Although we now have the rise of the likes of Instagram and Pinterest, Twitter is still one of the fastest growing social platforms. However, we still see avoidable mistakes being used on the social media channel all the time….so we have put together a list to help you succeed!
Writing a tweet
Twitter, a microblogging site has a character limit of just 140 characters per tweet. Adding an image will take up 23 characters and creating a link will use a further 22. This only leaves you 95 characters to write your message. Therefore it is so important that every tweet is carefully thought about to ensure getting your message across correctly.
People often try and fit too much into the limited space. To do this they may abbreviate or even you poor or slang grammar, this can impact your engagement and could have a negative effect on the brand.
Remember links are crucial for driving traffic back to your website and although we love images in our tweets they can sometimes be an over utilised luxury. Therefore if you are short on space, prioritise what you need to say over what you would like to add.
How to Hashtag
Keep it simple. Use hashtags when you are promoting a product/service or a tweet about your industry. It is also worth using hashtags when you are contributing to a Twitter trending hashtag (a hashtag already being used by a lot of people on Twitter). It is best to avoid using too many hashtags in a tweet as not only does it make it hard to read but it also uses up a lot of that limited space!
Hashtags are definitely worth using and can be very effective – but moderation is key. Including keywords for SEO purposes is also a great way to increase website hits.
How often should you post?
There is a fine balance between posting too much and not posting regularly enough. If you post too often, your audience can become frustrated and unfollow you. If you don’t tweet enough, you won’t gain momentum and will lose Twitter followers.
Best practice tells us to tweet 5 times a day, Monday to Friday. This allows your audience to see your content throughout the day, without being overloaded.
When to post
As well as posting around 5 times throughout the day, it is important you are tweeting at the right time of the day. If you can discover when your audience is checking their Twitter feed, your content will gain a huge advantage and benefit from the increased impressions.
Your audience’s daily activity will vary depending on your sector. Below is a general idea of when is the best times to post:
A morning post between 7.30am-9am will help you catch commuters checking their phones on the way to work. A lunch and post lunch tweet from 12-2.30pm will engage users who are on their break. A tweet between 5-7.30pm will reach commuters travelling home, followed by one final tweet from around 9.30pm-11pm engaging those people checking their phone before bed.
Building your Audience
Everyone wants to have thousands of active and targeted followers, yet seem to find this difficult to achieve. But there is a way of doing this and it is rather simple to follow.
By manually following relevant Twitter accounts every day or week, you will find that 20-35% of them will follow you back. The next week, simply unfollow those who aren’t following you back and repeat the process. If you dedicate a ‘power hour’ each week to work on building your audience on Twitter with this strategy, you will see a big increase in followers very quickly.
If you feel you need help with Twitter we not only have full social media packages but we also offer training as well.
*Image from www.marketingweek.com
