WHAT TO WRITE ABOUT ON TWITTER

WHAT TO WRITE ON TWITTER?

The biggest question any fledgling Twitter will want to think about is what to write. Quite a few people I have invited to join me on Twitter ask what they should write about. Here is what you should and should not write on your Twitter pages. One friend kindly refers to me as a ‘Twitter expert’, which is flattering, but far from the case. Here are my answers though.

The main thing is not to be repetitive, or banal. The Twitter question what are you doing? Might be answered honestly with 'Having cornflakes for breakfast’ or ‘watching Spongebob Squarepants’, etc, but that in itself isn't very interesting. Neither are graffiti slogan responses like ‘I love Linda’, or ‘Manchester United are good’ (or rubbish if you support City). This would be worse still if you posted this kind of message to your Twitter page every day or every time your team played and after every viewing of Spongebob. People would stop following you and might even block you out. You can comment on Spongebob. And even review it fully, and well, but don’t say what 1,000’s of other fans will say. Make your review stand out from the crowd.

The key is ‘don’t be boring’. Though you only have 140 characters to each tweet, it’s surprising how dull you can end up being in even a few words, let alone in a 100,000-word document. Remember also that if someone is deciding whether to follow you or not on Twitter, they will look at a lot of your postings, especially your most recent tweets. If they all say essentially the same thing, the potential follower will decide to follow someone else instead.

If your Twitter is set up primarily to promote your business, as many successful Twitter pages undoubtedly are, do not just use Twitter to blatantly, flatly advertise and try to sell your product – A stream of free classified ad tweets on the lines of ‘Our supa-dupa mega-deluxe computers –Only $500 if you sign up today’ is going to stop me adding you as a friend. Just write like a human being, and you might secure my attention.

What do I write? If you scroll through my Tweets on http://twitter.com/arthurchappell you may well see certain patterns forming and a distinctive style evolving. I make one off comments on things I see, hear and do, that I think are sufficiently out of the ordinary or which people can see prove to affect my life and disposition in some way. I put silly jokes and puns in every now and then, though I prefer to use ones I have created rather than ones I have just heard – If I hear a joke going round, the chances are that others have heard it on the grapevine too. I will mention a pending visit to a Burlesque show, and offer a review of how it went on my return, or the next day that I am free to post a message. The death of my stepfather on Friday 13^th February was an obvious major change in my life, so I made several posts referring to that tragic event. Those kinds of postings stand-alone. There are also recurring sets of postings. Many relate to my website. As my website now has over 1,500 pages, I post a link each day to a different page, a different book review, and a different film review. I also provide a daily link to external websites (other people's), so there is a Youtube site of the day, and a website of the day, (most of these are funny pages, though some may be serious). I hope that my regular band of followers will tune into the pattern being set in this, and look in every now and then to see what pages I am putting up a link to that day. I am happy for anyone to recommend links that they think deserve the status of such a mention by me too. I also have a Twitter friend of the day this gives me effectively half a dozen regular features that can be maintained indefinitely without my having to say the same thing or offer the same link and Tweet, twice. I am shortly going to start adding links to my Facebook friend of the day and my Myspace friend of the day too. These will mostly be to famous people, or organizations, rather than to individual personally known pals, who I wouldn’t give such links to without securing their permission first.

So, as well as my irregular one off postings on what I think and feel about all and sundry experience, I have 1/. Twitter link Of The Day 2/. My Web page Of The Day 3/. My book review of the day 4/. My film review of the day. 5/. Myspace friend of the day 6/. External link of the day 7/. Youtube of the day 8/. Facebook friend of the day. That’s eight potential daily Tweets I can tap out, even if I don’t think of anything else to write about. There will be days when I don’t post and don’t get round to posting one or more such threads, but overall, I have a regular reserve of material to fall back on, and there is nothing to stop you doing likewise from your own range of interests and links. If you find something interesting, so does someone else, even if your hobby is as obscure as collecting the registration numbers off combine harvesters. In some ways such a minority interest is going to get you noticed easier than a twitter page dedicated to football, which has to find a way of saying something not said about the game by hundreds of others. Your postings on Twitter should show your interest in a way that gets others interested in sharing your passions.

What should you write? Think about what interests you. If it’s football, look for other Twitters writing about football. Find the ones who have high profiles, and lots of followers. See the kind of things they Tweet and how they say things. Interact with them, and Tweet back. Add them to your list of followers, and write similar but not identical messages on your pages.

It is possible to monitor how well or badly your Tweets and your Twitter page are doing. Make strong use of unofficial Twitter stats readers like http://twitterholic.com/ and http://www.twittercounter.com/pages/100. They will show you the leading Twitter pages, which you can assess the Tweets and see the kind of things that most readers like. You can also use the sites to Asses your own Twitter ranking. Don’t expect it to be too high when you first launch, but as you check it every few weeks, you will see if your ranking is rising and then you will know how well or badly you are doing and how well received your tweets are. If your ranking remain slow, or goes down, change your approach. My current twitterholic ranking (Saturday 21^st February 2009) reads “Arthur Chappell is ranked 45,288th on twitterholic! (By followers) Arthur Chappell is ranked 30th in their location on twitterholic! (By followers in 'Manchester, England'). It’s the additional second stat, for my home city that I like about twitterholic (in relation to similar stats readers), and you will be able to compare your status to that of other users in your hometown or city too. Don’t expect to keep up with the giants like Barack Obama who tops the chart and who has 304,591 followers but write well, and interact with other twitters and you will do well for sure. Good luck.

My best tip for any Twitter - When not Tweeting, keep a notebook with you, and if you think of something interesting to Tweet about later, write it in your book and add it to your Twitter page when you get a chance. You may think of a tweet that you want to add, but ask yourself, is it much different than the one you write ten minutes before? If it is exactly the same, don’t send it again. If reading your tweets gets like watching repeats of the same TV show over and over again, your readers will switch you off, just as they would change TV stations. If your Tweet is similar, but not too like the previous Tweet, write something else in the meantime, and add that Tweet later on, unless it is too topical not to post right away.

Tweeting is just like writing a poem, a short story or a letter. You want to do it well, and for people to read it and feel sufficiently interested in you to want to link to your Twitter page. Many of your followers also have 1,000 or more other people to follow. You want your Tweets to make them say to themselves, ‘I wonder what Arthur has written today. I’ll pop onto his page and read his messages again, right now. If a reader comes back for more, you are doing something right. Like a good publican, cherish your regular customers, and welcome newcomers.

Don’t just write Tweets. Read them, and be critical of what you read. Ask yourself, in relation to any Tweet, would you have liked to write that? If you think a Tweet looks poor, you will know not to write one like that yourself, and the chances are some or all of your readers will think of your postings in a similar way.

I hope this helps, and do please send me links to your Tweeter pages, and I’ll happily follow you, especially if you have something interesting to say and say it well.