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So You Want
To Tweet?
OneRedCat Media
Ok. So Who Is This Guy?
My name is Mike Tanner and I love Twitter. Ok. That in itself probably
doesn’t qualify me to write a guide on using Twitter. So what about the rest? Well, I spent
almost a decade as a manager and trainer in the corporate world. My time in this field was
spent mostly trying to teach people how to click a button while at the same time not be
mean to other humans. It was, surprisingly, a challenge. I have degrees in English and Education which means that not only can I write a haiku and tweet it, I can teach you to do
the same. I’ve spent the last five years of my life building online personas for people and
teaching them how to click some buttons while at the same time not being mean to other
humans. It’s amazing how things come full circle.
I currently manage a half dozen Twitter accounts including @OneRedCatMedia, my primary business and @StartacusHQ, our recently launched small business consulting firm. I
don’t currently handle any Twitter accounts related, either indirectly or directly, to hot
dogs (continue reading the guide for more information on this) but they do run the table
when it comes to industries. I’ve tweeted for political parties, musicians, astrologers, crafters and a whole host of people in between. What I’ve learned during the last half decade
of Twitter activity can be summed up in one sentence; the internet is a strange, wonderful,
dangerous, terrifying, awesome place. So now I spend most of my time trying to help people navigate that world. And captaining people’s ships across the Twitterverse is a heck of
a good time.
My days are spent keeping tiny hands away from expensive technology as I am also a stay
at home dad for two “energetic” children, aged 3 years and 6 months respectively. My son
and daughter teach me lessons daily on time management and how the best laid plans will
ultimately fail when Netflix goes down and there’s no Dora or Diego.
I wrote this guide because it’s easy to go oﬀ the rails online and whether it’s your business
or your personal identity, you don’t want to be known online, or anywhere for that matter,
as “Pantless Steve”, “Angry Charlie” or “Crazy Claude”. I hope this helps.
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Why Twitter?
There are a host of social media platforms, each with their
pros and cons. Some people limit themselves to a single platform, focusing on getting as big as possible in that particular sphere. Others spread their work across every conceivable platform, playing the odds and trying to get hits here
and there in order to up their social media street cred. I am
a twitter man. I dabble on other platforms. But most of my
social media day is spent on Twitter. Why did I choose this
particular platform for myself ? Well, there are a host of reasons.
First oﬀ, I’m wordy. I write long, drawn out prose, focusing
on beating a dead horse into the ground with every single
word that I can possibly use to get my point across. Twitter
has taught me the power of being succinct. Sure, I still get
to explore my gift for written gab in my long form pieces on
the websites that I write for, but Twitter makes me focus
my thoughts into those simple 140 characters.
Second, I like to know what’s going on right now. Most platforms are about what’s going to happen or what has hap-
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pened in the past. Hey, this is the meal I ate last night. Over here, this is a video of my kid
at last night’s dance recital. And so on. But Twitter is primarily about the here and now. It’s
about real time conversations. When I want to know what’s happening at a conference,
Twitter tells me. When I can’t spare the time to check out Apple’s WWDC, Twitter tells
me what’s dropping. When my wife wants to know if there are any traﬃc snafus between
her and her oﬃce, Twitter tells me. It is a real time source of information. And we live in a
real time world. If you look at the current state of newspaper media, you see what we’re
talking about. I don’t want to read about the news tomorrow, I want to see the story as it
develops. By the time tomorrow comes, it’s already too late. Twitter got there first.
Finally, I’m a big fan of mixed media. I like pretty pictures. I like funny videos. I like
words. I like all of the above. And there is no medium that more perfectly combines those
media formats than Twitter. Want to see a vine of a kid refusing to go to bed? Want to see
a picture of a hot dog that I JUST bought? Want to see a video from Soul Train? Twitter.
There is no media that it can’t handle.
This combination of brevity, real time communication and multimedia formats are the primary reasons that I love Twitter. But just because Twitter is a great platform does not
mean that it does not oﬀer its own challenges. It’s a platform that’s easy to master
and easy to fail at. It simply requires careful
consideration and an understanding of how
the platform works, in conjunction with an
understanding of how people work. If you can
put those two things together, you’re set. If
you are unable to master these few major
points of Twitter, you will find yourself mired
in a sea of purposeless and ineﬀective online
activity. This guide will help you avoid these
trappings and move forward. Without further
adieu, let’s get started.
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2
How To Turn
140
Characters
Into A
Conversation
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Isn’t it fun to shout out loud? To just yell things at the top
of your lungs? Sure it is. Expressing yourself is fun but the
reason social media is so popular is that we are social animals. We spend a great deal of time trying to connect and
relate to the rest of the world and Twitter gives us a wonderful medium with which to do this. Twitter should not be
used as a bullhorn but rather as a two way radio. It’s not
about just howling at the moon, it’s about listening to see if
the moon answers. But you also have to understand how
that communication works if you want to maximize its impact. Let’s take a look at what I mean.
