How to use Twitter for business, well. Incorporating best practices from around the web, this presentation was used to show Public Relations students at MacEwan how to use Twitter professionally.

1. Twitter, Professionally

2. What is Twitter?
• Twitter lets you ...
– send short messages to
many publicly
– send short messages to
one person publicly
– send short messages to
one person privately

3. Twitter
vocabulary
RT @MariamDiamond: LOL the moment I just got on Twitter
#JaiFollowMeYouPeasant #BeauFollowMeYouWorm R
trending WW @JaiBrooks1 @BrooksBeau U up 2 this ?

4. •
•
•
•
•
•
Review
handle/username
follow/follower
follow back
update / tweet
@reply / mention
direct message / dm / d
•
•
•
•
•
Twitter stream
tweet-up
hashtag (#)
re-tweet
ny
A
ns?
io
st
ue
q
lists

5. Your Account

6. Act like a human
•
Populate your profile:
•
•
•
•
•
avatar
banner
background
bio
website

7. Act like a human
•
Following:
•
•
Keep a balance
Use lists
instead of follows

8. • Prove you’re a human
twitblock.org spam parameters

9. Tweeting
My cereal is soggy! #YEGfood

10. What should you tweet about?
• Don't answer
"What are you
doing?"
• 75-25-10 rule

11. Share resources & expertise
• Events you’re attending
• Links to your blog or website
• Someone else’s content
• Opinions or observations about relevant
topics

12. Relationship Building
• Chat with someone
– @username at the beginning of the tweet
• Share someone else’s content with a
mention
• Thank or promote someone
• Conversational hashtags

13. “Chirps”
• Observations or opinion
• Chats
• Answering “What’s happening?”

14. S=PAM
•
Your “solution” needs to
reflect
•
•
•
Purpose
Audience
Message

15. S=PAM
•
Purpose
•
What does your bio say?
They should be congruent

16. S=PAM
•
Audience
•
Who do you want to
attract?

17. S=PAM
•
Message & Medium
•
Short, straightforward,
interesting
•
•
Links to things
Twitter “lingo”

18. • Prove you’re a human
What makes a tweet good?

19. Composing a tweet
•
Start with what you
want to say
•
Ignore length
restrictions!
•
Get what you want to
say down
John, thanks for
your feedback. We
appreciate
you
taking the time to
write. If you’d like
more information
about that, please
visit our website at
http://website.com/i
nformation. You can
read more about it
there. If you have
further questions,
call our customer
service number at
1-780-555-1212.

20. Edit, edit, edit!
• Aim for 110 – 120 characters
– Gives you room for #hashtags and @usernames
• Remove all fluffy text
• Shorten links (will need 18 characters)
• Shorten words, but aim for good grammar
and spelling
– If it looks like an error, don’t use it
• Your / you’re are NOT interchangeable!
• Don’t sacrifice punctuation

21. Try it!
@username, thanks for your feedback. We
appreciate you taking the time to write. If you’d
like more information about how the caramel
gets into the Caramilk bar, please visit our
website at http://website.com/information.You
can read more about it there. If you have
further questions, do not hesitate to call our
customer service number at 1-780-555-1212.
(353 characters)

22. Avoid Twuck-Ups
•
Proofread. Proofread.
Proofread. Proofread.
•
Are you in the correct
account?
•
If text-to-tweet:
•
Did you include @ or d ?
linger
@ink_s
That’s just silly.
^
X