I've just become a twitter - now what? Any experts to guide me?

[Mary Gallivan]

Hi

I'm trailing way behind the times when it comes to Twitter, stumbleupon and all those other well-known sites.

However, yesterday I finally got round to signing up with Twitter as it seems easy enough for me to understand. I'm not much of a tech wizard!!

I've put several links to article on my site and a few funny one-liners and that's about it so far.

I've just got my first visitor this morning - woo hoo!

Can anyone tell me how to get the most out of this for promoting and getting visitors to my site, rankings etc?

(My site and twitter is in a business name).

Best wishes

Mary

[allb450]

Hi Mary - I would start by using twitter to build relationships. Not really all that techy, just need 2 rite n 140 charctrs or less.

[Mary Gallivan]

OK - thanks.

I've already updated it 12 times so I'm getting content on it at least.

Mary

[Glenn Newsome]

Mary,
You need to check with warriors Dana_W and BigMike. Dana is the local twitter expert, or at least one of them and BigMike has a free software called TweetyBot.

WarriorForum - Internet Marketing Forums - View Profile: Dana_W

WarriorForum - Internet Marketing Forums - View Profile: BIG Mike

They will be able to get you started on your way,
Glenn

[Hamida Harland]

Add your twitter link to your sig and/or your contact info so that we can follow you

[Pete Egeler]

Mary,

One thing you need to do is go into your CP Panel here & set up your Twitter link, or put it in you sig.

Secondly, do start posting a ton of promos for your website as you'll turn a lot of folks off in nothing flat.

Take a look at posts by Dana and others and you'll see that they keep a pretty low-key Twitter page with only occasional "promo" type posts.

Pete

[Chris Hunter]

Originally Posted by Mary Gallivan

Hi

I'm trailing way behind the times when it comes to Twitter, stumbleupon and all those other well-known sites.

However, yesterday I finally got round to signing up with Twitter as it seems easy enough for me to understand. I'm not much of a tech wizard!!

I've put several links to article on my site and a few funny one-liners and that's about it so far.

I've just got my first visitor this morning - woo hoo!

Can anyone tell me how to get the most out of this for promoting and getting visitors to my site, rankings etc?

(My site and twitter is in a business name).

Best wishes

Mary

Mary,

Twitter is great for building relationships and using those relationships to drive traffic to your site.

Is your site a blog? If it is, go to twitterfeed.com : feed your blog to twitter - post RSS to twitter automatically and sign up for a free account. Then add your blog RSS feed to your TwitterFeed account and everytime that you make a new blog post, it automatically tweets it for you!

If you use FireFox as your web browser, get the Twitter Bar or the TwitterFox add-on and you can tweet right from your browser. TwitterFox also allows you to read your tweets, replies, and direct messages as well.

Make people that follow you feel welcome by going to Schedule Future-Dated Twitter Tweets TweetLater.com and create a free account there as well. You can create a special, custom message that welcomes new followers for you and it tweets them for you automatically. You can even schedule tweets with this free service as well as other things. Anyone that follows me gets an automatic welcome message and I don't have to worry about it!

You can also live-tweet what you're doing with services like TwitPic / Share photos on Twitter and Dial2Do - Home. TwitPic allows you to upload and tweet pictures from your cell phone and you can really share a lot of yourself and personality with this service.

You can do the same with Dial2Do. Dial2Do is one of my favorite new services. You can sign up for a free account and you can literally phone in your tweets! It will transcribe your voice to text and send it to Twitter, Blogger, WordPress, texts, Gmail, and a lot more. It'll even read your last 10 tweets to you and you can respond to them as you listen to them! It's awesome and fun to use...and free!

Well, anyway, those are the services that I use a lot and they help me have a lot of fun with Twitter. Dana is always wrestling her kiddos out of bed and Big Mike is always working on the next "big thing". Maybe they'll drop in here and give some advice as well.

Hope that helps! Have fun!

[Nick Doyle]

I use twitter to build relationships with prospects, and also to index my sites for SEO purposes. Its just like any other web 2.0 site that can help you boost your SERP ranking very quickly ... AND drive traffic if other people follow you on twitter.

Its great and addictive, so people will check out what you're up to

[gdwebs]

Thanks for all the information people, i'm just starting to use similar sites so its all new to me to!

[Mary Gallivan]

Thanks everyone

Next step - got to find out how to follow people :-)

There's enough info there to keep me busy for 6 months :-)

Mary

[naonline]

Originally Posted by Chris Hunter

Mary,

Twitter is great for building relationships and using those relationships to drive traffic to your site.

Is your site a blog? If it is, go to twitterfeed.com : feed your blog to twitter - post RSS to twitter automatically and sign up for a free account. Then add your blog RSS feed to your TwitterFeed account and everytime that you make a new blog post, it automatically tweets it for you!

If you use FireFox as your web browser, get the Twitter Bar or the TwitterFox add-on and you can tweet right from your browser. TwitterFox also allows you to read your tweets, replies, and direct messages as well.

Make people that follow you feel welcome by going to Schedule Future-Dated Twitter Tweets TweetLater.com and create a free account there as well. You can create a special, custom message that welcomes new followers for you and it tweets them for you automatically. You can even schedule tweets with this free service as well as other things. Anyone that follows me gets an automatic welcome message and I don't have to worry about it!

You can also live-tweet what you're doing with services like TwitPic / Share photos on Twitter and Dial2Do - Home. TwitPic allows you to upload and tweet pictures from your cell phone and you can really share a lot of yourself and personality with this service.

You can do the same with Dial2Do. Dial2Do is one of my favorite new services. You can sign up for a free account and you can literally phone in your tweets! It will transcribe your voice to text and send it to Twitter, Blogger, WordPress, texts, Gmail, and a lot more. It'll even read your last 10 tweets to you and you can respond to them as you listen to them! It's awesome and fun to use...and free!

Well, anyway, those are the services that I use a lot and they help me have a lot of fun with Twitter. Dana is always wrestling her kiddos out of bed and Big Mike is always working on the next "big thing". Maybe they'll drop in here and give some advice as well.

Hope that helps! Have fun!

Great post Chris, this is info I was looking for too.

[Chris Hunter]

Originally Posted by naonline

Great post Chris, this is info I was looking for too.

Great!

Hope it helps!

Twitter can be a lot of fun. Use it to get to know people. Not their marketing persona, but get to know *them*.

The rest will fall in place and you'll have fun doing it!

[Fabian Tan]

You can use it to ask others to syndicate your blog posts, Digg posts etc so that they get more traffic.

Fabian

[BrianMcLeod]

Mary,

Be a person, not a dotcom. Use a profile photo (settings in the top right corner).

Use the search link at the bottom of the page to search for others in your niche and follow them by clicking on their @name and then the grey "Follow" button. In turn, people will follow you back.

Join the conversation.

Best,

Brian

[Mary Gallivan]

Thanks everyone - I'm glad this thread has been f helpt to others too!

Brian - when I got to the sign up page I didn't know what to use as a user name. The name I use for my site is different to the one I use here - so, as I'm using twitter to promote the site as well, do I use the name I use on the site? People from here may find it confusing when they clcik my twitter link and not find Mary but someone else :-)

Mary

[Chris Hunter]

Originally Posted by Mary Gallivan

Thanks everyone - I'm glad this thread has been f helpt to others too!

Brian - when I got to the sign up page I didn't know what to use as a user name. The name I use for my site is different to the one I use here - so, as I'm using twitter to promote the site as well, do I use the name I use on the site? People from here may find it confusing when they clcik my twitter link and not find Mary but someone else :-)

Mary

Mary, go with the name of whatever you're promoting.

You can make it a bit more personal by making your username something like
"Maryat(BusinessName)" or "Mary@(BusinessName)".