I’m a huge fan of the work of Brenden Mulligan. He makes
extraordinary apps that make communication an absolute
treat. So every once in awhile, when I’ve used one of his
apps recently or read one of his articles, I like to let him
know how much I appreciate the hard work that he and his
team have done in order to make the internet a better
place. Now I have two reasons for wanting to do this. The
first is an altruistic desire to let someone know that the
work they do matters and that they are valued. The second is because he’s a real power
lifter in the IT world and when you have the opportunity to connect with great people,
you don’t waste that chance. Such opportunities were not available just a few short years
ago however today the ability to connect with those whose work you respect is a regular
thing. Recently, I commented on a new app that Mulligan’s team had put together called
Homeroom. It’s an educational app that allows teachers to communicate with parents in a
meaningful and powerful way. And so I sent out a tweet.
I made sure to include in that tweet Brenden,
Cluster (the main app of his that I use) and
Homeroom (the app that I had just learned
about). The tweet was favorited by Homeroom
and Brenden replied to the tweet with a very
simple and very appreciated “thanks”. Now I
really appreciate getting that message from
Brenden. He’s a busy man with over 119 THOUSAND followers. But the only people that will
see that tweet are people who follow both myself and Brenden. That’s the way replies work.
And that’s the way they should work. If we saw
every reply to and from every single account we
followed, our Twitter feed would be a mess. You
would spend your whole day reading conversations that you had no business or interest in. So, if you want to be seen, how do you get
around this? Well, there are a couple of ways. One thing that many users do is add a simple
salutation or even a punctuation mark prior to the name of the person you are replying to.
It’s still a “reply” but now it will be seen by anyone who follows you, regardless of whether
they follow the person you are replying to. This is extremely useful when you’re trying to
respond to someone but you want the rest of the Twitterverse to see what you’re saying as
well.
Another way to solve the problem of people missing out on the reply is not to reply. No,
I’m not suggesting that you stay quiet but rather that you modify the practice a little bit. I
tend to only reply now when it’s a conversation that I don’t feel the general public is going
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to care about or needs to see necessarily. Otherwise, I quote tweets. What the heck does
that mean? Well, I’ll show you.
The actor that plays Hodor on Game of Thrones
was recently in town for our local comic-con,
HalCon. Hodor is famous on the show for carrying around another character, a young boy who
is unable to walk. So when a local radio celebrity
tweeted that she would be hitting the stage with
Hodor, I decided to make a pop culture reference and suggest that she make him carry her. I
used Tweetbot’s “quote tweet feature” which allows you to retweet the existing message while
adding a comment of your own at the same
time. In my case I have it set up so that my input comes first and the original message
comes second. You can configure the message in a number of ways but I prefer this because it immediately calls attention to my comment. Now, why use the quote tweet or comment feature rather than just a reply. Well, as we previously discussed, a reply is only seen
by people who follow both ends of the reply; the replyer and the replyee if you will. But
when I quote a tweet and add my own message, everyone who follows me sees the message and the message exposure is greater. Assuming that someone leaves you room to comment.
140 characters, right? No more, no less, right? Well, no more, certainly. But maybe less.
When you use every single character that Twitter allows you to, you are making it impossible for someone to comment on your post. They can reply but we’ve talked about how limiting that can be. And maybe you don’t want them to comment. I will often use all 140
characters when composing a tweet. But when I think that my tweet may generate any
sort of buzz or communication or engagement, which is hopefully most of the time, I try
to beat Twitter at its own game. You’re limiting me to 140 characters? I’ll one up you. I’ll
limit myself to 60 characters. Self-editing is a powerful tool in the Twitterverse. It’s about
making a statement with as little as possible. As we said, it can be very helpful to your social media cause if you leave someone a little extra room to comment. Obviously you need
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some space to make your point but if you’re not interested in people engaging with your
thoughts and your words then you’re on the wrong platform.
As we move throughout this guide, we will talk more about ways to engage users. For now,
just remember; Twitter is a conversation, not a billboard or megaphone.
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3
To Hashtag
and How To
Hashtag:
There Is No
Question
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By now, you probably know what a hashtag is, but if you
don’t, don’t worry. It’s not the end of the world. A hashtag is
a tag or label that can be added to a tweet (or to any number of platforms for that matter) and it starts with #. They
are used in a number of ways by people. Let’s talk about the
three most common reasons for using a hashtag.
Connecting to an Existing Conversation
There are broad, sweeping conversations that happen on
Twitter. From worldwide political movements to popular local events, hashtags allow users to connect to a conversation even if they may not follow all, most, some or any of
the participants in that conversation. You don’t need to follow anyone in particular to be able to search for the hashtag
#Ferguson and follow the recent tweets in relation to that
situation. It can also be used to connect with major events
such as Apple’s World Wide Developers Conference. By
searching for #WWDC you are able to quickly scan what
everyone is saying about Apple’s recent event. From a business perspective you can also use it to search for things con-
nected to your field or to your interests. For example, I regularly scan a number of
hashtags including #webdevelopment, #ipadtraining, and #blogging in order to spot opportunities for education or connections. A number of applications can be used to scan
these hashtags automatically for you and deliver results that match your search criteria so
that you don’t miss anything.
