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Success on social media is never overnight. That’s why you never read headlines like, “broke man made $2 million off of his new Twitter account in one day.” But you do gather exciting news such as Buffer’s Product Marketer, Alfred Lua, having secured his job via Twitter.
So why is the first headline a title from la-la land, but Alfred’s job news a reality?
The real factor that differentiates between the two is the time invested in the social network.
In fact, active presence and time invested are the two most important factors that determine your success on Twitter, a platform of 300 million users.
The three tips that this post shares for helping you maximize your ROI from Twitter are based on these two factors.
So let’s get started. Drum rolls, please!
1. Engage with your audience in the best way possible
Your Twitter is up and running for a few days. Or let’s make another assumption here, it’s been up for years but it’s only gathering dust.
What now?
File yourself under the I-hate-Twitter-category and pronounce it dead. Simple.
Not so fast, there.
Your Twitter profile isn’t sparking any interest for a simple reason — you aren’t actively engaging with your target audience.
There’s always a right way to use a social media scheduler.
But simply adding generic posts in a social media scheduler and letting it publish on your profile isn’t the key. In fact, this is the very recipe for failure on Twitter or any other social network for that matter.
To get the most from Twitter, you need to try a different approach starting with:
Show up daily or, at least, regularly
Showing up once in a blue moon is no way to make friends. Would your friends like it if you didn’t show up for a drink? They’ll call you once, twice, thrice. Until one day, they’ll stop.
Or, in a parallel universe, you wouldn’t have any friends if you remained absent for days on end.
The solution? Show up.
The research concludes that your prospects need to interact with at least 7 times before they purchase from you.
That’s SEVEN, not once or twice or even thrice.
Naturally, such interactions are only possible when you use the app regularly, engaging and sharing valuable content (more on that in a bit).
This could be your followers’ content or anyone else’s. The point is to leave a thoughtful comment or strike up a conversation.
To this end, pay attention to what others are saying.
Listen. Listen very carefully. Because listening is what is going to help you leave a comment that leaves a memorable impression on the readers.
And, remember, a plain, boring comment won’t cut it, even if it’s a compliment. This is because viewers can instantly tell you’re leaving template-based comments, which isn’t very heart-winning, to be honest.
Try something like this instead:
The complete thread from Suhail is here.
Note what Bryce does here:
He first asks a question, which gets the tweeter to reply
Next, he leaves his opinion
And BOOM — the attention is all his (60 people liking his response).
As you engage with your readers, your replies will leave more impressions.
Think of it like this, when Bryce shows up regularly in people’s feed — twitter folks will not only start to know him but also view him as an authoritative person.
Participate in Twitter chats
When I first joined Twitter, I came across pretty mediocre tips for using Twitter for my business.
Most pieces out there chanted the same mantra, ‘engage, engage, engage.’ But that’s all. No solid explanation. Common sense told me to make friends and talk to them.
An essential element that was missing though was Twitter chats — the frank online communities by the water cooler. In fact, these chats bring together wonderful communities without borders. Or, CWB as I like to call it.
“A Twitter chat is a conversation between people who gather around a specific time, to talk about a specific topic, using a specific hashtag,” as Sharanya defines them.
For example, G2 hosts a #G2Firesidechat on Thursdays every fortnight at 10 a.m. CST.
Jump in and you’ll make lots of friends if you’re in the marketing industry. Or, look for other chats relevant to your line of work if you aren’t a marketer.
Some golden tips to engage in Twitter chats:
Answer questions with insightful answers, sharing your experience and what you’ve learned.
Read others’ answers and respond to them.
Interact will people you talked to after the chat too.
Here’s an example:
2. Only share what is valuable to your audience
The content you share on Twitter plays a critical role in driving your engagement levels further.
You can’t expect people to visit your profile if there’s anything of value on your account.
It’s like building a mall with no to a limited number of shops in it. No one will come to such a place.
Therefore, what you share counts. But there’s a second part to this too — only share what’s relevant to your brand and audience.
For instance, you can’t share a sales eBook if you’re selling baked goods. But you can definitely share a recipe for baking the best Napoleon chocolate cake.
So, let’s get this straight, you need to share content that is:
- Relevant to your business
- Offers value to your audience
- Presents some unique takeaways
Now that you get the idea, know that you’ve two ways moving forward:
Create relevant content and
Curate valuable content
But here’s the thing, both the steps go hand-in-hand.
If you share your content only, you risk appearing as a self-centered tweeter.
Let’s assume you’re offering awesome value in each of these original tweets (the how part of this is addressed in the next section) and getting good engagement.
But do you think you’ll always have enough time to create all this original content?
Enter curated content.
This type of content not only helps you save time but assists you in building relationships across your industry (hint: hey, thanks for sharing my content and adding your thoughts to it. Now I’ll share yours — as the rule of reciprocity works).
Plus, you learn a lot as curation keeps your reading list warm.
However, make sure you don’t just copy the headline of the article you’re going to share. Instead, read it thoroughly so you can caption it adequately.
Note how to exhibit A and B differ from each other:
Exhibit A:
Exhibit B:
In Exhibit A, the person behind the Twitter handle shares the news in a pretty boring manner. That’s all.
Exhibit B, however, shows that there’s real work that has gone behind the scenes. The one behind the handle has read, shared his opinion, and credited (by tagging) the relevant person too.
No wonder, it’s getting more hits than the other example.
In addition to adding your opinion, you can share curated content (content that you share from others) in the following ways:
- Share key takeaways
- Use the subheading of the post as pointers in your caption
- Pick a quote from the article and tweet it
Now that curation is out of the way, let’s talk about creating content specifically for your Twitter account.
3. Write attention-grabbing, engaging tweets
Sharing too much-curated content shows you off as a lazy person even if you’re captioning the content properly.
All your efforts will only send viewers to other sites.
So didn’t you just lose sight of your chief marketing goal here? Spreading awareness about your business and so on…
To attain a balance, start creating content.
You don’t necessarily need to share long-form blog posts. Instead, write engaging tweets.
These could be:
A backstage look at your business
Your achievements for the day/week/month
Valuable lessons you’ve learned from your business or a new book you’ve just finished
A life or business update
Social proof
A fun insider joke
A poll
Be sure you share each of these without fluff, redundancy (repetition), and in the most engaging manner. Wondering how to write the perfect tweet?
Let me share what I’ve learned below:
Be relatable
The more your audience can relate with you, the more they’ll/’d engage with you. It’s as simple as that.
A case in point is Gareth over at That Content Shed with a follower pool of freelance writers:
Ask a question or add a CTA
The goal is to tell the reader what you expect from him/her.
For instance, if you ask your viewer a question, he’s more bound to comment on your tweet than otherwise.
You can go about asking a question for a question’s sake or a question after some context. Here’s an example:
Share a little bit of vulnerability
Keeps you authentic. It truly does since running a business isn’t a bed of roses. But be sure to not overdo it.
And, don’t use this emoji 
with it specifically (and no, there’s no study claiming that — It’s just plain aversive).
Add visuals
Buffer’s investigation on adding images to tweets confirms that tweets with images show a 35% spike in retweets and 18% more clicks than those without images.
Before you go about adding any image though, make sure it’s high-quality and relevant.
In addition to pictures, you can share memes, GIFs, and even a plain graphic such as this:
Or, tap into the video:
Don’t focus on ‘I’ but ‘we’
The point is to talk to your audience, which is the golden rule for success on any social media network.
Therefore, your message should be intended toward making conversation and sharing the “we’re in it together” message.
Besides, emphasizing on ‘I’ instead of ‘we’ shows you off as self-centered, which isn’t a very likable trait.
Get straight to the point (don’t aim for novels)
While Twitter’s 280 character limit doesn’t leave you with any other choice, it’s imperative to point out that interesting tweets are punchy by nature.
Get straight to the meat of the matter. If your message is important and needs more words, then make some space by shortening the link you’re adding using Bit.ly or Replug.
Wrapping it up
Initially, it can be hard to attract the right audience to your Twitter profile. However, with these tips – engaging, sharing valuable content, and putting the time in writing interesting tweets – you’re sure to ace your Twitter game. (Source: medium)
Happy learning!