Last Updated on: January 26th, 2021
Twitter is one of the most widely used social media networks, and I’m learning to be a better, more frequent Tweeter, thanks to Joanna Penn, who encouraged me to use SocialOomph, and Max Christian Hansen, who put together an ebook that’s super-helpful.
I more than doubled my followers in less than two weeks using Max’s guide, and even tried used the free version of SocialOomph to schedule some my tweets. (The free version runs on a two-week trial period.) I didn’t particularly like scheduling my tweets, but I thought I’d try it. I discovered that I much prefer tweeting on my own, although I can see some benefit to scheduling SOME tweets.
I have also used Ashley Faulkes’ advice, which is to improve the quality of your tweets, and I used ManageFlitter to help “unfollow” people who have no interest in following you back. These strategies should be used in conjunction with Max’s guide.
The results:
Thanks to Max and Ashley, I have nearly tripled my Twitter following in the last couple of months. Since six months ago, I have multiplied my following by nearly twenty times.
Let’s look at some facts:
At the beginning of April, I had 56 followers.
Four months later, at the beginning of August, I had roughly 356.
Two weeks later, in mid-August, I had 551.
1.5 months later, I have over 1010.
In mid-October, I had over 1125. Of course, some of my followers were gained due to the #FF, which means
Follow Fridays. It seems that people use this hashtag to tell others about cool peeps to follow. (More on this below…)
If you are a visual person, take a look at chart I created. You can see for yourself how drastic these results are!
To Schedule or Not To Schedule Tweets?
I never thought that I would be one to schedule my tweets. I did not schedule all of them, but I did schedule some of them. It took me an hour to input a week’s worth of tweets. I mixed it up, promoting others, promoting my blogs, tweeting quotes, and saying stuff of my own.
The experts say to use different rules or ratios for this. For example, using the 60/20/20 or the 80/20 or the 70/30 rule. Whichever way you look at it, the larger numbers represent the promotion of others’ content and the smaller numbers represent the promotion of your own. Getting caught up in the numbers is not for everyone – and I don’t, really – but I do try to promote others more than myself. It’s really true that people like givers. It’s also true that by giving, you will get. However, you will not get if you don’t give. It’s that simple. Also, you don’t want to seem needy, or spammy – no one likes a spam whore! 😉
Learning to be a better Tweeter takes time. I’ve been at it for months. Sometimes, I forget to tweet. That’s when scheduling comes in handy, I guess. You can get people to see your face daily, even if you are sick in bed with the flu, out for dinner, or visiting family or friends. Scheduling allows you to be in two places at the same time! In that respect, scheduling is awesome! 😀
Generally, I share good articles when I come across them. I tweet when I remember. I try to mention someone each week, and I try to RT (retweet) good content. Of course, I always check out the site before RT-ing something! I don’t want to be associated with promoting something I don’t like, or promoting a site that is flagged as ‘red’ by my WOT (Web of Trust) browser add-on.
I’m still learning, though, how to be a better Tweeter.
Recently I learned that using the hashtag FF (#FF) will get you introduced to popular, active, awesome Tweeters. If you click on someone’s handle, you will be brought to their page, where you can choose to follow them. Did you know this? If so, great! 🙂 If not, now you do!
Learning to be a better tweeter takes time, patience, and practice. If you are committed to growing your following, impressing people with numbers, and/or building an author platform, then investing some time into learning the tricks of the Twitter trade is something I’d advise you to do. It’s nice when total strangers mention you or retweet your tweets. Of course, many will “favourite” your tweets, too. (This is equivalent to “liking” something on Facebook or on WordPress! Or so I’m told.)
As always, I’d appreciate a social share and/or a comment. Looking at my stats to see if people are reading my blog posts is just not the same as interacting with you.
Are you a good Tweeter? What strategies do you use? Please share your thoughts in the comment section! Thanks!
Hello ! I а toy want to have a lot twitter followers you can get them at http://twitaholic.net This is a good start that to find a good friend )
Archie, I wish you the best of luck in your Twitter mission!
I’m enjoying Twitter, but just haven’t had time to learn from more about it. I’ll have to sit down and try out some of the things you have suggested here. Great information as always Lorraine.
Thanks, Debra! Twitter is pretty neat, and I admit I’m still learning about it. It’s a great way to connect with others, for sure! 😉
I use the paid-version of the JustUnfollow app. It was only $4.99 and has been a lifesaver in organizing my followers. In two years I have gained about 5k followers, but am no longer actively growing that number. I even cut it down by 1k awhile back. I make use of lists to keep track of the most helpful and friendly people. Also, Tweet Old Post is a great plugin that can used with self-hosted WordPress sites.
Sigh. Too many people can sure to be hard to keep track of, and that’s why I have started to cut back on growing my followers. I’m back to letting things happen naturally. I think that is the best way.
Thanks for sharing your strategy, Jeri. 😀
Wow, what great stats! I have been on Twitter much longer than you and don’t have half the followers you do. I also forget to tweet A LOT!
I much prefer to retweet others and reply when I am on there. Plus I find a lot of stuff on there is just fluff and annoys me, so I don’t want to add to it when I have nothing to say.
Still, if I want to increase my numbers I have to do something, so thank you for this. It’s about time I did something about it.
As with any social media, if you are active on it, people will notice.
I confess that I go in spurts – one week it will be Twitter, another it will be FB and G+. Variety is important.
I always try to share interesting posts to Twitter, which reminds me to go on it and post a few tweets. As long as I have something to say, I do that. You might try the same strategy, Rebecca. 😉
Thanks for commenting, too! 😀
Nice post, Lorraine! I am not very active on Twitter with my personal account – i don’t like it much and always think there’s something better to do with my time LOL. But reading your post – all the tips there are excellent but something else comes to mind, too – don’t get too caught up with numbers. Having a single great follower who is an influencer, for ex., or simply who is very fond of your writing (or book, or service, or whatever you want them to be fond of) is way better than having 100 random followers who have followed you back as courtesy of you following them in the first place…
One of the most common problems clients come to me with is having thousands of followers who don’t even know who they are and don’t care what they do or what they have to offer. Then twitter is of no use, especially to business. Numbers may be important sometimes but quality of the followers on twitter is way more important – just so you know 🙂
What happened to Max, by the way – do you know? I have not seen anything from him for a long while. Thanks for the link to Ashley’s twitter post – heading there now!
Diana, I appreciate your concern about both Max and the numbers. I have no idea where Max has been, actually. I sure hope he’s okay.
As for the followers, I completely agree with you, and I would have to say about half of my followers genuinely want to follow me – maybe even more than half, seeing as how many people follow back manually (instead of using tools like Just Unfollow, which I don’t agree with) after having viewed my profile page. At any rate, authors are told that they have to have a knowledge of social media and be active on different mediums to help with marketing their books. Growing my following is conducive to my career as an author. So I’m told.
Ashley offers a wealth of information on his blog. His knowledge about all things technical amazes me. I’m also guest posting for him next Monday! (YAY!)
I hope your move went well, Diana. Are you getting settled yet?
yes, i am getting settled slowly – thanks for asking! Moved in to our new home and now waiting for the internet guy 😉 Finally i will have steady and reliable internet connection on Thursday so… expect me to be back online and in the blogosphere after then!
Moving is such a big step; kudos for you for doing it! Glad you’re okay, Diana. There’s always a lot of risk involved when moving across or to another country. See you soon!
You got my attention, Lorraine. I subscribed to the newsletter of Blog Academy and signed up for ManageFlitter.
I’m still clueless about hashtags though. The link you gave would be helpful if I just understood how and when to use them, which I don’t.
Okay, here is the rundown on the basics: If you are posting a link to something that has to do with social media, then use #socialmedia.
If you are posting a poem, use #poem and #poetry. If you are posting a link for writers and/or bloggers, use #writer #author #bloggers.
Use one to three hashtags per tweet. Get the picture?
If you want to see all the tweets with the hashtag #poem (say you feel like reading poetry someday), then you would type in #poem in the search bar and your screen will change, showing you all the tweets that use that hashtag.
It’s rather easy, using them this way – you’ll be able to find what you’re looking for! Others will, too!
I hope this helps!!! Thanks for your comment, Glynis. I’ll have to see if this topic warrants a whole blog post; I’m sure if you googled “how to use a hashtag”, that may also help.
Have a great day, Glynis!
Isn’t it wonderful when we can learn from fellow bloggers. I will have to check out Max’s book. Great post. 🙂
Yes, it sure is! I’m so grateful for all the wonderful, intelligent people I have met over the last ten months, both from LinkedIn, Google+, Facebook, and Twitter, as well as all of the other bloggers I have found on my own. I’m a bit surprised that there are so many awesome people out there (here?) in cyberspace – which equates to the real world. What’s really great is that they share their knowledge freely, and so I have learned to do the same. Being a teacher, I naturally want to help others, and think I’m doing a bang-up job of that on this blog.
I’m proud to know so many great people. 😀 😀 😀
Thanks for the compliment, Susan. 😀
This is a great boon for me as I am attempting to grow my platform. Thank you so much.
I’m so happy to hear that! You’re welcome!
I like helping others and so often I will pass on my learning to them through comments and blog posts.
Thanks for commenting, Mario, is it?
See you again, here and maybe on Twitter, too! 😀
I have learned to tolerate Twitter, but I don’t care for all the spam that goes around and Twitter is worse than Facebook for spam.
As with any type of social media, there are pros and cons to Twitter. Some people love it; some people don’t. I don’t like spam, either. Then again, who does?
This post is just what I needed. I have a Twitter account, but I was never really sure how to use it or what kind of return I could get by using it. This clearly states all I need to know. I am now more inclined to use it. I agree that scheduling tweets doesn’t appeal to me either, but thanks to your post, I will try tweeting more often and see if I get the same results you did. You’re such an inspiration to me.
Awwww, thanks Jo Ann!
Twitter does take some getting used to, but it is often a good source of information, too. When I find something good, I re-tweet it. The more you tweet, the faster you’ll grow your followers. It does take time, though. I’ve been at it for ten months – off and on – and I’m still not a daily tweeter, but I do use it weekly, even if it means just sharing someone’s blog post on it! 😀
Reblogged this on Work Experience Girl….
Thanks for the re-blog! 😀
Your welcome 🙂
YOU’RE welcome, too… 😉