Tips for using Twitter

If you want to just search for some tips – this search will look up the Twitter’s help pages.


Otherwise here are some of the most common questions you might come across when trying Twitter for the first time.

What is Twitter?
How do I get set up?
Who should I follow?
Conversations, not just broadcasting – why @ is important
What are hashtags?
Is everything public?
How do I shorten links to get them within the limit?
Retweeting and influence
Tools that can help you manage Twitter
Things you can do with twitter
More info

What is Twitter

Twitter is a free service that uses the internet to share messages (or tweets limited to 140 characters long) with those people that are ‘following’ them or everyone if they wish to make their messages public.

You can send messages via the Twitter website, your phone, or using one of many applications that can help you manage your use of Twitter (see below)

How to get set up

Head over to Twitter.com and get a free account – This video tells you how to go about it

Who should I follow?

Once you’ve posted your first tweet and put something about yourself in your profile, the Twitter experience can seem a bit empty.  That’s because Twitter is all about relationships and to build those relationships you need to start following people.

Twitter can go through your contacts in Gmail, MSN, Yahoo and find people that you know already which is a good start.  You can also use the Twitter ‘Find People‘ link to search. Once you click on someone’s Twitter page, click on the Follow button and you will start to see their updates when you log into Twitter. Once you have found someone useful, have a look at their followers and who they follow and you’ll start to see useful clusters of people.  When you follow more than one person who is tweeting to another you’ll see their conversations (see below) in your Twitter stream.

Conversations, not just broadcasting – why @ is important

You can just use Twitter to answer the question ‘What are you doing right now?’ but it’s not just about broadcasting.  There are some useful tools to help push out information via Twitter – eg Twitterfeed which automatically sends a tweet every time you write a blog post. But by sending a message starting with another user’s name (@theirname) you will alert them to the fact that this tweet is directed ‘at’ them. They will see this tweet but it is still public, so anyone following both of you will also see it and unlike email or normal text messages, the conversation is shared and can be replied, commented on and  repeated across your networks.

What are hashtags?

Hashtags are a way of tagging lots of tweets from different people so that they can be collated together, eg around an event – #rebootbritain. You could just search on a topic, but hashtags make them stand out and once a unique tag is being used it can be visualised in lots of different ways.

Tools for visualising tweets using hashtags

Is everything public?

Every Tweet you do is effectively its own webpage and has its own permanent link. This means that unless you chose to ‘Protect your updates‘ in your account settings, they are on the internet and can be searched, found and linked back to. Protecting your updates does mean that no-one can see your tweets unless they are following you, and this may limit the number of followers you get, because people cannot see if you are worth following without seeing your tweets.

How do I shorten links to get them within the limit?

With only a 140 characters, every one is precious and when posting links there are ways of replacing long links with much shorter ones so you can still have something to say in your Tweet. Some programs that help you use Twitter can do this automatically or you can put a button in your browser to convert links. An added twist is with something like bit.ly, you can track people that click through links that you post.

Retweeting and influence

When someone wants to pass on a good tweet (or link within a tweet) they will prefix it Retweet or RT. If you get lots of people retweeting your stuff, then you’re probably doing a good job with valuable information that people appreciate and want to pass on. Links, ideas and news can spread astonishingly fast on Twitter, with each individual being able to alert their (tens, hundreds, thousand of) followers to interesting tweets. This can lead to some very influetial people on Twitter and can be measured by tools like Twitalyzer and Klout.

Tools that can help you manage Twitter

Twitter can be accessed through the Twitter website, but there a lots of tools that can help you become more productive by managing groups, monitoring different tags and keeping on top of who you are following and your followers. Tweetdeck, Seesmic, Tweetie and Twibble can all be downloaded to your computer and there are plent of mobile options too.

Things you can do with twitter

  • Alert people to something interesting – put a link in and if it’s through bit.ly you can see how many people click through
  • Tweet from an event -using a hashtag, join in with comments and questions at an event.  Meet up with people at the event or if you’re not there, join in too – some events now have screens displaying the tweets that people are sending
  • Follow someone interesting and ask them a question. Just start your tweet with @theirname and they will see your tweet when they check their stream

More info

One page guide to Twitter

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