Some Tips for Using Twitter

Twitter has become one of the many ways to announce a new product, a special promotion or link to a press release. To hang on to their followers, business's tweets need to be more than shameless self promotion. Twitter is a remarkable social media platform for businesses. It’s a way to connect with new people, keep in touch with those you know, find out what’s going on in your world and get your message out there. And all in 140 characters.

                                             Some tips and tricks

- Don’t be Vague – Write your bio. This will allow other Twitter users to get to know who you are at a glance.

- Don’t just Click on the Follow button – Make sure to check out the bios of each of the people following you, this will eliminate the chance of you following spammers.

- Keep it short. Posting links and content is a great thing, but Twitter users are all about brevity, so be sure to shorten your links by using a redirect service. http://bit.ly is a good one for measuring your click-thrus and performance.

- Reply with a period. Twitter filters allow users to only view replies if they are following each side of the conversation. But by starting off your reply with a period, the post won't start with @--it will instead be viewed as a separate tweet and will be seen by all of your followers.

- Ask Questions. People want to feel like you value their opinion and asking questions, even simple ones, tend to receive more engagement.

- A picture's worth a thousand tweets. You know how important pictures are in any social media platform, and Twitter is no exception.An image attached to any tweet is sure to increase visibility and engagement.

- Follow people by industry or interest, learn from them.

- Share tweets that adds value to the stream. Adding value to the stream is how to stand out in Twitter.

- Watch for auto-correct. It's a sneaky beast.

- There's room for 140, but try to keep it to 100-120 characters.

- Connect it with Klout.

- Use a URL shortner for all links you post .

- Incorporate hashtags when possible, it's how people find you.

- Use tools like Tweetdeck or Hootsuite to help manage multiple accounts & searches.

- Connect Facebook to Twitter.

- Post your Twitter handle in your email signature, website, or other sites.

- Share your best tweets on other platforms (blogs, Facebook, websites).

- Read tweets twice before posting.

- Try using Tweepi.

- Profile: Link to your own site, not other social media.

- Build relationships by continuing engagement with people.

- Take a peek at #hashtags that interest you.

- Retweets: (RT) Retweeting is how Twitter users share interesting tweets from the people they’re following. They copy and paste the original tweet and send it out. To give credit to the original person, users usually put “RT” plus the originator’s username at the beginning of the tweet. You might also see HT (heard through) and MT (modified tweet)

You don’t need to follow someone to @reply them. If you put the @username anywhere else in the tweet other than the start all your followers will see it. This is called an @mention. You may want to do this to give someone public acknowledgement or credit or to promote them or their tweet to your followers .

You can protect your tweets so that only your followers can see them.  This will lead to less spam However it makes it less likely you will pick up new followers, as people can't see what you're saying.

If your account is protected, you cannot be retweeted by use of the "retweet" button. People still can retweet you though by copying and pasting your tweet with the letters "RT" at the start of the tweet.

Don’t worry too much about how you “come across” on Twitter. Just be yourself and tweet form the heart. Don’t stress too much about the numbers—instead, use the platform to connect genuinely with the Twitter followers you already have, and let the rest take care of itself!