Diane Charno, "I’m just sayin’..."

Yesterday, Twitter released “Twitter 101”, a special guide for how businesses can use Twitter. It provides a lot of great information on getting started, key terms, case histories and best practices. Although this guide was created for businesses, I think there’s some great information for real people using Twitter, particularly in the best practices section. Below are some best practices - some taken right from the guide, others altered to fit a real person tweeting, and some of my own thoughts.

 ·         Think of Twitter as a place to build relationships, not just broadcast information. It’s not just about posting what you had for lunch. It’s more about sharing information, joining the conversations and having some fun too.

·         Include a bio description, location and avatar image. Personally, I don’t follow back people I know nothing about. You may be a spammer or a bot. If people think you’re a spammer or a bot, they may block you.

·         Use a casual, friendly tone in your messages.

·         If you like a particular message, retweet it. People often like the sharing and amplification of their ideas, so retweet cool stuff.

·         Post links to articles and sites you think folks would find interesting. Think about the type of followers you have and what they might be interested in.

·         Don’t spam people. Twitter’s following model means that you have to respect the interests and desires of other people here or they’ll unfollow you. The most common way to run afoul of that understanding – and to thus look like a spammer – is to send unsolicited @messages or DMs, particularly when they include a promotional link.

·         Too make sure you’re not spamming folks, Twitter also recommends to avoid the following:

o   Posting duplicate updates to an account, especially throughout the day.

o   Cross-posting duplicate updates to multiple accounts.

o   Following churn: Following and unfollowing the same people repeatedly, as well as following and unfollowing those who don’t follow back.

o   All of the above could be violations of Twitter’s terms of service which could lead to your account being suspended or shut down.

·         Don’t use any of those “get lots of followers” services. You should build your following organically. It’s not a numbers game on who has the most followers. You want to follow real people or businesses because of the information they share or conversation you may have.

·         Don’t follow hundreds of people all at once without building up a following along the way. When I see an account that follows hundreds or thousands of people, but only has a couple followers and tweets, I’m not likely to follow back. Start off with a few people you know, some local businesses or news networks. Begin engaging and build from there. It can also be overwhelming to follow a ton of people right off the bat. Information overload may scare you off.

So, what do you think? Do you have some best practices to add? Comment below. You can also find me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/charno. To see Twitter’s business guide, click here: http://business.twitter.com/twitter101.