Short slide pack for Wessex Qs, delivered by Wessex AHSN's head of communications, Michael Goodeve, on 8 March 2018 at the Wessex Q Community coffee morning.

1. TweetFest for Wessex Qs
Michael Goodeve
Head of Communications
@MichaelGoodeve | @WessexAHSN
#QWessex | #QCommunity

3. Understand and master the jargon
• Tweet: A 280-character message
• Retweet (RT): Re-sharing or giving credit to someone else's tweet
• Feed: The stream of tweets you see on your homepage. It's comprised of updates from users you
follow
• Handle: Your username
• Mention (@): A way to reference another user by his username in a tweet (e.g. @WessexAHSN).
Users are notified when @mentioned. It's a way to conduct discussions with other users in a public
realm.
• Direct Message (DM): A private message between two (or more) people. You can decide whether to
accept a Direct Message from any Twitter user, or only from users you are following. You may only
DM a user who follows you.
• Hashtag (#): A way to denote a topic of conversation or participate in a larger linked discussion (e.g.
#NHS70, #AHSNs). A hashtag is a discovery tool that allows others to find your tweets, based on
topics. You can also click on a hashtag to see all the tweets that mention it in real time — even from
people you don't follow.
Adapted from: https://mashable.com/2012/06/05/twitter-for-beginners/#ooPatNWViZq7

4. Okay, great.
But why bother?

5. Twitter communities

6. What should you absolutely not do?
• Swear
• Tweet when angry, drunk or too happy (trust me)
• Tweet anything defamatory
• Be disrespectful to patients, public or colleagues
• Compromise patient or personal data
What should you do?
• Engage via hashtags, following, replying
• Share useful links, tips (curate)
• Use media – pictures, videos, emojis
• Respect others’ opinions (you can always mute or block)
• RT important updates
• Have a profile picture (only Russian twitterbots and trolls don’t)
• Remain timely (news gets old quickly on twitter)

7. Want to see how it’s done?

8. Health twitter events and hashtags:
#NHS70
#AHSNs
#FutureNHS
#QCommunity
#QWessex
#Expo18NHS
#Confed18
#HelloMyNameIs

9. Final thought:
Treat communicating over twitter like you would
in person.
If you wouldn’t say it in person, don’t say it on
twitter.
That said, don’t be shy about being yourself –
personality wins the day.