Posts tagged "twitter"
  1. 6 days ago 

    14 Tools Or Services To Help You Get The Most Out Of Twitter

    Using Twitter or any of the other social networks shouldn’t be a painful experience but yet many people find the thought of using Twitter to be a daunting and scary task. With that in mind I have come up with a list of 14 excellent tools and services you can use to help get the most out of your Twitter experience.

    1. A robust desktop app - The Twitter website has come a long ways in terms of functionality since its inception but it still lags far behind many of the free desktop clients currently available on the market. You can find Twitter Desktop applications that are cross-platform and built using Adobe Air and you can find operating specific applications as well. The desktop apps include many enhancements and functionality over Twitter website including:
      • Image upload to supported services
      • Automatic URL shortening using third party services
      • Multiple account support
      • Access to other social media networks from one app
      • Multi-Column view to divide up your @ replies, direct messages, searches and keyword tracking
      • Quick use buttons for retweets, sending direct messages or @ replies
      Some of the desktop apps you may want to check out include:
    2. A Good mobile app – Much like the main Twitter site the mobile version of the site is missing many of the features and functionality currently available in the different flavors of Twitter mobile apps available. Many mobile Twitter apps include features found on the desktop such as image upload and URL shortening. Since I currently run Windows Mobile and have experience using Windows Mobile I highly recommend looking at PocketTwit but if you run an iPhone or Android based device there are numerous apps available that you should consider looking at.
    3. A different browser based app – In case you are unable to due to company policy, don’t want to install a new program on your computer or haven’t found a Twitter app you were satisfied with yet, there are many browser based alternatives available to use instead of the Twitter site. These browser based apps include much of the same functionality you would find in one of the previously mentioned desktop apps, but are available from any computer browser without installing additional software. Some of the best browser based apps to check out include:
    4. Bit.ly – If you plan on sharing any links on Twitter you need to get a bit.ly account and begin harnessing the powr of their api key. Bit.ly has become the standard URL shortener on Twitter and for good reason. Many app developers have already integrated bit.ly into their apps and an account with bit.ly includes free analytics so you can track just how well your shared links are doing.
    5. Twitpic – Twitpic is my and many others Twitter picture sharing service of choice. It was the first image host dedicated to the Twitter platform, is very easy to use and is integrated into many third party apps already.
    6. Listorious – Listorious is a directory of available Twitter Lists broken down into different categories for easy discovery. I have talked about the importance of Lists and how to create them in another post so I won’t go in to details here, but if you are looking to subscribe to or find new and interesting Twitter users or Lists; Listorious should be your first stop.
    7. Wefollow – WeFollow is a Twitter discovery tool used to describe you using hashtags to the rest of the community. If you’re looking to be discovered on Twitter add yourself to the Wefollow directory under the appropriate hashtags or if you’re looking to discover other new and interesting people to follow start browsing Wefollow under the relevant category.
    8. TweetMeme – If you are looking to discover the hottest and most shared links on Twitter look no further than the aggregate site TweetMeme. Categorized into categories and sub-categories Tweetmeme makes it easy to find exactly the type of content you are looking for and with their top Tweeted stories you can get a glimpse at what is currently trending on Twitter. Adding the Tweetmeme button to your own site can help your content become more easily shared.
    9. Twitter Grader – Twitter Grader is a free Twitter analytics tool you can use to check and compare your profile with the other users who have used the service to help determine how influential you are on the social network. Grader will rank you profile, offer you Tips and Suggestions if they find anything odd about your account and they have a tool for checking if another user if following you back.
    10. Twitalyzer – is another free Twitter analytics tool that offers many additional features over that of Grader. Twitalyzer looks at metrics such as: impact, engagement, influence and generosity. If you only look at one Twitter analytics tool make sure you look at Twitalyzer because in my opinion they are the best.
    11. TweetStats – TweetStats is another free analytics tool that graphs your Tweet timeline, Tweets per hour, Tweets per month, most active Twitter days of the week and your reply stats. This is a good tool to analyze when you are most active on Twitter, the times when you are least active and who you have the most conversations with on Twitter. This type of information can help you decide if your Tweets could be sent out at a different time or day to further your engagement.
    12. Search.twitter.com – There is going to come a time that you will need to either find something or monitor something on Twitter and at that point you are going to have to turn to search. The Twitter Search (formerly Summize) is a very good real time Twitter search engine with advanced search features such as location, dates, and hashtags to help you pinpoint exactly what it is you’re looking for. Looking for a review on that new restaurant near your house? Try the Twitter advanced search to find this information quickly.
    13. Twitvid – I rarely need to post video to Twitter but when I do I have found myself turning to the easy to use Twitter video sharing service twitvid. Twitvid accepts video uploads up to a maximum size of 2GB in size and with no time restrictions in place. You can upload and share your videos directly from the twitvid site or by using one of the applications that currently have twitvid already built in. twitvid also shows you what the most popular videos are at that time, recent video uploads and who the most popular members are. Twitvid can be used to discover new content or to promote your own videos.
    14. OneForty.com – Just in case you run into a problem on Twitter and are in need of a solution look no further than the Twitter app store OneForty.com. oneforty is extremely easy to use as it is broken down by category, essential apps and trending apps. If you can’t find what the Twitter app or tool you’ve looking for at oneforty chances are it hasn’t been built.

