Friday is all about sharing in my mind… and so, another popular edition of some cool Twitter Things that I’m pleased to share with you Twitterers and would-be / should-be Twitteres…Enjoy!
FollowFriday – Friday has become know as FollowFriday to many on Twitter. Essentially, a day where you show some Twitter “Love” to others by suggesting a few potential followers to your followers. It’s very simple… you simply compose a tweet using the hashtag #followfriday then you list some cool people that you follow and want to share with others. My followfriday for today…
GPS Twitter -available via WHERE widget, GPS Twitter enables mobile users to Tweet from their mobile and also embed GPS coordinates – provided your mobile is GPS-enabled… works great on Symbian OS!
TwitterHolic – this cool mashup shows statistics for Twitter users. It pulls twitter name, location, URL, follwoers etc… useful if searching for followers.
Dash Express – Dash has an open API where developers have created the functionality to grab location fix via Dash and then send the information to Twitter. The app adds your exact location (street address ) along with a link to your location on Google Maps – developed using the Dash Express API- http://www.dash.net
Twibble (Mobile Twitter Client) – This application from German developer http://www.twibble.de/ enables smartphone users – including Symbian OS and Blackberry, to add location to Twitter posts. The application also has a desktop client as well which has built on Adobe Air. Something you may not be aware of though is that the team also makes available an API that allows developers to easily watch your twitter location in a map or Google Earth. According to the developers it works great with positions sent via the iPhone or other GPS enabled devices! You can grab Twibble mobile from http://www.twibble.de/twibble-mobile/
NearbyTweets does exazctly what is says.. it helps you locate Twitter followers that are close to you in physical space – see http://nearbytweets.com/
Special Mention… HootSuite (was Brightkit) is a must-have app enabling you to manage multiple Twitter accounts – provides for Tweet scheduling and gives you statistics as well. http://www.brightkit.com/
New to Twitter? Research shows that many new Twitter users are initially lost and are unsure of where or how to start. The following are several key starting points that any new Twitter user should consider:
- Search – Twitter is used in many different ways, some share tips and tricks, others simply push their news feeds, many are more active listening in on others conversations gathering leads, tips, tricks, and ideas. A great way to start using twitter is to search via search.twitter.com and search on some key words, perhaps even your own name or company name to see who’s tweeting about you or things that interest you. Ideally if people are tweeting about your company or your services (even your industry) then these are perfect people to start following.
- Follow your follower’s followers! Once you have a couple of trusted followers and people you enjoy following, browse the list of their followers. Chances are you’ll find several people there that you will want to follow.
- Consider following people that follow you – it’s a great idea to follow most of the people who decide to follow you… or, at least click on their profile and find out what they are all about. Once you get into a grove you’ll likely come up with a following to follower ration of about 2:1 or 3:1 – that is, you should have 2x or 3x more followers than people you are following – this may not be the case for a corporate Twitter account. Corporate Twitterers (mostly tweeting about their company) typically maintain a ratio close to 1:1, if not they should be!
- Add a link from your website or blog to you Twitter page, even better, add a Twitter widget to your blog that posts your latest tweets onto your blog via the widget
- Make sure you complete your Twitter bio and add a weblink to your blog or website – no bio… sorry, I likely won’t follow you!