Welcome to part 2 of my “Twitter Guide for Dummies”
Twitter Guide for Dummies
If you missed the first one you can see it here: Twitter Guide For Dummies Part1 In this part 2 I will give you some tips on how you can improve your skills on Twitter. In this part I will go into some of the features that personally took me a little while to discover myself.
The # and @ paragraph
One thing you might notice when you begin with Twitter is that the # (Hashtag) and @ (AT) paragraphs. Those both have special power on Twitter. Whenever you use the # paragraph in front of a word in a Tweet it will be highlighted and made click and searchable. The @ paragraph is used in front of all profile names on twitter. If you want to mention someone in a tweet you start with the @ and then the profile name. e.g. “@TechWork_dk I love your #tweets..! ” This will make your tweet show up in my @Mention tab even if I am not following you. I will explain what the @Mention tab is in a minute.
Direct messages (DM)
With Direct messages you can send message directly to people on Twitter. Only the receiver can see these messages. Use the Direct message button on the receivers profile to send a DM. You can only send DM to people who follow you on Twitter. Otherwise Twitter would be a spam hell 😉
Remember to check the @Mention Tab
One thing that took me a while to figure out when I began with Twitter is how important it is to check the Mention tab from time to time. In the mention tab you can see every time your profile name has been included in a tweet. It can be ReTweet for one of your own tweets or it can be a reply or maybe a question to you. The mention tab is a great way to connect with your followers and people who are following you, but it can also be a great way to find new friends you want to follow.
Twitter Lists
One of my most supporting visitor here on TechWork.dk, Adrienne from Adriennesmith.net suggested that I should explain Twitter lists here in part2 so that I will do.
With twitter list you can create groups of users that you want to pay special attention to or simply to organize the people you are following. You can keep your list private or you can share them with the rest of the world. That is all up to you.
To create a list:
1. Find the List button on the main page
2. Select Create a list
3. Give the list a name, a description and select if it should be Public or Private
4. Add people you want on your list (You don’t need to follow a user to list her/him)
When you have created your list you can select it to see only tweets from the users you have put on your list. This can be very useful if you are following a lot of people or people you think “spam” sending big series of tweets on your timeline.
Well this was all for part 2. If you have something to add, please leave a comment and share it with us all. If you want to learn more about Twitter they actually have a great online help I don’t know if I there will be a part3 to this series, but I do have some ideas so maybe. In the other hand maybe it will be a post about: How the experts use Twitter but then I will need your help 🙂
Please leave me a comment…
That is a whole lot of info – Keep it up!
Hi Jay
Thank you for the comment. Hope you find it useful.
Wow! Great info. I’ll have to bookmark this for when I do join Twitter. Thanks as well for the link to Twitter’s online help.
I’ve been meaning to get over here to your Twitter part 2 and glad I did. Also glad you took my advice and shared about the lists. I think people leave that part out or they don’t quite understand why they are useful. Thanks for including that Thomas. You did a wonderful job explaining more about Twitter. It’s a great way to really connect with some cool people. I’ve had some great experiences.
Love the info and will definitely be sharing this post with my followers.
Adrienne
Hi Adrienne
I am glad you liked my post. After I have written these two posts I am considering making a post about Twitter apps and services. I have come across a lot of twitter apps lately. Maybe you have some ideas for apps that I should include? I am thinking about: Buffer, FollowFriday, bit.ly, Klout and Apps like that.
Thank you for your support Adrienne 🙂
I’ve got a few that I use as well. SocialOomph, Co-Tweet, ManagerFliter and then Buffer, Timely and Klout that you just shared with me. Yep, I know, kind of a lot but hey I love them… 🙂 Thanks Thomas..
You did a great job at explaining this. I’m a twitter user but haven’t been there in a while. This post has reminded me I need to go check it out and participate more often.
Hi Anne
Glad you liked it. Twitter seams so simple at first, but there are a lot of tips and tricks to learn to improve the use of it. I have met some great people on Twitter that are visiting my blog from time to time.
Hey Thomas, I’m glad that I read your part2. Great explaining on the # and @ paragraph.
PS I also read the joke of the dahy and that was super funny! going to post it one my facebook. LOL “go tell your mother to come here .”
Twitter lists are a really powerful way of following separate groups of people. My personal Twitter account separates my work from my social life. For example, I have a list for business associates and a list for friends. If you’re a Google + user, you can think of a Twitter list as you would a “circle”.
Hi Dean
I have also created a lot of lists. It makes it a lot easier to track a group of people and see what they are tweeting about.
Hi Thomas,
Exactly, i think Twitter lists are seriously under used. Not many of my friends know what they are.
hmm now heres where i can learn a thing or two! I honestly never tapped into the twitter list, i didnt even know it existed! Im going to try to incorporate it in my business, thanks for sharing!