Everyday Tweet

Oprah on Twitter: "What Can I Use Twitter For?" Here's 7 Things

You've been hearing about Twitter almost everywhere you go, and even Oprah is on Twitter. People have tried explaining it to you, but still, you are scratching your head a bit wondering, "What can I use Twitter for that I can't do with something else I got already like a Facebook page, IM, or text on a cell?

I describe Twitter as a Swiss army knife of texting awesomeness, and here's what you get. I personally enjoy Twitter over all other social networks because it's instant, your page is clean and simple, and the community is uber friendly and a bit older than MySpace and Facebook, 35-49 was the largest age group in Feb 09. {source Nielsen}

Oprah is all about living your best life, so here's 7 everyday things you can do on Twitter to help you along that journey. I also include sample topic #hashtags you can use for searches:

• Accountability tool for reaching a goal: I started using Twitter back in 2007 as a way to help me drop the last 10lbs in a 25lbs loss effort. Because you can use Twitter from a cell phone or mobile device, I would tweet my workouts and that helped me first, to stay accountable to my workouts because I knew people were watching me, and second, it helped me develop a support system of others trying to reach the same goal.

• Find job leads and job hunting tips: Not only are companies starting to use Twitter more for recruiting, but other people tweet about job openings they've heard about or simply ask, "Hey, I'm looking for a job as an {insert role}." Here's a great post on using Twitter for job search including stories from people who actually landed jobs via Twitter. If you're a small company, and can't afford to pay job boards, Twitter is free. Search terms you can use for job hunting include: #jobhunting, #jobsearch, #jobs, #salary.

What is a Retweet and How Do I Retweet?

A Retweet in Twitter is when you see a tweet you like written by someone else, and you want to share that tweet with your Followers.

For example, I saw this tweet from @Foodimentary about a marinara sauce factoid that I thought my audience would enjoy.

1. Highlight and copy the Foodimentary tweet
2. Hit the Reply arrow on the side of the box

When you hit the reply button, your Twitter stream will open up straight to your home box along with Foodimentary's name with the @ symbol attached.

What the @ symbol does is let Foodimentary see in their @replies box that you did a retweet of their tweet. This is nice because people like to see where there stuff has been mentioned. Helps you build goodwill with others.

3. Paste the Foodimentary tweet

4. Add the letters RT which stand for Retweet in front of the @name. It is important to add the letters RT because it gives credit to the original source of the tweet, and communicates to your audience, "Hey guys, here's something cool I saw and wanted to share." It also tells Twitter that your tweet is Retweet and not a continuation of a conversation.

It is also important to make sure there is a space between the letters RT and the @Foodimentary name. If the RT and @ are butted up next to each other, the @Foodimentary name cannot become a live link again to let Foodimentary that you retweeted them.

 

5. Hit the Update button, and now the Retweet will show up in your Twitter stream, and in Foodimentary's @replies stream.

A common faux pas newbies make is simply copying someone else's tweet, going back to their home page, pasting the tweet in their home box, and then hitting the update button with no addition of the RT or the person's @Twitter name.

This makes the tweet appear like you are the original source/creator of the tweet which is not the case. It appears that you are plagiarizing someone else's tweet which is not a way to build goodwill.

It's always a good rule of thumb to be generous with praise and to give credit to other people's work again helping you build goodwill with others and in the Twitter community as a whole.

Part IV of IV: The Suave of Attracting Followers

Check list time:

• Twitter account is set up and ready to go
• Started posting some tweets
• Began Following people

Now that you got some momentum going, let's start attracting some Followers shall we? Tweeps btw, means Twitter peeps (your people). As I mentioned in Part III, normally what happens is that people will oblige your Follow by Following you back. It's kind of the polite thing to do.

As you build up your Twitter momentum and start signing yourself up at places like Twellow and We Follow, other people will start naturally finding you on their own. People will differ on this automatic mutual Follow philosophy though, and I'm one of them.

I don't believe that you have to Follow everyone who Follows you. It's not because I'm elitist, it's because I do care about the quality of the people and content I Follow. I am one of those rare top Twitterers who actually takes the time to read bios, click on website links, and reads a whole stream. This is what I look for:

Part III of IV: Finding People to Follow, Where Following is Good not Stalkerish

Now that you have some tweet food on your Twitter table, it's time to go Follow some people. Following people first is the way to start getting people to Follow you because normally what happens is that people will oblige a Follow by Following you back. Here are 5 ways to start finding people to Follow:

• At the top of your Twitter page is a button, "Find People." You can go here to find out if any of your friends, family, or co-workers are already on Twitter. You have the option to also Invite others to join or have Twitter see if anyone in your email address books are signed up. There's also a Suggested User page which is filled primarily with celebrities and huge media sites like the New York Times or ESPN.