    If you have used any of the above mentioned tools or services please leave a comment with your review or if you think I missed a crucial tool or service that all Twitter users should be using please let me know that as well.

    If you found this guide to be of any use please consider sharing it with your Facebook friends or Twitter followers by clicking on the Facebook or Tweetmeme icons below.

    2. Comments
  2. 1 week ago 

    14 Tips To Help You, Your Brand Or Your Business Get Started In Social Media

    Are you looking for a few tips to help kick start your social media/networking experience? Here are 7 Do’s and 7 Don’ts of social networks that can hopefully help guide your social media journey in the right direction and because I couldn’t stop writing there is a bonus tip at the end.

    Do

    1. Do go and join at least one social network right now and after creating your account sit back, monitor and discover how that social network works before posting or sharing any content. As author Ray LeBlond once said “You learn something every day if you pay attention.” So before you jump in and do something you may regret later you must first learn how the community interacts with each other and you must learn how to use the different features contained within that particular social network.
    2. Do make sure to accurately and truthfully fill out your user profile including a real picture (or at least something that represents you) of yourself. This allows others in that social network to get to know the real you and will help them to trust you in the future.
    3. Do spend plenty of time actively communicating and interacting with your community. Not only will you learn a lot from your community but you can also help your community by answering questions, sharing content and if applicable pointing them in the direction of your services/website/blog. A quote I enjoy that applies here is:
      “A single conversation with a wise man is better than ten years of study.”
      -Chinese Proverb
      In other words you can learn by watching but at some point you will have to interact, engage and participate in order to truly learn how to make the most out of social media.
    4. Do spend time using the search features at whichever social network you are currently on to actively seek out and discover new and interesting individuals who you should friend or follow. You can’t have a sane conversation with yourself and in order to participate in meaningful conversation and begin to build a community you are going to have to go out and find those you wish to communicate with.
    5. Do take the time to remove and block any spammers that may have latched on to you like the parasites they are. By taking the time and effort to block and report spammers you are helping the social networking sites become a safer and cleaner environment for all users. If spammers find a social network increasingly aggressive towards their tactics eventually they will leave to find an easier place to spam their wares.
    6. Do make sure you share quality links and content from others with your community. Sharing useful and relevant content with your followers and friends shows the community that you are there for more than just self promotion.
    7. Do realize that the internet and social networks are increasingly transparent and it is very easy to be found out as a fake or imposter. The best advice I can give to those wishing to use social networks effectively is to always be yourself and to pretend to be someone you aren’t. If you like hockey, show that you do, don’t try and fake your knowledge of football because you will fail. If you are a heavy user of curse words (maybe tone that down a bit) don’t censor yourself simply to gain a larger audience.