Branding
There are a number of people that I follow who use hashtags as a tagline or brand motto
for their business or ventures. I use this myself with OneRedCat where I often use the
hashtag #startupdadlife to talk about how I balance being a stay at home dad with running several outside projects. We use this with my small business consulting firm,
StartacusHQ, where we encourage our members and followers to #StartSomething. These
are examples of hashtags used as a branding tool. A number of individuals that I follow use
similar methods such as #LeadWithGiants, or #ETInspires. It’s a quick way to identify
your brand and, as we discussed in the first point, to draw others into that existing conversation.
Sometimes You Just Need A Laugh
Not every hashtag is meant to connect to an existing conversation or allow you to brand
yourself on Twitter. Sometimes, you just want to make a point. Sometimes, you just want
people to pay attention. And that’s another way to use hashtags. People generally pay as
much if not more attention to hashtags than they do the actual tweet. And you can use
that to make your point. Whether your point is
to make people laugh or make people think,
hashtags can be a useful tool. Let’s look at
some examples.
Josh White is one of the people that makes
Halifax Pop Explosion (a huge Halifax music
festival) happen. But trying to explain to a
three year old what “festival organizer” does is
a diﬃcult task. So I finally told him that Josh
(who is also a musician) was a #RockStar. I got
a laugh out of it. Josh got a laugh out of it. Twit9
ter seemed to enjoy it. I was not attempting to connect to a broader conversation about
rock and roll musicians. I was not attempting to brand either myself or Josh. I was simply
making a joke. But the fact is that many people would not have noticed the joke were it
not for the hashtag. One of the negatives about online communication is that it is often
devoid of the ability to perfectly express tone. Hashtags allow you to put the right emphasis on your tweet. It’s like telling a joke. When you deliver the punch line, you often
change your tone or your cadence. Hashtags can have the same eﬀect. Sometimes,
hashtags are not about joking but instead are an attempt to drive a point home.
As a father of two small children, a lot of my time is spent jaunting about the city in an attempt to keep me sane and my kids entertained. However ,over the last couple of years,
my city has become a relatively dangerous place for pedestrians to travel. There are have
been a number of car/pedestrian accidents which have led the city and our local police
force to work on measures to improve crosswalk safety. Recently this included
#CrosswalkAwarenessDay where both drivers and pedestrians were given advice;
#HeadsUpHalifax.
As you can see from my tweet, I don’t believe that this campaign was as successful as
it could have been or should have been. As
such, I took to Twitter to voice my displeasure with the behaviour of some drivers. I
used the existing hashtag not necessarily as a
way to engage in an existing conversation
but rather as a sarcastic reprimand of both
the campaign’s success and the drivers it was targeting.
But hashtags themselves can be abused in any number of ways. For example, a few years
ago I spoke at a social media conference. We will call it Social Media Conference 2011 for
the purposes of this conversation (that’s not the actual name but I loved the conference as
a whole and will not speak ill of it). It was a fantastic conference where I not only got to
lead some really interesting workshops but also met fantastic people and learned a lot
from the sessions others put on. But there was one thing that bothered me. If you’ve ever
attended a conference, especially one focusing on tech or social media, you know that a lot
of attendees spend their time live tweeting the event, drawing attention to points of view,
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interesting people or the conference as a whole. But when you have such an event, you
tend to create a hashtag for the event that is short, sweet and to the point. As I said before, #WWDC is a prime example of this concept. However, this conference chose to use
their entire conference name as a hashtag. That’s right. The hashtag for the conference
was #SocialMediaConference2011. So right our of the gate, 1/7 of your tweet will be just
the name of the conference. If you tag individuals, or want to compose a meaningful message, you’re now limited to even less characters. The lesson? Hashtags, in the case of
events/conferences/etc, should be shortened versions of the thing in question. For example, the conference hashtag should have been #SMC11 or even #SMC2011.
That’t not the only way to get it wrong when it comes to hashtags. You also need to ensure
that your hashtags are directly connected to what you’re talking about. For example, if
you’re tweeting a picture of your meal, why are you including the hashtag #SEO. This one
kills me. The internet (and Twitter in particular) is full of people trying to tell you how important search engine optimization is. And they’re not wrong. Optimizing your website so
that it can be more easily found can be the diﬀerence between your business making it or
breaking it. But search engines like Google have become increasingly wary of marketers attempting to circumvent their search algorithms by attaching tags and keywords that are
unrelated to the issue at hand. Here’s an example.