• Go to Twitter Search, and search for a key term that interests you. For example, if you are into muscle cars or are gluten-free, search for those terms, and the results will pull up everyone who is talking about those subjects. Clicking on their avatar will take you to their page where you can check them out and hit the Follow button.

Part II of IV: Easy as 1-2-3, Let's Get Going With the Tweets and Mingling

In Part I, we got you signed up and your account set up on Twitter. Now, here's where the fun starts: Writing your first tweets, finding interesting people to Follow, and starting to build your own band of Followers.

In essence, it really is as easy as 1-2-3 to get going on Twitter. Here's a quick illustration:

Whenever starting anything new, whether it be riding a bike or starting your own business, I recommend easing in with small steps because as our theme goes here: tiny actions, doable results. Small wins also help build up your confidence. For you daredevils, go for it and jump right in.

First things first, let's start filling your Tweet table 

Part I of IV: Easy as Oatmeal, Creating Your Account on Twitter

You've heard all the rage about Twitter and are now ready to jump in! In this 4 Part series, we'll give you some quick tips and how-to's to make your first experience a pleasant one as you get signed up, tweeting, and mingling.

Setting up your Twitter account

Before signing up on Twitter there are two things you'll need to think about: a Twitter screen name and an avatar picture. Here's a quick illustration to help you in picking a screen name and an avatar:

A Twitter name that smells so sweet

Picking a Twitter screen name is important because:

1. Eventually people will mainly know you as your Twitter name over your real name unless of course you use your real name
2. A memorable or catchy name is easy for people to remember, and it helps build your online presence if you desire to pursue a career or some kind of influence online.

Smile, you're on Twitter

Smiling faces make for the best avatars mainly because people like to follow those who look friendly and warm. If you are tweeting anonymously or are not quite comfortable yet showing your face, that's okay, no rush. Twitter does provide generic avatars but really do you want to look like this...

In Simple Speak: What Does the # Hashtag Symbol Mean on Twitter?

One of the most frequently asked questions about a tweet is, "What does this # symbol (aka the hashtag) in front of a word mean like #cupcakes or #BSG?"

The geeky explanation is, "Hashtags in Twitter are a community-driven convention for adding metadata to your tweets. They were originally developed to create groups on Twitter for tracking a topic." {source Read Write Web}

Anyone else get deer in headlights look at "metadata"? Metaphorically, I like to describe the hashtag # in front of a descriptive word as a way to help to organize and find tweets on specific topics much like how file folders and sticky notes in book pages work.

Here I have illustrated basically how the hashtag works conceptually on Twitter...

What is a Tweet and What Does it Mean?

I find it amusing how the meaning of a word can change over time and in context when something new and hot comes along. Remember when a post was a piece of lumber in the ground? Now it's a noun/verb referring to an article or something you do on a blog or social site.

The word tweet was more commonly referred to a chirping bird sound, but now, tweet is also a noun/verb depending on context in reference to a 140 character text you create on Twitter, a service which I affectionately describe as a Swiss army knife of texting awesomeness. Here's why I describe Twitter that way.

Here's examples of the word tweet in use:

• Tweet as a noun: "Did you see that tweet from Demi Moore (aka @mrskutcher) about the celebrity she's be most excited about meeting?"

• Tweet as a verb: "That is hilarious! I will tweet about the dog chewing mom's snuggie."

What is Twitter and Why Can't People Stop Talking About It?

With the media all a flutter about Twitter, you'd think someone just invented the newest Krispy Kreme craze. When you got mainstream types like Stephen Colbert and Barbara Walters chirping about this latest social networking thing, well, it's easy to see how the gab fest is going Main street.

In geek speak, Twitter is a free social networking and micro-blogging service that allows its users to send and read other users' updates known as tweets. You can use Twitter on the computer, cell phone, or mobile device. Twitter has also been referred to as the "SMS of the Internet" because the platform is based on text messaging technology.

With that explanation, you're probably falling asleep or scratching your head thinking to yourself, "Uh, so what?" Yeah, I get it.

So, this is how I describe Twitter: Twitter is a Swiss army knife of texting awesomeness. Here's what you get: