a 125×125 TwitterCard on your Blog or as an Advertisement
Twitterribbons - Twitter Ribbon Ad generator
FeaturedUsers - FeaturedUsers is a Twitter application ad network
BeaMagpie - Be a Magpie is an ad network for Twitter

Twitter for Developers
Twitter API for Dummies
How to Make a Unique Website for Your Twitter Updates
Building an Application with the Twitter API
Building Your Own Twitter Client with Fluid and jQuery

Using Twitter for change
Twitition.com - create petitions that people people can sign by retweeting a message
Twitition - Create petitions using Twitter
TinyPetition - Petitions on Twitter

Twitter for Nonprofits
Nonprofitorgs on Twitter - an aggregator of nonprofits on Twitter and is following over 2,000 nonprofits.
TwitterPacks/Nonprofit - a list of over 300 nonprofits (not all are on non profits orgs on Twitter)
NPTech Twitter Group - a list of 263 nonprofit technology geeks.
How nonprofits are using Twitter to spread the word about their programs and services
Twitter Tool Box - A collection of Twitter tools, tips, and how-tos assembled by nonprofit techies.