EdNET 2009 Roundtable Handout

EdNET 2009 Roundtable: A Twitter How To The adoption of social media is well past critical mass – nearly two thirds of brand marketers (59 percent) are implementing social media in their marketing plans (Equation Research, 2009). With social media here to stay, education organizations are faced with the challenge of integrating Web 2.0 technologies into their marketing and public relations strategies. Twitter, a free social networking and micro-blogging service, can serve as a viable channel for reaching current and potential customers, in addition to building your brand online. To help you be proactive about the opportunities Twitter has to offer, here are some helpful tips. What is micro-blogging? Micro-blogging is a form of blogging that limits the writer to publishing brief text updates (usually under 200 characters) to be viewed by anyone, or by a select group chosen by the author. The most popular service is Twitter, which was launched in July 2006, and supports posts up to 140 characters. How do I get started using Twitter? 1. Go to http://twitter.com/ and click on “Sign up now.” 2. Create a username that is authentic and easy to remember. Choose either your company’s name or your own name. Avoid names that are “cute” or too clever, which may deter people from following you. We recommend keeping your name short. This allows more characters to be used for content, links and retweeting (see below). 3. Once your account is created, set up your profile under “Settings.” a. Include your company’s URL, which provides validation to your account. b. Provide a one-line bio of you or your company. Be sure it includes the key words (such as “education,” “technology” or “teaching”) that are associated with your brand for easy searching. Also, many organizations are now noting which of their representatives are actually tweeting to provide a “human face” to the brand. c. Upload a profile image, either your picture or a company logo. This is important, as other Twitter users will identify your account primarily by its picture. MORE

d. Adjust the background design. There are a few Twitter backgrounds provided through Twitter, but most are overused. We recommend creating a custom design that depicts your brand, which you may choose to do in-house or by commissioning a third party. Here is a site that can create a custom background for you for a small fee: http://www.twitterimage.com/. 4. To “follow” someone on Twitter, visit his or her Twitter homepage and click the “Follow” button under the profile image. Anyone can follow you, but you can choose whether or not to follow him or her back. You can block someone, if you believe it is necessary. What are the terms I should know? • Retweet: When you read someone else’s post and believe it will have value to your followers, you can forward or “retweet” the post by placing an “RT” at the front of your message, attributing the post to the original author by placing an @ sign in front of their name, and copying/pasting the original message: • Reply: You can respond to any tweet via a reply, which will appear on your feed for all your followers to see. To reply to a tweet, place an @ sign in front of the recipient’s name and type your message: • Direct Message: A direct message can be sent only to one of your followers. It is a one- way communication and will not appear on your feed. You can direct message someone by placing a “DM” in front of the recipient’s name at the beginning of your message:

• Tiny URL: As you have only 140 characters to draft your message, it is critical that you use a tiny URL when providing a link. There are many sites available online that will allow you to transform a long URL into a tiny URL, such as a bit.ly or an ow.ly. @Califone used a bit.ly to create the tiny URL in this message: Tips About Tweeting • Set goals for your brand (or yourself). What is the purpose of tweeting? How many followers would you like to have after a month? • You have 140 characters to write your message. We recommend that you stay closer to 120 characters. This allows people to retweet your message, which helps in building your brand. • Place important keywords at the front of your message, and the least important words toward the end. Readers have short attention spans, so catching them early on is key. • Share important company announcements, information about product launches and events, but keep the verbiage informal and light. • Share videos and pictures that showcase your brand. • Never pick a fight with anyone on Twitter. Stay positive and friendly. • Be careful what your write – once you’ve hit the update button, the text is always available online for anyone to find and read. • Follow people who are in the education industry (educators, associations, vendors, media, etc.). They are more likely to follow you in return. • Some people on Twitter will follow you simply because they are trying to build a gigantic following. Don’t feel bad about not following them back. • Use links to validate your messages. Send readers back to your Web site, to newsworthy stories online, or to great pictures. • You can track how many people click through your links by using shortened bit.ly and ow.ly URLs, and checking the analysis services provided by those sites.

Online Resources About Twitter Visit this Diigo page for a series of tutorials and other great articles about Twitter: http://www.diigo.com/list/cblohmassoc/ednet-2009-twitter-roundtable. Screencast: How to Set Up a Twitter Account Check out our short Twitter tutorial on YouTube. The screencast illustrates how to sign up for an account, and addresses useful Twitter terminology: http://bit.ly/12gjQP. Presented by: Charlene Blohm and Sandy Fash C. Blohm & Associates, Inc. http://www.cblohm.com http://twitter.com/CBlohmAssoc charlene@cblohm.com, sandy@cblohm.com http://twitter.com/CharleneBlohm, http://twitter.com/SandyFash EdNET, Sept. 15, 2009, Chicago PRSourceCode Top Tech Communicator 2009

EdNET 2009 Roundtable Handout

by C. Blohm & Associates, Inc. on Sep 16, 2009

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EdNET 2009 Roundtable Handout — Document Transcript