---

Guest post by: Roy Derrick Become an Author

Tweet

---

---

When I first began to use Twitter it was all very confusing to me. To the younger generation it is second nature, but knowing how to use twitter was alien to me. The only tweet that I was familiar with was the sound a bird made, twitter was a succession of notes sang by birds, tag was a children’s game and trend was just the latest fashion item. Oh how the world has changed!

Many of you may still be asking yourself “Why use twitter at all”? However twitter can be great fun to use both socially and from a marketing point of view for your business. Indeed, using twitter for business is a must. Let’s first of all clarity some points that you will need to be familiar with before you get started:

Twitter

Twitter is the name of the social network that allows followers to share tweets (namely shortened messages) with each other.

Tweet

A tweet is a shortened message (similar to a text) that a user posts to be read by their followers.

The maximum amount of characters allowed is 140 which also include those of your URL.

Followers

Followers are people who have agreed to follow your tweets. One of the best ways to get twitter followers at the beginning is to follow others in the hope that they will start to follow you too. One way to try to get more of your Twitter followers to follow you is by posting good quality and varied content and by retweeting or commenting on others people’s tweets.

Retweeting

Retweeting is when your post someone’s tweet to your followers. This can be beneficial to both parties. It can benefit you as it will help you to connect with your followers by retweeting their tweets. It can also provide good content for you. It will help your followers as you will be sharing their content with a wider audience i.e. your followers.

Connect

Connect is the most important section within twitter as it will show you details of people that have “connected” with you...namely people that have started following you, retweeted your tweets, mentioned you within their tweets or favourited your tweet. This section will help you to determine how powerful your content has been to others. It is always beneficial to reply to the people who have connected with you in order for them to continue to follow you and to distribute your content to their followers. This is particularly advantageous to business owners who want to promote their brand and products as it will help you to market to more people.

Tag

A tag is when a follower mentions you within their tweet by inserting a @ symbol before your twitter domain within their tweet (ensuring not to leave any spaces in between.) Again this can be very powerful in helping you to reach a wider audience.

Favourite

A Favourite is when someone likes you tweet and they press the “favourite” tab. This is useful as it acts like a “like” on Facebook and proves that your content has been of value to others.

Hash tag

A hash tag is a means of categorising messages and keywords by insert the # symbol before your keywords (again without any spaces between the characters.) Hash tags also help to create a list for followers to see what is trending at that particular time.

Trending

Trending is where a list of the most popular topics being discussed at that time, is displayed for others to see. Often people will then join in by tweeting their own views on that topic by adding the hash tag.

One popular hash tag that is frequently used is #FF which is short for follow Friday. This is where, every Friday, users recommend people that others should follow.

You should generally not use any more than 2 hash tags per tweet.

Using # on twitter can be particularly useful for businesses as they can add a hash tag to categorise certain aspects of their business e.g. #builderincardiff #landscaperinpontypridd etc.

Discover

The discover section highlights any current items that are featured within the news media that day.

To get the most from any networking sites it is important to interlink them. For example you should always link your face book to your twitter account.

Despite my initial reservations about joining twitter to promote my business, I have to say that not only is it great fun but it is hugely advantageous in promoting my services for free.

If you are thinking about starting a new business, twitter and other social networking sites can offer the best ways to promote your business for free.

As stated previously, do not be put off by all the jargon, as when you familiarise yourself with all the terms and you know how to use Twitter, it can be great fun and create great results both for your business and from a personal point of view by connecting you with other like minded individuals.

Related Articles

  Four Easy Twitter Tools to Supplement Your Marketing
  Blogging, Articles and Twitter - A Powerful Marketing Combination
  Legal Marketing: Why use Twitter?
  You're Addicted to Twitter If You..
  How Twitter can have a postive effect on your business
  Twitter Tips: The Secrets You Should Know
  Twabulous Twitter Tools
  Twitter Tools: The Definitive List of the Best Twitter Tools Ever
  Is Twitter on their last “tweet”?
  Twitter Quick Tips
  Is Twitter For The Birds?
  Fun Calculators to Gauge Your Social Media Campaign
  WordPress Blogging Tip - Get Known in a Huge Way Using Social Networks
  Small Business Marketing with Twitter – How to Integrate Twitter with Your Website
  Why Twitter?
  Get Your Website in Front of 2000 Qualified Prospects for Free Using this Simple Advertising Method
  Wanna Know How To Increase Twitter Followers?
  Avoid These 5 Twitter Mistakes
  How to Use Twitter for Business
  Harnessing The Power of Twitter Marketing in Your Business

Related Forum Posts

Re: Host of Marketing Made Simple TV
Re: e-Commerce and e-Payment providers
Re: Domain name sugestion
Re: Using Twitter To Double Your Traffic?
How to Use Twitter to Market Products?

Share this article. Fund someone's dream.

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

How To Improve Your CTA (Call To Action)

What Is A Solo Entrepreneur?

Hold On To Your Plan -- “Loosely”

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.