This is a tweet about the relationship between Apple’s
Tim Cook and his recent comments and admissions
and how those relate to comments made by One Direction’s Louis Tomlinson. It’s been a big news story
in the UK where One Direction enjoys a cult following. And the news surrounding Tim Cooks sexuality
has created buzz worldwide as people, companies and
in some cases countries, react to Apple’s CEO recently coming out. But here’s a quick
question for you. What does that have to do with #SEO. A tweet such as this makes me
totally unwilling to trust @OnlineMRKTG as a source on anything. It was more than
likely an automated message that automatically aﬃxed the hashtag in an attempt to join a
conversation that, based on its content, it had no business being attached to. Throughout
this guide I will repeat one mantra over and over again. Whether it’s in hashtags or replies
or who you follow, above all else, be honest.
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4
A Picture is
Worth 1000
Words...Or
At Least 120
Time and time again, research into social media, its users
and its practices yield the exact same results; people like pictures. Everyone likes pictures. Everyone likes to share pictures. Who doesn’t like pictures? And yet, think of all the
tweets that you see on a daily basis that would be so much
better with a picture...and it’s just text. It’s shocking to me.
Images help create a story more clearly than any word can.
Sure, you can picture the elephant in the room but when
you see an actual picture of an elephant it certainly drives
the point home. But it’s not just about attaching an image
to every single tweet that you send. It’s about crafting
unique stories and using visuals to do so. And like hashtags,
there are some things to be careful to avoid as well.
Don’t share crappy pictures. This should go without saying.
But it doesn’t. So we have to say it. Images should be crisp
and clear (where possible) and it should be pretty evident
what we’re looking for in the picture. Unless you’re sharing
a “when you see this it’s gonna blow your mind” image, then
I honestly don’t want to spend several minutes trying to fig-
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ure out why I’m looking at a picture of a Ford Focus only to find out that if I squint and
tilt my head to the right, at just the right angle, I can see someone walking behind the car
carrying a copy of your new book. Stop it. That’s ridiculous.
It should also go without saying that the images you’re sharing should be suitable for someone’s Twitter feed. Just because you follow a certain adult entertainer and believe that
their newest photo shoot is really classy doesn’t mean that you should retweet that. I’m
not kidding. I’ve seen this. I’ve seen so-called professionals tweet nude images from their
Twitter account. Don’t do this. Trust me. Suitable can be a matter of judgment. For example, many users believe that posting fresh images of a car crash is appropriate. I’m going to
suggest that you save those types of tweets for the media. There are several reasons for
this, not the least of which being that it can be insensitive. It’s also important to make
sure that the images you are sharing do not put people at risk. During a recent manhunt in
a nearby community, users were tweeting images of police searching through neighborhoods despite repeated requests by the authorities to not do so. The secret to pictures on
Twitter? Just think. It’s great that you can tweet something so quickly but it’s also terrible
because it often means that you don’t have to take the time to think about what you’re doing. Do me a favor. Do you a favor. Think.
Now this next section is sure to be a sticking point for some people but you need to understand that many images have very specific licenses and that to share them without permission can be a violation of copyright laws. So how can you get around this? Well, there are a
few ways. First, where possible, share pictures that belong to you. If you DO want to find
an image to get your point across, try to use a service that oﬀers images that are totally license free. Unsplash and Pexels are two websites that oﬀer amazing high definition images, entirely free of any copyright. For example, all of these pretty pictures that you see in
this guide at the beginning of each chapter... those are either from Unsplash or Pexels.
They’re great for blogs and they’re great for Twitter. Now sometimes you just need a picture of a cat climbing a tree. Just understand that when you share an image that does not
belong to you, especially if you use it to in any way promote your business, you are opening
yourself up the possibility of legal issues. Does it happen often? No. Can it happen? Yes.
Also, unless your Twitter feed is ALL ABOUT thing X, don’t ALWAYS post pictures of
thing X all day, every day. For example, if I’m following you because you provide amazing
insights on web development, maybe I’m not super interested in a hundred photos a day
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of your dog, Pookie. Now there is nothing wrong (in fact there’s a lot right) with varying
the images you share, but it’s important to understand that every image you share has an
eﬀect on your image and your social media presence. I share lots of images that are well
outside my wheelhouse. But I tend to make sure that they’re connected to a conversation
and further, I share offbeat, unrelated images rarely enough that it does not turn into a
trend. I’ll give you an example of what I mean.
I’m not in the hot dog industry. I’m not connected to the world of hot dogs and people
probably aren’t looking to me when they
need insight into the world of hot dogs.
However, I recently ate a marvelous creation
called a Poseidon Dog. I won’t go into great
detail except to say that it’s the inception of
hot dogs and tastes like magic. People look
to me for info on Apple, web development,
productivity, and occasionally parenting. But
that doesn’t mean that I can’t occasionally
share a picture of a delicious hot dog. In this
case, it actually has an alternative purpose as
well as I have dealings with several vendors
at the marker where this hot dog was purchased and where possible I try to support
great local businesses, like this particular hot
dog vendor, @HFXFL.
