How To Use Twitter

Twitter recently has been getting alot of press and there are alot of non geeks getting on twitter. With that many are (a) confused or (b) misusing the service due to a lack of knowledge. One thing that is very interesting to me about the twitter main site is they poorly describe to the new user how to use the site.

I first joined twitter in 2007 and when I thought it was cool but didn’t really understand it at all. Well, a few years later, I got back on it and began to use it but because I couldn’t find my friends (Misconception #1) I got back and stayed with facebook. To me facebook was clean, made sense instantly and everyone I knew was there. But then in 2009, it hit me and I found out how to (1) extract value out of twitter and (2) put value into twitter.

Here is my list of ways to get and give value into Twitter.

1. Do not think of Twitter as a Social Network First
   1. This is the biggest misconception when you look at Twitter first as a social network you will quickly see it as silly or having no value.
      • View twitter as a way to follow leaders, movers, shakers, family, friends and see what they are thinking or doing.
      • The “follow” principal is based on that you are not where they are, you are not thinking what they are thinking but by “following” someone you can gain access to someone that you may not otherwise gain access to.
      • Think of Twitter of Follow/Followers First and Then as you develop a relationship it becomes social networking.
2. 140 Characters
   • First you may think, man how am I supposed to cram all of my super long thoughts into 140 characters?!?! That is the point.
     • The 140 character limit forces you into being conscise direct and hopeful meaningful. This does not mean to break a 500 character message into 3 updates, no one wants to read that… Trust me.
3. Statuses, Replies, Direct Messages, Favorites
   • Statuses
     • In the box with a simple message, “What Are You Doing?” can cause someone to update this with, “I am using the bathroom.” or “I am driving to work.” But this, I believe is the most ineffective way to use twitter. Think of the question not “What Are You Doing?” but “What Are You Doing/Thinking that Adds Value to Your Follower’s Life?”Want to find out if your statuses are of value? Are you loosing or gaining followers? If you are loosing followers, what better way to tell you… Post something of value.
   • Replies
     • Because of the lack of value put on Statues when you reply to someone’s status and they reply to you, why not just keep that party going? No! Your followers, do not want to follow the conversation of your friends unless it meets the rule of adding value to their life. No one wants to pull up twitter and have their feed filled with a conversation about you and your dog. Unless, you have mentions that are meaningful.
   • Direct Messages
     • That brings me to Direct Messages, the perfect place for a conversation. I will often times, I have a status or respond to a status through DM so that we can converse on that topic keeping all the details here. However, if something is said that is powerful or impactful then I move it to my status.
   • ReTwit
     • Lets say you like someone’s status and want to share it with everyone that is following you. You can “ReTwit” which means to take their take and make it your status. Twitter will automatically add their name so that the original poster can recieve status. This is how alot of news or information passes quickly through Twitter.
   • Favorites
     • This is one of my personal favorite features of Twitter. Often times I am reading Twitter on my phone using Twikini and someone says something of value but I can’t read it now. It may be a great link or a interesting status that I want to think about later. I will mark it as my favorite and then later come back to it to really evaluate it.I use this often with industry leaders. They post so much stuff, I can’t possible take it all in at that time, so I will favorite it and then come back when my life slows down.
4. Twitter Language (@, #, Follow Friday) – Another wrench is that Twitter does have it’s own lanugage and to a novice that language looks rather foolish.
   • @
     • When you are directing a message to someone you will use the “@” symbol. This is only used in statuses and not direct messages because it tells all of your followers that you are talking @calvinwilliams.
   • #
     • This is a really neat feature to me but you are able to tag your statuses so that others that maybe searching for the same subject can find it. For example, if this were a post “Going downtown to grab some #fastfood.” The “#fastfood” part will feature an underline (on my twitter apps) that would allow you to then click on the link and view everyone else that is talking about the same thing. It is a real quick way to guage the activity of a certain topic or term.
   • Follow Friday
     • If you log on Twitter on Friday, you will see status like #FollowFriday @calvinwilliams @freelancesw @xmgonline @beverlbr. That may just look like a bunch of WHAT?! But lets break this down with our current knowledge:#FollowFriday – ah telling everyone that follows me that I am posting a status about Follow Friday
       @calvinwilliams (and others) – giving everyone that follows me the names of other users

       FollowFriday is all about promoting some good people that you follow to other people. It increases their “follow-ship” (just made that up) and is good for the community. Think of it as these are my top friends/associates on twitter.

5. Linking
   • Alot of statuses now have links to other content because of the 140 limit. So, often times people post a link that looks real short. They have used a URL shorten to make a long URL fit and take up less characters. Check out this site.
6. Twitter Applications
   • Twitter has such a following that they have some sort of economy around them (although not sure if everything is profitable). Instead of being on your desktop, logged on to www.twitter.com you can use applications to access twitter for you on the device that you use the most. They have applications for BlackBerry, Iphone, Windows Mobile, Ipod, Desktops, Plug In To Websites, Facebook, etc.It is all about where do you already spend much of your time and then finding the app that you like that fits your lifestyle.My suggestion of apps are for Mac and Windows, Windows Mobile, and Iphone. For Windows Mobile, I just have to highlight my favorite program, Twikini. I love this program! It is so easy to use. It has different profiles. It is out of beta now and it is great. It meets all of my needs for a twitter app (see screen shot) listed below. If you want to get it, you can visit here.What Do I look for in a twitter app?
     • Ease of Use
     • Attractive
     • Fast
     • Ability to Post/Read/Reply/Edit Status, Replies, Favorites and Direct Messages easily
     • Ability to click links out of the status

So, there are alot of other uses for Twitter but this is a good foundation and will get you on your way. One of the best things you can do on twitter is to follow me, lol. Can you blame me? Enjoy the Day.

C.