Just decide if you want it to be your personal Twitter or your business Twitter. Then go with that!

[John Sullivan]

Mary,

You may want to check your link to twitter it seems to show page not found.

John

[Mary Gallivan]

Thanks John - I'll go and check it now. Is there any particular way I should do it? I'm not always that hot on links :-(

I still can't figure out how to get my twitter link in my contact info.

Still working on all the other tips and advice that's been given.

Thanks everyone.

Mary

[Tina Tiano]

Thanks for all the info. I have already set up an account with tweetlater

[Jassa]

Mary, very likely you know this - and all of the rest of the world - but I couldn't work it out until Perry, our 'Mr. Video' very kindly twittered it to me:

You can butt into other people's conversations, and when you want to reply to someone you put '@' followed directly by their username. I just learned this today, so just have to pass it on...

BTW, it looks as though you and me are close neighbours...

[Mary Gallivan]

OK - got sig and contact sorted.

Thanks Jassa for the tip - I've been wondering why the @ is there and why some posts have it and others haven't.

Did you know there's a twitter social group here?

Where abouts are you then?

Mary

[Ben_Curtis]

Chris,
Can you tell us more about how to access Dial2Do? That sounds crazy!
Thanks.

[Ben_Curtis]

Found it! Signed up! Thanks all.

[Mary Gallivan]

When I started out I soon became an 'expert' on EA; then worked my way up to an 'advanced warrior' here and now - well, now I'm a 'TWIT'.

Goodness, what's to become of me? :-)

Mary

[jasonvanorden]

Mary,

The first thing I did on Twitter was to find any of my friend and contacts that had Twitter accounts and followed them.

Then I went to the Twitter pages for people in my industry and my friends to see who they were following. I looked for interesting people and followed them.

The interact with these people.

This is a great way to get a kick start on building a Twitter following and getting the interaction flowing.

A lot of these people will follow you back. Make sure you have your bio, image, web site and other info filled out so that if people click to your page they will have an idea of who you are and will be more likely to follow you.

[Jassa]

Hello again,

Could you twitter experts give me an idea on the following: would twitter be a place where, apart from the fun aspect, interesting business contacts could be made for:

a) someone who designs Formula One racetracks and
b) someone who is in really high-end luxury property development - and while I'm about it for
c) business Interior Design?

In fact, I would like to know the complete scope of Twitter, what one could accomplish by using it and the range of people who use it?

[Mary Gallivan]

Jason - I've got most of that done today. It's still my first full day today. I'm working my way through the list of warriors here as well.

Jassa - it wasn't even the fun aspect that I joined for but as a traffic generation tool. It's turned out to be great fun though and I now even feel more of a community member here in the forum.

You'll find all sorts on twitter, it's worth checking it out. I did a google search for twitter to find out a bit about it before I started.

Mary

[Marlow]

Originally Posted by Mary Gallivan

When I started out I soon became an 'expert' on EA; then worked my way up to an 'advanced warrior' here and now - well, now I'm a 'TWIT'.

Goodness, what's to become of me? :-)

Mary

Lol Mary. You're hardly a TWIT. I'm glad you posted this thread. It has been very helpful for me too. Looks like were in the same twit-boat. Fun!

Quick thanks to Chris for all the great info

[Mary Gallivan]

LOL!!

I have 'talked' to so many people today and I really feel as if I 'belong' in the forum now.

It's so nice to see a friendly face on twitter. You need to tell me how to do the auto sig you mentioned.

How do you get the time to twitter, use facebook, youtube, Myspace, this forum and work?

Mary

[Jassa]

Mary, how come you've made 900-odd posts and you still didn't feel you 'belonged' on the forum??!

[Pete Egeler]

Who is "Sue Baker" ?

I'm getting real confused here.

Iz you Sue, or iz you Mary?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Pete

[joblythe]

Pete

Inquiring minds want to know.

If you read Mary's (Sue's) OP and her subsequent posts - all will be revealed.