But if I started tweeting a hot dog picture a
day, my followers may become disinterested.
If my Twitter name were @HotDogPics,
then I’m golden. People would be getting
what they signed up for. The lesson is not
“don’t tweet pictures of hot dogs”. No. The
lesson is don’t CONSTANTLY tweet pictures of hot dogs.
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5
Reach Out
and Tweet
Someone
I grew up in the generation of fan mail. I grew up when the
best way to contact those people that you most admired,especially celebrities, was to send actual mail (it was this
weird form of communication whereby you would “write”
things down on “paper” and then put it in a small paper receptacle and then someone would hand it to the person you
wanted to send the message to). Now that mail rarely made
it to the actual celebrity because it was usually care of their
fan club, a group of people whose job it was to read you
gushing about how much you loved New Kids on The
Block. But you at least got the sensation that you were talking directly to them and if you were lucky you’d get back a
signed poster of Donnie Wahlberg. It was the best of times,
it was the worst of times.
Times have changed. Now, if you want to tell Aaron Rodgers that you think he’s the best quarterback in the history
of professional football, you can actually tell HIM, instantly. Now there’s a solid chance that since he has over 1.2
million followers, he’s never going to actually see that
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tweet. But you can send it. Ok, so maybe you can’t connect directly with someone like
Aaron Rodgers, but you can absolutely connect with people who previously would have
been behind a virtual wall. I’ll give you an example.
One of the best books I’ve ever read on starting and running your own business is a book
by Frans Johansson called The Click Moment. The book is about serendipity and chance
and being open to what seems like randomness in order to be successful, specifically in
business. It’s an amazing read and I’d recommend it to anyone. As I read the book, there
were a number of points that I found particularly key, so I tweeted them and told everyone I knew about the book. I also included Frans Johansson in these tweets. Despite the
fact that Frans has 3000 followers and is an extremely busy public speaker, I was pleased
to see what followed.
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So what? Who cares if Frans Johansson got back to you on Twitter? Well, first oﬀ, I do. For
me, knowing that someone that inspires me is happy that they can do that for me makes
me happy. It’s a vicious happy circle. He inspires, I let him know. He’s happy. He does
more inspiring things. And so on. Forever.
When I am inspired by someone’s work now, I tend to seek them out on Twitter and tell
them so. I make feedback as specific as possible. I try not to be a gushing fan, although
sometimes that’s hard. More often, I like to connect what they’re doing with what I’m doing in a natural and organic way. But it has to be natural and organic. Just like the marketing company that uses #SEO to talk about One Direction, if one of those things is not
like the other, people will notice. If people recognize that you’re trying to ride the coat
tails of a celebrity, real life or Twitter, they will revolt.
Now not everyone that you reach out to on Twitter is a “celebrity”. I don’t spend my day
tweeting at Mark Wahlberg and Cake Boss. But I do spend a good portion of my day tweeting with others. For me, if you don’t communicate WITH people on Twitter, you’re leaving out a very big part of social media (hint: it’s the social part). For me, one of the truly
wonderful aspects of Twitter is the ability to connect, instantly, with people. Whether it’s
a good friend, a professional colleague or the local sports bar, the ability to engage on Twitter is what makes it so unique.
Remember when your mom said that if you can’t say something nice about someone, don’t
say anything at all? Well, apparently Twitter missed that particular lesson. Twitter, like
most online mediums, can be incredibly negative. Some of the worst things that have ever
been said to me have been said to me on Twitter. It happens. But don’t let that be you.
When you’re connecting with the social media world, where possible, try to give people
the benefit of the doubt. Remember that sometimes it’s hard to get your point across in
140 characters. So, if you’re not sure what someone meant, reach out to them. Ask them.
Treat them like you would treat a human being.
I’m absolutely guilty of having some conversations that I wish I hadn’t on Twitter. Occasionally someone says something that you just can’t let slide. They hit that trigger, they
scratch open that scar. It’s easy to get pulled down the rabbit hole when reaching out to
someone else or when they’re reaching out to you. If you find that happening, think about
it this way; what would I do if I were sitting in a coﬀee shop, having a conversation with
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this person, instead of talking to them on this here computer type thing? You’re going to
come to one of two options, 90% of the time. The first option is that you would ask them
if they could explain a little further and you would try to wrap your head around what they
were saying or suggesting. And if that option didn’t work,you would probably employ strategy number two where you just walked away. But the perceived anonymity of online communication imbues as with the superhuman ability to bicker and whine. You’re not always
going to be able to avoid it, but do your best.
Now all the being said, try not to be a groupie. A groupie retweets EVERYTHING someone says. A groupie comments on EVERYTHING someone says. Don’t be a groupie.
