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Sue Waddington explains how to boost your Twitter followers
Personally, I am not tweeting, but I know that a growing number of businesses are. Having begun, the big question that everybody has to ask themselves is how to increase the number of people that they reach. Earlier this year a team of students analysed half a million tweets in order to discover what factors it was that increased the number of Twitter followers. The answer was:
- It is important to be informative. Tweets that have a lot of URLs in them are the biggest predictor for positive growth, so link to interesting content that is likely to be re-tweeted, whether that is a news story or a cat video, as this will increase your exposure. In contrast only tweeting about yourself is a sure way to lose followers... unless you are a rock star.
- Remain positive. If you moan a lot, expect fewer people to follow you. Generally, moaners get followers who become bored rather than sympathetic. On the other hand, tweeters who are positive tend to get more followers.
- Be readable. Potential followers may only glance over your tweets, so if they are indecipherable and difficult to understand you can expect to be ignored. Overuse of hash tags is equally off-putting.
- Be regular. The students found that the optimum number of tweets is between one and eight per hour - fewer than that and you go unnoticed, more than that and you may irritate your followers by clogging their feeds. It also helps to keep to a topic. Apparently, users who use the same words regularly grow followers quicker.
- Be human. Twitter is awash with bots, so ensure your followers know you are the real deal by reaching out to them. Swap the default Twitter profile for an interesting biography, post a clear picture and interact with people you would like to follow you. Reply to people, mention or re-tweet them, as it sends that signal directly.
How to make a conversation
I've tackled this subject before but I feel strongly enough about it to tackle it again. When you find yourself in a one-to-one conversation, it is really crucial to get the other person to open up to you. In fact, it is often more important than getting your own point across. How can you do this? Here are a few tips:
- Do your homework. Good preparation leads to better questions. It also demonstrates a genuine interest. If you know what you are talking about, you really will breed respect.
- But don't be a know-all. After you have done all that homework, you may feel you are an expert. But keep things simple by starting with direct, open-ended questions. Then use your knowledge to get your subject to expand on pat answers.
- Ask why. If you ask people what they do when you meet them they go onto autopilot but if you ask them why they do it, it gives people a reason to provide you with a fresher, more thoughtful answer.
- Watch for facial cues. During a conversation, facial cues can indicate if someone wants to say more or less about a subject.
- Force yourself to be interested. If you are bored by the person sitting across from you then it is going to show and you aren't going to get the best out of them. As a result, it is vitally important to at least pretend to be interested.
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