Scott Design

Part 1 in the Getting Started with Social Media series

OK, I’m going to start with the easiest way to use social media today: Twitter. Can you think of something to say in 140 characters or less? If so, Twitter is for you!

Twitter is a site where you can create a microblog, which isn’t a teeny, tiny blog, but a blog consisting of teeny tiny posts. Each post or “tweet” can be no more than 140 characters. Each of these tweets answers a simple question: “What are you doing?” Your answers can be about your personal life, your work life, an interesting article you just read online, a funny video, a shout out to a friend, or anything you’d like. It really couldn’t be easier.

Here’s all you need to do to use Twitter:

1. Open a free Twitter Account. First, go to twitter.com and click on “Join the conversation.” Select a username and password, enter your e-mail address, enter the codes on the screen, and click “I accept.”

2. Find your friends on Twitter. If you want to have Twitter check if any of the people in your web-based e-mail (Hotmail, Yahoo, Gmail, etc.) address book are on Twitter, enter in your e-mail and password. You can skip this step and do it later if you want to, or never!

3. Write a tweet. Just answer the question in the box and click “Update” and you’re officially tweeting! Your  update appears on your page, as well as on the public Twitter timeline, where everyone in the world can see what you’re up to!

You’re done! You can stop here if you want to. Just add tweets as you feel inspired, sharing what you’re up to, what you find interesting, or anything else you want with the rest of the Twitter world.

Getting social with Twitter

Now, if you want to get more “social” with Twitter, you need to “follow” what others are saying and have others “follow” you. Following is like having a subscription where you see all the tweets of everyone you’re following and your followers see all of your tweets.

First, let people know your Twitter name and they can visit your page and see your posts. You’ll get a notification if someone starts following you. If they do, visit their page and if you want to, follow them! You can always easily remove them from your list later.

Here are the easiest ways to find people you want to follow:

1. Use the “Find People” function and upload all your friends’ e-mail addresses.

2. Visit search.twitter.com and search for someone’s name, a company or product name, or a term that interests you. See who turns up in the results, take a look at their Twitter page, and if you like what you see, click “Follow.” Next time you go back to your Home page, you’ll see their tweets alongside yours.

3. Ask your friends if they’re on Twitter. If you know their Twitter names, you can visit their pages. For example, if your friend’s Twitter name is “myfriendontwitter,” his or her Twitter page is at www.twitter.com/myfriendontwitter.

4. See who people you find interesting are following. Just visit the person’s page and click on any of the pictures in the “Following” section. See if you like what they’re saying, and if so, click on Follow.

5. See who’s tops on Twitter. Visit TwitterGrader to see who has the most active Twitter accounts and see if you want to follow any of them.

Personalizing your Twitter Page

If you want to make your page more personal, here’s what your next steps should be:

1. Update your account information at Settings->Account and add a bio, your website URL, and click if you don’t want your tweets to appear in the public timeline or just on the timeline of your followers.

2. Upload a photo for your profile at Settings->Picture.

3. Select a page background, or upload your own, at Settings->Design.

With these steps, you should be well on your way to getting started with Twitter. I look forward to seeing you up there soon!

P.S. Check out “Real things you can do with Twitter” for a list of ways to have fun and do work on Twitter.

Tags: social media, twitter

This entry was posted on Monday, December 8th, 2008 at 12:35 pm and is filed under Marketing, Technology . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.