Sometimes it’s hard. I’m not kidding. There are a few people that I follow that everything
that comes out of their Twitter mouth is pure gold (I’m looking at you @TheCoolestCool).
But I do my best to only comment or retweet the really top end stuﬀ. Twitter is about
your voice as much as it is about communication so as much as it’s nice to share someone’s
thoughts, you also need to understand that if someone wants to see EVERY picture of a
kitten on the internet, they will find a way to see EVERY picture of a kitten on the internet and they don’t necessarily need you to retweet EVERY picture of a kitten on the internet.
Every time that you reach out to someone on Twitter it should be real. It should be
thoughtful. And it should be organic (I know organic is one of those words, like synergy,
that people are quickly falling out of love with, but I like it, so there). And with all that in
mind, let’s talk about automated messages. There are reasons for automated messages. If
I’m getting a hundred new followers every single day, my content is blowing everybody out
of the water and I want to say thank you and hello to every single new follower, that’s a reason for an automated message. If I want to make sure that I don’t miss a new follower and
want to make every single follower feel like a special and unique snowflake, that’s a reason
for an automated message. But please, please, please. Don’t confuse the word “reason”
with the word “excuse” because while there are a lot of reasons for automated messages,
there is never an excuse for an automated message.
No one has ever received an automated message and thought, “wow, now I feel like a special and unique snowflake”. An automated message says, “Hey, I care enough about you to
have set up this automated message so that I can acknowledge you as a follower without
putting any real eﬀort into your care and feeding. Sincerely, anonymous internet service.”
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It’s gotten to the point where even REAL thank you messages that you might send because someone has followed you are looked on with disdain because there is the possibility
that it MAY have been an automated message. There are two lessons here. The first is that
you just shouldn’t use automated messages to thank people for follows, retweets, favorites,
etc. The second is a lesson that we’ve mentioned more than once. Social media, without social, is just old school advertising and old school advertising is dead. If you’re planning on
using Twitter to advertise, that’s fine. Just understand that people are not, at their core, using Twitter the same way that they would have used the Yellow Pages. So when you reach
and and tweet somebody understand that these messages, even direct messages, can easily
become public domain. So don’t sound like a used car salesman, unless you’re selling used
cars, which is a perfectly noble and honourable thing to do.
So if you want to thank someone who follows you, or someone who retweets you, or comments on something you say, what are you supposed to do? Are you supposed to just send
personalized messages to every single person that you want to thank or connect with online? Yes. That’s exactly what you’re supposed to do. Put in the eﬀort; the grunt work. If
you value someone, take the time to let them know it. I promise you that an automated
message means the same, if not less, to someone as if you didn’t message them at all.
Coming in slightly above automated messages on the insidious Twitter scale is
#TeamFollowBack. There exists within some of the Twitter community a belief that if you
follow someone, they should automatically follow you back. This is ridiculous. You might
follow me because you’re interested in my insights into productivity and work life balance
but if most of your tweets are pictures of shoes, I’m not really obligated to follow you
back. Here’s my rule. Whenever I get a new follower, I take a glance at their profile. If it’s
something I think is interesting, I’ll follow them. If their bio doesn’t immediately interest
me, I’ll take a look at the last 10-15 tweets they’ve sent. If none of those interest me, I”m
not going to follow them back. It’s not that I don’t appreciate them, it’s that I use Twitter
as a source of information and insight I might want. If you provide neither of these things,
I’m not going to follow you back.
So, reach out an tweet someone but if they don’t respond or follow you back, don’t read
too much into it. Just keep calm and carry on tweeting. Don’t worry. The internet is the
wild wild west. Someone is going to be really excited to see all those pictures of your
shoes.
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6
The Future
Will Be
Automated
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Now, I just got finished telling you not to automate things.
Right? Ok, well now let’s talk about some things that you
should automate and how. I know this probably sounds
counter productive to you because we just talked about how
meaningless automated communication is, but what we are
talking about here is diﬀerent. You’ll see what I mean.
A huge segment of Twitter users are on Twitter just looking
for information. For many people, Twitter has replaced traditional media outlets as their primary source of news.
Sometimes that manifests itself as real time events; a car accident, a political event, financial news. But sometimes people are looking for information in a more traditional sense.
They’re looking for things to read, things to learn and
things to know. And the internet is FULL of this information. Twitter is no diﬀerent. A large portion of the people I
follow are there to provide me with information. Whether
it’s the graphic designer who oﬀers step by step illustrator
tutorials, or the web developer who provides new and
unique processes for Wordpress or the Edmonton Oilers
fan who talks about how terribly the team is doing this year. Yes, these are all real things
that I follow. And over the course of the last year, I’ve taken it upon myself to share the
things that I find interesting with the world. But I don’t spend all day, every day reading articles and then forwarding that information on to the world. Instead, I get hour long
chunks of time that I get to spend reading as many things as I possibly can.
