how to engage and get more twitter followers and friendsTo tweet or non to tweet was your question of 2010. At present that information technology'due south 2011 you lot've decided to take the big tweet plunge. Yous finally get the guts to hop on Twitter.

Chances are your experience might take started out a picayune like this:

1. Yous setup your business relationship.

two. You followed some famous people that Twitter suggested you follow. Every bit y'all did this you thought... "hmmm... just what I idea... Twitter is a waste product of time... why practice I need to follow Justin Bieber?"

three. You listened to the advice of the people "who get information technology" and put a real photograph of yourself every bit the avatar, not the generic egg Twitter provides y'all with.

four. You tried changing your Twitter background and colors merely gave up as you don't have a brand nonetheless anyway.

5. You question the purpose and the fact that you setup your Twitter account. You don't see what all your friends are getting and so excited about Twitter. Y'all might even be thinking to yourself that you'll never set up foot on it once again after today unless at to the lowest degree 1 person follows you back within the next 24 hours.

half-dozen. You first to wonder if you are equally absurd as you lot thought you were before you hopped on Twitter. Merely then you think again and decide you aren't going to let some dumb blueish bird determine your cool factor.

7. Yous transport your first tweet and it reads something like "hellllooo... Information technology'south my first day on Twitter... anybody there?"

8. Yous wish you had more than followers.

9. You decide to wait until tomorrow to effigy out this Twitter matter. You lot have real piece of work to do.

10. On your fashion home from the office you start thinking about what on earth you are going to Tweet most tomorrow! You just can't seem to become that crazy little blueish bird out of your caput!

I know the in a higher place may not be exactly the same steps y'all went thru when you lot hopped on Twitter. Nonetheless, from my experience in helping many small and medium size business organization leaders, my guess is information technology's pretty close!

So, allow'due south talk about where you should go from here.

17 Tips to Become you Tweetin', Makin' Friends and Hopefully Some Followers Along the Way!

1. Organize your social firm. Grab yourself a notebook and keep rails of all logins, passwords etc. Create a folder in your electronic mail inbox to salvage all of the business relationship creation confirmations and other information.

ii. Develop your tweet plan. Random acts of tweeting and random acts of social media accept offer only one guarantee and that is to waste your most greatest asset which is time. Ensure that your social media and tweetin' activities align to your business concern goals and objectives. Having a purpose in your tweets volition better organically attract people to you and your content.

iii. Create a content message firm. If y'all don't already have one, create a message house for your business. At minimum it should include your vision, mission, value proffer, descriptions of business and products, primal features, differentiation statements and key positioning messages. Every bit part of the bulletin create a list of potential tweets that could aid an audition. Focus on educating and inspiring your target audience.

4. Commencement social listening. The first step in social media is to larn about the ecosystem yous are getting gear up to enter. Spend some fourth dimension searching for, post-obit and listening to interesting tweeters. Hop on to Kurrently, Twellow and Twitter Search for real-time searches. Kurrently offers existent-time results for both Twitter and Facebook. These types of tools will provide you an easy mode to observe and connect with similar minds.

5. Create Twitter lists to showtime tracking the people yous meet and find interesting. Organize your twitter lists past topic, industry, demographics or whatever best supports your concern and marketing objectives, goals, and plans.

half dozen. Show some social media dear! During your early on stages of social media and tweeting focus on learning from and supporting others. Even if y'all aren't yet creating your own content y'all can be a content curator which searches for and serves upwards peachy content from other thought leaders in your industry. Focus on finding good quality content creators in your market industry or niche. And so you lot tin retweet and share their content on platforms such as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.

7. Connect authentically with other thought leaders. Now that you've done some social listening, started to curate some decent information and likewise share some of the best content yous find with your friends, at present information technology's time to first building some relationships. Get out a comment on your favorite blog. Transport your favorite writer a tweet about their content, their website or something you found interesting that they said.

viii. Be authentic and real. Don't pretend you lot know everything. Be apprehensive and don't be afraid to ask for aid. If you don't understand something someone writes near or tweets to you lot, so by all ways ask them for description. Allow people know the real you. The more you exercise this the easier information technology will be for you to connect with existent people.

9. Search for and outset following more than people. At present that you lot're getting the hang of this "Twter thang" a little fleck, it'southward time to get-go finding more people to "tweet with". There are numerous tools that volition help you find and follow people easily. Check out HootSuite, TweetDeck, and simple practise a search on Google for Twitter tools. Send a tweet and inquire for suggestions or ask ane of your favorite thought leaders you met during your early stages of social listening.

10. Proceed to focus on adding value. Never stop giving when tweeting. Focus on sharing valuable, relevant content with your audition and yous will organically grow your following.

11. Use hashtags such as #sm or #twitter. Hashtags increase the chances of your tweets getting found, increase your organic twitter post-obit. Hashtags are basically a keyword that starts with a pound sign. For example people talking about real estate might use #realestate. Hashtags assist people connect who have like interests in topics. Y'all can bank check out trending and popular topics using hashtags at What The Hashtag. You tin can also connect with groups or create a grouping for a hashtag at Hashtag.org

12. Make it easy for people to find your twitter handle. Add your new twitter handle to your online and offline signatures and identity. Don't forget to add it to your business cards, electronic mail signature, LinkedIn profile and Facebook data folio. Basically add it everywhere and anywhere you provide your contact information.

xiii. Learn and have twitter and social media is one large conversation. This is not a gimmick or a bunch of crazy tweeters gone mad. Twitter is truly ane big social conversation. The best thing you tin do is join and add together value. Go role of the conversation as early as you lot tin. Ask questions, provide answers, share quotes, and tell jokes. Just exist the person you are but do information technology in 140 character increments.

xiv. Realize your success will profoundly depend on relationships. The ameliorate you tin can connect with other tweeters via conversations and past providing valuable content, the more than benefit you will reap. You lot will organically attract friends and followers as y'all build existent and authentic relationships. If yous think about it, it'southward really no unlike than how you network offline. The big departure is instead of wasting time driving to a networking outcome and having to talk to Emerge, Dick and Harry about the same thing you talked about at the final 25 networking meetings, you can now exist more selective in where you lot spend your time. You tin can accept side bar ane:1 conversations with i, 2 or 10 people at a fourth dimension. Learning the conversation and human relationship duo in social media volition jet set you above your competition and fast.

15. Know yous are not going out of business if you lot lose a twitter follower! Followers will come up and go. Everyone volition not like you lot but that doesn't matter. Focus on the ones who practice! You lot aren't going to larn everything over night. Larn what you can at the speed that makes sesnse for you. Focus on the proficient people you meet and give and so your energy and focus. In that location are 10 more than good people who will follow you for anyone who won't or who unfollows yous. Realize many people employ auto-follow and motorcar-unfollow tools. Often times if you lot don't follow someone dorsum their motorcar-tool may drop you. So, if they un-follow it might not be personal at all!

16. Don't get caught up in the lingo. Aye learn it but don't be as well hard on yourself. It's okay if you refer to a twit every bit a tweet in early on days. Information technology's not going to blow upwardly your tweet account. We've all been there. You'll larn information technology eventually!

17. Have fun. When all is said and done information technology'south non life or expiry if you "get twitter" inside the next xxx days. You've been without it this long, what'southward another xxx-sixty days. Integrate information technology into your business and find fun ways yous can engage and leverage to build real relationships.

Your Turn

What are your thoughts? What did you first think when you joined Twitter? How can you assistance others who are still new and learning? If you are new, what do you find the most difficult to learn and understand? What have yous constitute the about humorous in Twitterville?