I'll let you find out why!

[TheVCF]

Mary,

Have you Joined the Twitter Followers Group Here in the Warrior Forum yet?

If not, and no one has already recommended this (?) ...

I would Highly Recommend You:
1) Join the Twitter Followers Group Here in the Warrior Forum
2) Start Following other Members of the Twitter Followers Group
ok?

I may Post some other Twitter Groups elsewhere as soon/as I am able, ok?

I hope this all helps and Have a Great Day!

- Michael

[Chris Hunter]

Originally Posted by Ben_Curtis

Found it! Signed up! Thanks all.

Did you find it?

Have you tried it out yet? It rocks!

And for that little tip, you can follow me a Twitter / Chris_Hunter

[Andyhenry]

Most people seem to do one of two things:

1 - Just chat and find new people and have fun.

2 - Automate link building messages and promotional messages and send them out all the time to see if people respond.

I'll let you choose yours

[Mary Gallivan]

Pete - hope you found you're answer :-)

Michael - Yes, am a member of the twitter followers group.

Andy - my aim of joining twitter was for your second point. Is there a way I can automatically update twitter when I update my site?

or, shall I post on twitter that I've updated my site?

What I was doing yesterday was to post the title of an article and provide it's link. I was doing that regularly throughout the day and was planning on doing similar today.

I also have a category for 'Humor' on my site with any fun stuff like jokes, silly diets etc and have been adding some of them bit by bit to twitter.

ps. I like what you have in your sig :-)

Best wishes to all

Mary

[Chris Hunter]

Mary, is your site a blog?

[Andyhenry]

You can get plugins for wordpress so that your posts get tweeted too - you can also set Aweber to tweet emails if you use that.

You can also get wordpress to show your tweets.

I use the wordpress to twitter plugins but I don't post too much on my blog as I always stop following people who just use twitter to auto post their blog entries, or if they're just posting affiliate links.

[Mary Gallivan]

Chris - I use wordpress and never know whether I should call it a site or a blog!

Thanks Andy - I'm looking at getting more plugins and widgets.

Mary

[Mary Gallivan]

Hi glorified777 - glad you found this thread useful, there's others that have as well.

It's all about helping each other.

Mary

[chloe707]

Thanks, Glenn, I have also just joined twitter and can use the help I can get

[Chris Hunter]

Originally Posted by Mary Gallivan

Chris - I use wordpress and never know whether I should call it a site or a blog!

Thanks Andy - I'm looking at getting more plugins and widgets.

Mary

Ok. Good! WordPress is a blogging platform, so it's both, but more importantly (in this situation) it is a blog.

Now back to what we were addressing...

Go to twitterfeed.com : feed your blog to twitter - post RSS to twitter automatically and register for a free account there. You'll have to create an OpenID account (which is free), but it's easy to do and there's a link directly to OpenID on TwitterFeed.com.

Once you've created the TwitterFeed account, you can add your blog's RSS feed to this service. What this will do is scan your RSS feed every 30, 60, 90 minutes (whichever you select) and if it finds a new blog post on your RSS feed, it'll automatically tweet about it on your Twitter account with a link directly to your blog!

It's easy to set up and implement and very customizable. You can setup a customizable intro message that says anything that you'd like. An example would be:

"New Blog Post! (New blog post title here) (New blog post link here)"

Of course, "New Blog Post!" is customizable and can be anything you'd like for it to be, but be sure to make it short because Twitter only allows 140 characters and you want to have space for your blog post title to be in the tweet along with the link.

Here's an example from my Twitter - Twitter / Chris_Hunter: Go Read! Lesnar Doesn't Pu ...

There is also a free WordPress plug-in that you can use called Twitter Tools that you can get from here - http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/twitter-tools/

It's easy to use and the installation instructions are right here - http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/.../installation/

Hope this helps!

[Marlow]

Originally Posted by Mary Gallivan

LOL!!