Have you ever been following someone and just thought “oh my god, why do they just
send tweet after tweet after tweet? Do they not have anything better to do?” Maybe they
do. Maybe they don’t. But the point is that people do not like it when one user just absolutely clogs their feed, especially since most people don’t have time to read those twelve articles you just posted in a row right now. So what’s that solution?
Buﬀer is a service that oﬀers you the opportunity to push a bunch of tweets out, at predetermined times throughout the day. It’s used to “buﬀer” your tweets and make you less annoying to the general public. Here’s how it works. You have ten articles that you want to
send out. You set up a schedule on Buﬀer. Let’s say that you want to post tweets every day
at 11:15am and 3:45pm. You set a schedule in Buﬀer that says exactly that. Now, as you add
articles or tweets to your queue, they will automatically come out at those set times. It
spreads all of your posts out over a period of time, at intervals chosen by you, so that you
can ensure that your tweets are read by as many people as possible, not just the people
who happen to be following you and paying attention between 11:17pm and 11:49pm when
you fire oﬀ your hundred tweets.
So, you want to send a tweet at precisely 2pm on the following Tuesday. You have a couple
of options. You could wait til the following Tuesday at 2pm and send the tweet or you
could schedule it ahead of time using a service like Hootsuite. Hoostuite is useful for a
whole host of things but I personally find it most useful in its ability to schedule updates.
Here’s why. Imagine you are launching a new website in conjunction with a business that
you are starting. The website will be going live Monday morning at 6am. You want to share
an initial message with your followers at 6am to let them know the site has gone live. You
then want to share an update at 10am directing them to the first post on your website’s
blog. You then want to direct them to your contact page at 3pm to highlight the various
ways they can connect with you and your team and finally at 8pm you want to thank everyone for a successful launch. I promise you that you have far better things to do than sit
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around at 6, 11, 3 and 8 and send each of those updates manually. So a service like Hootsuite can help immensely with this sort of thing.
A word of warning about using Hootsuite for scheduling messages. It’s fine to schedule
some updates here and there specific to an event or something similar. However, Twitter is
meant to be a real time communication medium, so don’t get in the habit of spending Sunday evening watching football and scheduling a week’s worth of tweets. That’s not to say
that it’s not a good idea to plan out your week on social media however you need to understand that most of your communication on this medium should be as real time as possible.
There are too many reasons to go through all of them however I’m going to tell you a
story that explains my biggest reasons.
About a year and half ago I was out to dinner with a group of friends. We were talking
about any number of topics but had somehow made our way to discussions about the upcoming Batman movie and specifically that Ben Aﬄeck had signed on to play the lead
role. This conversation went round and round, from other Batman movies we liked to who
we preferred as Batman, to who would make the best Robin, and so on and so on. Finally,
after roughly 30-40 minutes of Batman related conversations, one of our friends chimed in
and made the following bold statement; “Did you guys know that Ben Aﬄeck is going to
play Batman?” This resulted in uproarious chuckles from everyone. He had just not been
paying attention. At all. And the timing of his comment made it sound like he was not the
sharpest tool in the shed. But people forget about those things, right? Flash forward to
three weeks ago when I had roughly the same group of friends at a gathering for my birthday. The most common phrase uttered during that party? Every single time that person,
we’ll call him Brian, said anything? “Did you guys know that Ben Aﬄeck is going to play
Batman?” People don’t forget. And unless you want to be the person that chimed in way
late to comment on something that had already been said a thousand times, a thousand
ways, you need to make yourself a real time member of that conversation.
While Buﬀer and Hoostuite are useful for very specific purposes, there is another tool becoming more common and more widely used called IFTTT. IFTTT stands for If This
Then That. It’s a logic statement that says “when this thing happens, make this thing happen.” It’s cause and eﬀect. And it’s incredibly useful. For example, I can set up IFTTT so
that whenever a new blog article goes live on my site, it automatically tweets it out with a
specific message and format. I can set up IFTTT so that when someone favorites an Insta22
gram photo of mine, it automatically posts that image to Twitter with a predetermined
comment. There are hundreds and hundreds of recipes (what they call an IFTTT statement) available using every platform you can think of. Let’s say that every time someone
favorited one of your tweets, you wanted a Philips Hue Light (an internet connected light
bulb) to turn on or oﬀ. You can do that. I don’t know why you’d want to, but that’s besides
the point. IFTTT lets you share across multiple platforms with minimal setup. It is an incredibly useful and diverse tool that I recommend everyone familiarize themselves with.
A final note on automation. Every platform is a little bit diﬀerent. Facebook, Google+,
LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram and so on. None of them share exactly the same user base
and the way that people interact with people and updates on each one is a little bit diﬀerent. So please don’t treat them all the same. Do not set up your accounts so that every
time you tweet it sends that same identical message to every other platform that you’re
on. A tweet is a diﬀerent medium than a Facebook post. This is a fact and yet people treat
them exactly the same. What works on LinkedIn is not necessarily going to work on Instagram. So please don’t treat them the same. The key to automation is not duplication. It’s
ease. Automation is about setting in motion some things that allow you to be more successful. It’s not designed to give you the equivalent of an internet stutter.