    Do Not’s

    1. Do not be afraid to try new social networks. They may only currently have a couple of hundred members but they could quickly turn in to the next Facebook or Twitter. When it comes to social media and social networks it is almost always more beneficial to be an early adopter rather than a late follower. At minimum by being an early adopter you will be able to secure your chosen username to help further your branding efforts.
    2. Do not be offended if you follow or friend someone and they do not reciprocate. You should only be following or friending those individuals who you find interesting and relevant anyways and those who enhance or add to the quality of the conversation. If they don’t reciprocate the follow at least you are still getting something out of the relationship because they were someone you found interesting to begin with.
    3. Do not fall into the spammy cycle of follow/unfollow or friend/unfriend simply to get a notification to them in hopes they will follow you back. This can be considered a form of spam and is highly annoying to the individual who you are trying to entice to follow you. Why not engage in relevant conversation with this individual instead? Chances are they will friend or follow you a lot quicker if they know you are adding to the conversation and not just trying to inflate your numbers.
    4. Do not use a fake profile picture (such as that of a scantily clad blonde) to try and entice more friends/followers into following or friending you. This is a common tactic among spammers (especially on Twitter) and after being found out as a fraud you will almost certainly be blocked and/or reported as a spammer.
    5. Do not solely use the social networks to promote your own blog/product/service etc… Self-promotion is a good thing but excessive self promotion will get you unfollowed or unfriended rather quickly. Instead of only self promotion try engaging with your followers in a real conversation, try helping by answering questions, ask a few questions yourself and yes even promote your products/services or site.
    6. Do not stress out over your follower/friend count. Inflated numbers matter very little, instead what really matters is the quality of users and the quality of conversation that is taking place within your community. Strive for quality and not quantity.
    7. Do not expect overnight success using social media. It is very difficult and rare to see a company, individual or brand jump into social media and instantly garner hundreds or thousands of fans. Instead work daily at growing your community and increasing your brand’s online presence.

    Bonus

    1. Try not to limit yourself to using only the web interface for whichever social networking platform you are currently using. There are plenty of high quality and free third party tools available for Windows, Mac’s and mobile devices that integrate many great features, combine many different social networks into one centralized place and can greatly increase your productivity and efficiency when using the social networks.

    Are there any tips or guidelines I am missing that you could offer up in the comments to others who may be reading this post? If you liked this post or found it useful in any way, please leave a comment below or share it with your own community using the Retweet or Facebook icons below.

    3. Comments
  3. 1 week ago 

    The How, What And Why’s Of Twitter Lists

    In November of 2009 Twitter rolled out one of its newest features to the general public…Lists. Since the initial launch Lists have seem to be mostly forgotten. In case you are new to Twitter or unaware of what Lists are, they are nothing more than a self managed group of individuals focused around a central topic and placed into an appropriately name List.

    In order to understand how Lists could be beneficial for your use we should first look at we go about creating lists from within the Twitter website.

    1. Login to your twitter account
    2. On the right hand side of the Twitter site below the search you will see your lists. Click on “New list” to create a new list.
      Create New List
    3. After clicking on new list you will be presented with the following screen.
      New Twitter List Options
      Enter a name for your list (something related to the users you will be adding to it) a description of what this list is about, the access level whether private or public and finally click create list.
    4. To add users to your newly created list go the profile page of another Twitter user who you would like to add to the list. Click on the “Lists” button and you will see this:
      Create New List
      Select the list you would like this user to be on and they will automatically be added to the list.
      ** You do not have to follow a user to add them to a List.
    5. Repeat step 4 for each additional Twitter user you would like to add to your list.

    Now that you know how to create your own Twitter lists let’s take a look at a five reasons to use lists and five types of lists you could create.

    Reason To Use Lists

    1. Tracking The Competition – If you are in an industry where many of your competitors are on Twitter you can create a new, private list (remember the choice given when creating a List from step 3) that only you will be able to see and access and because you can add them to a List without following them your competition won’t know you are tracking what they do.
    2. Easy One Click Following – If you search the Twitter List directory Listorious you will be able to find a list in a niche that interests you created by someone you may or may not follow. After finding a list you want to follow you can then click on the Follow button and you will be subscribed and will be following that list of users without having to go to each one of them and clicking follow.
    3. Trust – If you are unsure if you should be following a particular person because of spam or other concerns check there Twitter profile and look for the “Listed” below their profile name. Chances are if they are Listed on several different lists you can trust them.
    4. Gaining More Followers – As you gain in popularity you will eventually be added to Lists yourself and as these Lists become followed you may gain followers from users who decide to follow the individuals who are on the Lists they themselves are currently following.
    5. Easier To Unsubscribe Than To Unfollow – If you use lists to track and monitor a niche or an event the use of Lists make it is very easy to unsubscribe from the list once you are done tracking the niche or when the event is over by simply going back to the list and clicking unfollow. If you weren’t using lists and had went to each profile and followed them manually you will now have to go into your followers list and unfollow each user you had previously added to remove them. This of course could take quite a long time depending on how many users you had followed for that particular event or niche. Lists can save you time.

