This document provides guidance on creating a Twitter profile in 3 steps: 1. Choose a username, add a profile photo and biography to make your profile appear more personal. 2. Customize your profile further by choosing a theme and privacy settings. 3. Begin engaging on Twitter by following others, writing your first tweet, and searching for topics that interest you.

1. My simple guide to Twitter Using the new Twitter layout Autumn 2010 Part 2: Creating your profile

2. What is a tweet? A tweet is a short message comprising 140 characters (that is letters plus spaces) which answers the simple question ‘what’s happening?’ Twitter is based on the sharing of these short messages between people who choose to ‘follow’ each other. It’s a bit like a micro form of email – but public rather than private

3. How do I join? Visit the Twitter website: http://twitter.com Click on ‘sign up’ & follow the instructions.

4. Your username Choose a user name – this could be your real name or a nickname. The shorter the better (this will leave more room for your tweets – 140 character messages). All Twitter addresses are the @ symbol followed by the username (it’s like a contracted email address). The actual url address is http://twitter.com/username

5. Example

6. Change how your profile looks & your privacy under ‘settings’

7. Privacy settings & notifications Decide whether to make your tweets ‘protected’ – only certain people can read them or ‘public’ - everyone can read them. Decide on how regularly you wish to receive emails informing you of new ‘followers’.

8. Profile picture In ‘settings’ and then ‘profile’ you can add an image. Choose a picture that you have stored on your PC. You could use a cartoon or other image, it doesn’t have to be of your face. Next to where the image icon is, go to ‘change image’ and then ‘browse’. Find your picture in the box and select it by clicking ‘open’, then click ‘save’ at the bottom of the screen and your picture will upload. This works just like when you add an attachment to an email. Having a picture is important as it makes you appear more ‘real’ and friendly. You wouldn’t attend a meeting or a conference with a bag on your head would you?!

9. Example

10. Add a biography It helps if you complete the ‘bio’ section describing a bit about yourself. This will help people to find you and also help them to decide whether to follow you. Some people use a list of key words, others write a greeting. It’s up to you but don’t leave it blank. If you have a blog or company website – add this in the ‘web’ section – this should increase traffic to your site. Or put your LinkedIn public profile address.

11. Example

12. What it looks like on my profile: If you’re not sure what to put, see what other people have put for some inspiration You may also want to share your location

13. Choose a profile theme There are a few different ‘themes’ to choose from to create your profile background. This is what people will see when they visit your Twitter profile. Visit ‘design’ in settings to do this. You can design your own background by choosing an image you have stored on your PC and selecting the colour scheme. To do this click on ‘change background image’ and ‘change design colours’.

15. Settings You can change any of these things at any time by clicking on ‘settings’. For some tips, have a look at other people’s profiles to see what they have put in their biographies and also what their photos and themes look like. Your profile is like your advertisement for yourself so think about the image you want to portray. I would suggest that be yourself as much as you can!

16. Write a tweet Don’t be scared, just go ahead and share something, it might be an article you’ve read – share the link Or simply say ‘I’m new here’ – Twitter’s a very friendly place in my experience

17. Find people to follow The whole of Twitter works by people ‘following’ each other. When you follow someone, you will see their most recent tweets appearing on your Twitter home page. The easiest way to find people to follow is to find one key person, eg. @BarackObama – and see who they’re following. Click on a name to go to their page and then simply click on ‘follow’.

18. Find people to follow Search for something you’re interested in (eg. books) using the search bar on the Twitter home page. Here you will see all the tweets of people using that term. If you’re interested in what someone has said, click on their name, this will take you to their page and click ‘follow’. See if they’re following anyone you would like to follow and repeat the process. The more people you follow, the more useful Twitter becomes. Don’t agonise over who to follow, you can change your mind really easily at any time by clicking on ‘unfollow’.

19. Finding people to follow See how I searched for ‘learning’ in the search bar, then I clicked on gatesfoundation and the box opened on the right, I can now click ‘follow’

20. That little blue tick That blue tick means that this is a verified account – this is useful for when you’re looking for famous people – sometimes some people pretend to be someone. The blue tick tells you it’s really them.

21. Don’t forget to follow me! My Twitter address is @vahva The link to my Twitter profile is: http://twitter.com/vahva Tweet you soon!

22. End of part 2 (of 4) View the other parts in the series at: http://slideshare.net/bryonytaylor Part 1 – Why should I join Twitter? Part 2 – Creating your profile Part 3 – Tweeting Part 4 – Managing the flow of information on Twitter