If you’re really unsure about automation; if you’re not sure the best way to automate messages, updates, posts and images, don’t. Or ask someone who does know. You might find
someone on Twitter. If only there were some way to reach out to them.
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7
Odds & Ends
If you swing a baseball bat on Twitter you’re bound to hit
three #SEO experts, a Twitter “Wizard” and a half dozen
content marketing “gurus”. If you follow their accounts and
read all their updates, you’re going to learn an awful lot
about the internet. And some of that information is going
to be really helpful to you and some of it isn’t. Here’s how I
honestly recommend you go about getting the most out of
Twitter. Are you ready? Ok? Write this down.
Tweet.
No manual, guide or tutorial, including and possibly especially this one, will ever provide you with as much insight
and instruction as the school of Twitter hard knocks. This
guide isn’t designed so that you can teach a seminar on social media nor is it designed so that the second you start using it you’ll surpass Justin Bieber and The Pope in terms of
followers. This guide is designed to help you feel comfortable with developing your online habits. What works for
me will not necessarily work for you. Some of the habits
may be the same but the way that we write, the way that we
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think and the way that we respond are never going to be the same from one person to the
next.
I recently completed a social media contract for a client. I helped build and manage their
online identity while they became more comfortable with the process. One of the questions they had in the very beginning of the contract was “how many followers do we want
to aim for”. That’s a fair question, but honestly not a very important one. When I’m planning a campaign or an account I care much less about how many followers we’re going to
have than I do about how engaged our followers are going to be. I’d rather have 100 engaged followers than 1000 followers who don’t regularly interact with me. Again, when we
consider what social media is and should be, we come to understand that nothing is as important as the social aspect.
I’m also asked by a lot of people, “how often should I tweet?” That’s a question that is almost impossible to answer. And to answer that impossible question I’d like to tell you a
story about my university English professor, Dr. Robert Morrison. He was possibly the
most wonderful human in the history of time. British, with a dry wit and a brain like a
steel trap, Dr. Morrison was an absolute pleasure to learn from. His knack was not in
throwing information at you but rather in getting you to reconsider whole thought processes. He was and always will be one of the greatest teachers I have ever had. The first
time that I ever wrote a paper for him, the question that comes up in every university
class came up. “How long should the paper be?” His answer was that there was no minimum or maximum. So we all varied the question slightly and asked about 1ooo more times.
And every time he said that there was no minimum or maximum. Finally, exasperated, he
explained.
He said that if he told us that it should be a two page paper, we would do one of two
things. We would either write one good page and then fill another page with crap. Or we’d
write four good pages and then cut out really important things to pare it down to two
pages. He said that he’d had papers ranging anywhere from 300 words to 10,000 words
and the marks were never related to the length but rather directly related to the quality of
the words. His advice, which I have followed in a number of diﬀerent fields since; write til
you’re done. That’s my Twitter advice. If you’ve got something to say, say it. If you’ve got a
lot to say, say it all. And if you don’t have anything to say, shut up. While writing this guide
I’ve gone a little bit “Twitter Dark”. Partly because I’ve been busy writing this guide but
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partly because I just haven’t had a lot to say. I’ve been playing with my kids and watching
football and most of my written work has been poured into this tome. When I have something to say, I’ll tweet it but I will never tweet for the sake of tweeting. Don’t. Do. That.
Have you ever been to one of these new frozen yogurt places? The places where you take a
bowl full of frozen yogurt and then cover it with slivers of kiwi and chocolate and gummi
bears and whatever else your weird mind can think up? Well, in a weird way, your Twitter
feed, both incoming and outgoing, should look a lot like that. Mix it up. Get playful. Follow three straight tweets about financial management with a video of Milli Vanilli singing
Blame It On The Rain. Why not? People like to be entertained. I was once listening to a
podcast featuring Demetri Martin who is a relatively well known stand up comedian. He’s
been compared to particular comedians throughout his career and on this podcast he
talked about that a little. He said that no matter what you do, people are going to put you
in a box. Oh, you’re a stand up comedian? Here’s your box. Oh, you do one liners? Here’s
your box. But he said that if you really want to be successful, don’t try to stay out of the
box. Try to make the biggest, weirdest, most awkwardly shaped box you possibly can because sure, people are still gonna put you in the box but imagine how much fun you’ll have
in there. I like that. And it’s how I try to live my Twitter life. In a weird box that no one
else exactly fits in. So as much as this guide is about giving you some practical advice on
your Twitter journey, my biggest advice would be to be yourself and see where this crazy
world takes you. And now, here’s a picture of a cat.
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