    Types Of Lists

    1. Location Related Lists – You can create a list of users from your City/Town/Province/State etc…and can keep up on local news and happenings usually before it hits traditional media outlets.
    2. Connect With Fans Of Your Favorite Sports Team – You can create a list of those who are fans of your favorite sports teams. Use search.twitter.com to easily find those who are talking about your team and add those who are fans to your list. I currently run an Edmonton Oilers List where I keep track of fans of my favorite hockey team the Edmonton Oilers.
    3. Official Employee List – Create a list of all official employee Twitter accounts and then share and promote this list so others are aware of who is officially communicating from within the company.
    4. VIP Lists – If you are attending an upcoming event or are hosting an event create a list that contains the Twitter names of all those who will be in attendance. Share this list with all those that will be in attendance as it will help put a face to the tweet.
    5. Peers And Experts – Create a list of peers and experts in your industry. Share this list with those in your industry to make it easier for everyone to find peers without having to go through the process of creating their own list.

    Of course there are far more than five ways to use Twitter lists but hopefully these five give you a place to start.


    Please leave a comment below letting me know how you are using Twitter lists and if you find this at all useful; consider clicking the Facebook icon to share it on Facebook with your friends or click the Retweet button to share it on Twitter with your followers.

    4. Comments
  4. 2 weeks ago 

    Avoiding The Initial Social Media Mistakes

    One of the mistakes that I’ve witnessed many new brands and individuals make when first entering into social media is their attempt to bring their old media way of thinking along with them. This traditional way of thinking and attempt to squeeze into a different medium will eventually lead to failure.

    Instead of joining a social network, listening to the community and determining how that particular community works, quite often instead they will instead join and begin quickly aggressively pursuing the members of this social network with their look at me and buy this now message. The community whether it be Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or some other community will eventually turn its collective back on the brand as abuse will only be tolerated for so long.

    What brands and businesses new to social networks should instead be doing is:

    1. Join the social network using a real name or the business name
    2. Upload a real picture of yourself or your product
    3. Use the search tools to discover individuals who are already talking about you or your brand and friend or follow them
    4. Listen to the conversations that are currently taking place and learn what is and what isn’t appropriate conduct on that particular social network
    5. After gaining followers and have learned the rules begin to socialize with those in your network. It is after all called “social” networking.
    6. Answer questions, ask questions and offer genuine help to those people who may be interested in your product/brand/business
    7. Repeat

    To put the above into perspective I present you with two very different scenarios:

    1. You’re at a party and there is someone there who’s had far too much fun already and is harassing everyone he/she encounters with loud drunken talk and push behavior. Eventually he/she is dancing on the table and puking in the planter.
    2. You’re at a party and there is an individual there who is walking around making small talk with all those in the room. He/she is asking questions, telling jokes, sharing stories and listening to what others around him are saying. This is an articulate individual who is facilitating conversation among the group and everyone seems to be drawn to him/her.

    How do you want your brand/business to be remembered amongst the social networks? Do you want your reputation to be that of the loud drunk or that of the articulate well spoken individual?

    5. Comments
  5. 1 month ago 

    Could Google Buzz Be More Than Just A New Social Network?

    Google launched its new social networking platform Buzz about five days ago and it appears Google has been listening to user feedback and has been able to close up some of the privacy concerns users had been voicing since its launch. Despite the fact Google has been attentive to its early adopters I am still not convinced that Google Buzz is a social networking platform and instead may actually be a real-time blogging platform.

    Google has already built many blogging features into its Buzz service currently implemented by many of the other blogging platforms either by design or via a plugin system.

    Features found inside Buzz that are similar to other blogging platforms include:

    • Buzz pulls in all your content from around the web (Flickr, Picasa, Reader, etc…)
    • With the major exclusion of Facebook Buzz is able to pull in most of your social graph
    • Buzz allows for long form content to be posted where Facebook and Twitter both have limits on the amount you can post
    • Built in commenting system
    • Built in sharing system
    • Built in upvoting system
    • Tight integration with its mobile platform

    So, what would Google need to do to become a real-time blogging platform?

    • Allow customization/templating of your Buzz/Profile page
    • Ability to use your own domain instead of the profile url
    • Facebook integration into the connected sites
    • Text formatting tools like those already found in Gmail
    • Third party tools for posting

    I don’t think it’s Facebook and Twitter that have anything to worry about as they have already reached a massive audience that will be hard to win over, but instead if I were Tumblr and Posterous I would be looking over my shoulder at the Google giant that is about to strike.

    What do you think? Is Google Buzz a new social network or could it be more of a real-time blogging platform? Who should be most worried about Buzz? Is it Facebook and Twitter or Posterous and Tumblr?

    6. Comments
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