The beginner’s guide to using Twitter

Do you want to start tweeting but don’t know where to begin? Maybe you want to use this new fangled social media to promote your business and are thinking of making a start with Twitter?

As the internet’s quickest growing, hottest social media property right now, it has the potential to be bigger than Facebook and MySpace and even takes on Yahoo and Google for news.

Twitter can be described as being like text messaging, but over the web. You compose messages of 140 characters or less as updates, or Tweets.

But Twitter lets you text everyone on Twitter, all at once, rather than texting to an individual.
Twitter describes its service as follows:

Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent messages. People write short updates, often called “tweets” of 140 characters or fewer. These messages are posted to your profile or your blog, sent to your followers, and are searchable on Twitter search.

You probably have friends and in the case of business owners, competitors, who are tweeting right now and you don’t even know it.

Twitter seems to be everywhere at the moment – most of the web marketers are raving about it, Barack Obama famously used it to great effect, and even celebrities like Stephen Fry, Bill Gates, John Cleese, Demi Moore, Arnold Schwarzenegger and many more can be found ‘tweeting’ away to their huge bands of followers.

Tweets can break and unfold national and international news stories, and Twitter is even considered to be faster than Yahoo or Google for breaking news, as it can come from journalists and independent Twitterers at the scene.

So, are you ready to jump on the bandwagon?

1.) The first step is to set up your account – go to http://twitter.com/ and click on ‘give it a try’. Pretty straightforward so far!

2.) Choose a user name. If it’s taken, then you’ll need to be a bit creative to find something based on your name. If you’re doing this on behalf of your company then it certainly makes sense to claim the brand name if it’s available.

3.) Customise your profile. You could add your one-line bio and a link to your website or blog.

4.) Add a picture. A mugshot, company logo, or a picture of your pet wearing a dress if you’re feeling particularly amusing.

5.) Customise your background. If you’re doing this for your company then maybe aim for something that fits with your brand.

6.) At this point you may be tempted to submit your first tweet. But don’t get carried away yet, as you have no followers!

7.) Go to ‘find people’ and find friends who are already on Twitter via one of the provided tools. Invite friends who aren’t already on to join automatically using the email tool if you have Yahoo, GMail, Hotmail, AOL or MSN

Twitterisms

Tweeting has given rise to a number of new terms previously unknown in our language. These can all be discovered when you enter the Twitterverse! Here’s an explanation of a few.

Some common Twitterisms

The Twitterverse - the community of Twitter users
Tweeter, or Twitterer - a Twitter user

Tweet - a post on Twitter and the updates you, and everyone else, post

Followers - people who have chosen to receive updates for a particular Twitterer

Twitterati - the members of the Twitter A-list that everyone wants to follow.

Twitterstream - the public, or friend, timeline – the posts on Twitter are chronologically listed
Retweet - the action of reposting another user’s post, crediting them for it

Retweeter,- someone who retweets

Twisticuffs - the posts when 2 or more twitterers have a disagreement

Twetiquette - the right way to behave on Twitter
Twitterjacking - pretending to be someone else, usually a celebrity

Twithore - Someone who follows anyone and everyone

Tweetup - A real face to face meeting of people who twitter

Tweetwise - A Twitter Pro

Twinfluence - How influential you are on twitter.

Twiticism - A witty tweet

You can find more comprehensive lists of definitions at Twictionary, Twittonary, and Twitter Fan Wiki

Twitter Shorthand

Shorthand is used a lot when tweeting as each post can only contain 140 characters:

RT - retweet
OH - overheard
DM - direct message
BTW - by the way
JV - joint venture
IRL - in real life, (remember that?!)
LOL - laugh out loud, or lots of laughter
FTF - face to face
IMHO - in my honest opinion
b/c - because
abt - about

You will also need to familiarize yourself with the inner workings of the Twitterverse
Don't panic, it’s easy once you get used to it!

If you attach the @ symbol to a username in your tweet, it will also appear in that person’s Twitter feed

You can send private messages to people who follow you (‘called direct messages’).

You can also ‘retweet’ other people’s tweets and can flag that by using the ‘RT’ abbreviation.

Meanwhile ‘hashtags’ are a way of creating searches, by placing the # symbol before a word, such as #embarrasingtweets

Some extras

Becoming a bit of a Twizz? Then take it to the next level…

Download a Twitter client.

This means downloading a bit of software that allows you to use Twitter more efficiently.

One free example is the TweetDeck, which can manage all your Twitter activity, so you don’t need to visit the website itself. TweetDeck allows you to monitor and reply to tweets, to filter tweets, to form groups and to automate searches.

Set up a Twitpic account. This service that allows Twitter users to upload pictures and attach them to their tweets (as no such functionality exists within Twitter).

Add yourself to directories. There are various directories that allow Tweeters to add their profiles, to help people find them. Take a look at http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10199077-2.html

Integrate Twitter with your website. You can use blog widgets, Tweetback buttons, Twitter feeds, etc.

And there you go – you’re ready to tweet!

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