Twitter is a game played strategically like Chess. Make your moves in a way to step ahead in the least amount of time. For the Twitter addicts, this is a bit left field. For the business owners, this is great way to optimize your time much better. We all know time is money and you want to create a presence that appears you’re on all day, but you are really not. Here’s a great guide to get 1,000+ followers on your Twitter account.
Create and Optimize Profile The first thing you should do before you begin sending out Tweets left and right is to get your Twitter profile intact. It’s very easy, but imperative because you want those that visit your profile to know exactly what you’re about. First off, pick a good picture for your avatar or profile picture. Go to settings and browse your computer to find a suitable photo. When you follow people or tweet them, they are less susceptible to block you because you’re a real person rather than a Twitter egg. A good background would be your logo for your site/niche you’re promoting to bring automatic awareness to your brand. Fill out your headline at the top with a brief description of what you do and a couple of interests. Make sure you post a link so it’s easy for people to check out your page. After you’re done with this portion, go ahead and begin tweeting away!
Maximize Your Tweets You want to make sure your Twitter presence is felt, but you don’t have time to be on there for hours upon hours. Guy Kawasaki is well known for his outstanding Twitter presence and of course, marketing the early Macintosh computers. Now he’s become quite an aficionado on social media even creating a book titled APE: Author, Publisher, Entrepreneur. He was a chief evangelist for Apple and now advises for Motorola – particularly to establish a Google+ mobile device community. What we can learn from him is how to adapt a more efficient approach to a Twitter account.
When it comes to your Twitter, you want to do a few major things to gain massive followers. First of all, you want to tweet your own content – your blog, your social sites, etc. Next, you want to retweet others, but don’t make it spammy to the point where it seems you can’t keep up with your own content. Why? It makes it look like you’re a spam bot and you don’t have any real value to provide. This will do the opposite because you’ll get an unfollow left and right and even blocks/marked for spam requests. This is enough to get your account suspended or even worse – disabled. All of those followers will go for naught if you can’t even get into your account. You can maximize your tweets much more efficient in a number of ways:
Use a service such as Hootsuite or other sites to help you automate your tweets. This is perfect because you can set out some time each day (even a week in advance if you are really strapped for time) to put your main tweets on autopilot. Try to schedule some tweets for a few times a day. Just because you have a huge following doesn’t mean you’ll actually reach a lot of people in one update. Also, you have to take into account that everyone gets on at a different schedule. Take advantage by repeating some of your blog tweets 3 times a day but hours in between other unique content you may send out. Also, you can use apps on your phone to tweet content you find on other sites to your multiple accounts without logging back and forth on each account.
Don’t have an idea of what’s good content? Check out the next section.
Creating Great Content Great content doesn’t have to come solely from your site. Use your resources to stay in touch with relevant events to create conversation and speak on stuff other than your own blog. Here are some ideas to help you on that front:
Using Feedly is a great resource for finding information in your niche. You can easily publish the content and truncate it to fit your 140 characters. Remember, content is only valuable if your readers find it attractive. It’s a good way to divvy up your own content, relevant articles, and retweeting others to ensure an active account. Not only is using Feedly helpful, but quotes are useful, too.
Everyone needs some motivation or a bit of inspiration to make the day go by smoother. Goodreads is an excellent source to get quotes and inspire your followers. The great thing about quotes is they create more engagement. A good quote that hits the nail on the head surely will give you responses, retweets, and some followers. Before you even start tweeting valuable information, spout out an early morning quote for the day. You’ll be surprised how it impacts your profile.
It goes without saying how effective news sites help you with developing rich content. Whether it’s politics, local events or even random news, it all helps to create more buzz to your Twitter account. If you’re big on LinkedIn, you can send links from your LinkedIn account to your Twitter. It’s a good way of showing you’re part of the industry and gives you more clout in a professional social setting.
Pinterest is always great because you can join boards with relevant niches to your own and there are great pictures and infographics that give your content more appeal. Not to mention, you can post to Twitter and Facebook with just a click. This type of cyclical traffic grabber will help you build multiple social networks up at the same time. Also, you see how effective pictures are for your brand.
Pictures are seriously worth thousands of words. You want your tweets to stand out a lot so they can double your conversions and followers. Remember, Twitter shows your picture and tweet in timelines better. It’s smart to tweet like this for better optimization. Rectangular images perform better because it shows well in the Twitter feed. Also, if you have multiple tweets, try to create a rhythm for every 4th tweet to be accompanied by a photo. It makes it look more distinguished to have a photo up top, information in the middle, and an additional photo below.
Follow and list people for your specific niche Another powerful part of Twitter is following and organizing your followers in a list. Why? It makes it easier to sort out what kinds of information you want to scope out. If you want tweets in internet marketing/SEO, go to that specific list. Likewise, you can organize for humor or news to keep it all together. Follows and lists show up on mobile devices as well as emails. If you take the initiative, 9 times out of 10 – your followers will do the same. Of course, you only want to follow people you find interesting and related in your niche. Don’t go overboard and start following hundreds of people a day. The point is building relationships and getting people to follow you because you both appreciate what each has to offer. Also, Twitter will define you as spam and you can get your account deleted quickly.
Use good resources such as Twellow and WeFollow as directories to see what type of people you should follow. You can scope your followers’ lists to see there followers and find out what they tweet. It’s a good way to help you build outside of your box. You never know how great of a relationship you can get from searching outside of your immediate brand. This is also the case when you attend different seminars and conferences.
You’ll be surprised how many Twitter events or events using hashtags there are out in the world. If you’re into technology, you can literally build followers by tweeting what’s going on during the event. Use the hashtag to target followers who may be looking for details. You can get an extra boost in traffic and followers by using this method. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to converse with others and get their Twitter info as well. For giggles, wear a shirt with your Twitter name because you never know if someone’s filming! Free advertising is free advertising.
Additionally, you can gain followers by being in the right live chats and seminars. Give a quick message on Google Hangouts, YouTube and Ustream of your Twitter information. Get creative and participate in events by providing good questions and responses. This way you build a presence around other people and widen your range. Monitor these events and if it’s scheduled ahead of time, go ahead and take a look at some profiles while you’re on top of your game.
Make it easy to get in touch with you One of the best ways to get Twitter followers is by making it easier to get in contact with you. How do you achieve that feat? Let’s break this down in a few ways:
It doesn’t matter if you use Pinterest, Facebook, and Twitter. Make sure your link is live! If someone is genuinely interested in your content, that person wants to converse as well as follow because you have useful information. Good pins on your Pinterest page with a link to your Twitter can get you more followers especially if you have closely related niches. Even your YouTube is great because you can post videos. Videos build more retention. More retention means more shares to different networks. Fill out your YouTube homepage with all of your links including Twitter. Additionally, you can put your link under the description of your videos. You never know if someone wants to engage with you directly for a job or something else of value.
Always provide links in blogs, forums, and communities you are highly active in to maximize attention to your Twitter. If you are a constant participant in high profile blogs, you need to take advantage of the readership by providing one of the first comments to the post. Blogs and forums these days have a section where you can link to your site and social profile. Not only will you have the advantage of getting more views to the answer, but you’ll catch the blogger or forum owner’s attention. This works heavily in your favor especially if your answer is dead on or places a unique but well thought response in opposition to the view of the post. The blogger will have no choice to respond to your comment. Depending on the blogger’s authority and your answer, this turns into a lot of follows over time. Never disregard the power of a blog or forum community.
Additionally, you should get a Twitter follow button for your own blog. A call to action after a blog post like “Stay in touch with me on Twitter” is quite powerful. You can always give a shout out via your Twitter for follows from your blog. That retweet from your follower can mean even more follows down the line given you have solid content to back up your profile. Additionally, you should have a follow button on each page of your site. You can easily create a Twitter button or have a social feed on the right side of your page so visitors can see what you talk about. Sometimes, they want a preview of what you’re about!
Building 1,000 true followers takes time and energy, but you don’t have to spam or buy your way to it! Use these methods to guide you in a safe yet effective method of relationship building. Create a social media profile that exudes value and engagement and you’re already halfway there. Build your consistency in how you set up your tweets, your followers, and involve your networks to do subliminal advertising. This way you’ll exceed your expectations and have less work to do in due time.
About Tariehk Geter – Tariehk Geter is the Director of Marketing at OSI Affiliate Software and he loves to share strategies that help businesses sell more. Follow him on Twitter and Google+
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