I have 'talked' to so many people today and I really feel as if I 'belong' in the forum now.

It's so nice to see a friendly face on twitter. You need to tell me how to do the auto sig you mentioned.

How do you get the time to twitter, use facebook, youtube, Myspace, this forum and work?

Mary

Thought I had that auto-sig figured out. But alas, I am a TWIT!

I did get info on tweetlater.com and tweetbeep (also mentioned in this thread) and tweetlater seems to be functioning just great. It auto follows for me and sends a private "thank you" message to anyone new. Pretty cool.

I do feel the scrambled brain scenario coming on again. It's all good! How about you?

[traces2757]

Originally Posted by Mary Gallivan

Hi

I'm trailing way behind the times when it comes to Twitter, stumbleupon and all those other well-known sites.

However, yesterday I finally got round to signing up with Twitter as it seems easy enough for me to understand. I'm not much of a tech wizard!!

I've put several links to article on my site and a few funny one-liners and that's about it so far.

I've just got my first visitor this morning - woo hoo!

Can anyone tell me how to get the most out of this for promoting and getting visitors to my site, rankings etc?

(My site and twitter is in a business name).

Best wishes

Mary

Well first you build a following. I'm following you now.

[Michael Forey]

I have a twitter related question

what is the @ sign in a twet. It appear is is like a link to someone elses tweet. How do you do this?

Thanks
Michael

[Chris Hunter]

Originally Posted by Michael Forey

I have a twitter related question

what is the @ sign in a twet. It appear is is like a link to someone elses tweet. How do you do this?

Thanks
Michael

No, that means you're responding to someone's tweet. That means that you replied to someone's tweet.

That makes sense?

[Mary Gallivan]

Marlow - send me a message on twitter to let me know how to do the auto follow.

I still haven't figured out the wwtweet issue yet. I'm running between here, PMs, twitter and others. It's great exercise if nothing else! :-)

traces2757 - thanks, I'm getting a following ... slowly. Thanks for following me I'm following you too.

I've seen so many warriors on twitter - is nobody doing any work today??

Mary

[Mary Gallivan]

Hi Steve

There's been a lot of really useful information in this thread, especially from Chris Hunter - thanks Chris.

I found my first day on twitter absolutely manic while I was finding the ropes. Still haven't found them all yet, but that'll come in time.

Yesterday I stepped back and mainly watched. Watched how other people used it and started to find my way round a bit better.

Like you I find I can't get into a lot of the conversations. I'm also finding it very time consuming but maybe in time that will improve.

By far my favourite place to interact in right here in the forum.

I'll stick with it and see how it develops for fitting in with what I'm doing.

Best wishes

Mary

[Chris Hunter]

Originally Posted by Jassa

Hello again,

Could you twitter experts give me an idea on the following: would twitter be a place where, apart from the fun aspect, interesting business contacts could be made for:

a) someone who designs Formula One racetracks and
b) someone who is in really high-end luxury property development - and while I'm about it for
c) business Interior Design?

In fact, I would like to know the complete scope of Twitter, what one could accomplish by using it and the range of people who use it?

Jassa,

First, try using the Twitter Advanced Search function to find the kind of people that you're looking for. Simply type in keywords or even names of products to find people that you may want to follow.

Also, here are some more sites that you can use to find people with your interests:

Twitterel Find Twitter users with Related Interests
Just Tweet It » THE Directory for Twitter Users
Twannabe - find out who you want to follow!
monitter : real time, live twitter monitor | free live twitter embed widget
Twubble
And this is an interesting one - follow cost: Is that Twitter celebrity worth the pain?

These are all great sites that you can use to find people to follow that you can connect with so they'll follow you.

Good luck!

[Mary Gallivan]

Thanks Chris You've given so much valuanle information to this thread.

Ever thought of writing a book on how to get the best out of twitter? or How to use Twitter for IM?

This is the first time I've had so many replies to one of my threads - it's great!!

Best wishes.

Mary