twitter for business tutorials

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Twitter for Business

A Four Step PlanQuestions: @nicoleljohnson

August 2009

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Be able to apply Twitter to your daily work flow, resulting in better

job performance.

Business Goal

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Objectives

Gain a deeper understanding of what Twitter is

Define a purpose for using Twitter to improve job performance

Actively participate on Twitter

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What is Twitter?

Twitter is a free social networking and micro-blogging service that enables its users to send and read messages known as tweets

Tweets are text-based posts of up to 140 characters displayed on the author's profile page and delivered to the author's subscribers who are known as followers

Senders can restrict delivery to those in their circle of friends or, by default, allow open access

Users can send and receive tweets via the Twitter website, Short Message Service (SMS) or external applications

Definition courtesy of Wikipedia

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How Can Twitter Help Improve My Job Performance? There isn’t a shortage of resources online

that demonstrate how to use Twitter for business In fact, ReadWriteEnterprise made a Twitter

for Business Guide available in July 2009 If you are responsible for understanding

social media, using social media tools is key to improving your job performance

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How Can Twitter Help Improve My Job Performance? (cont) Define what your goals for using Twitter are

Do you want to learn more about social media? Are you searching for competitive intelligence? Are you trying to establish yourself or company as a leader?

Find people to follow that you share interests with If you’re a marketer, find other marketers, find agencies, find clients,

find users that specialize in what you do (mobile marketing, social media, CRM, etc)

Have a dialog with these people – this is a new form of networking and sharing

Incorporate what you learn back into your job Share interesting things that you find Be approachable and set the tone that you want to

continuously learn and improve your skill sets

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How Can Twitter Help Improve My Job Performance? (cont) Twitter helps you stay up-to-date in a rapidly

changing marketplace Twitter breaks news faster than other sources

Twitter brings great minds together, and gives you daily opportunities to learn

Twitter gives your critics a forum, but that means you can study them

Twitter helps with business development, if your prospects are online

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4 Step Plan to Get You Tweeting

1 If you’re reading this, I’m assuming you’re interested in learning how to Tweet. You can check off step #1.

2 Set aside a good two-hours to complete the four tutorials in this presentation.

3 Finding a Tweeting style takes time. The value may not kick in right away. Agree to commit to tweeting for at least 30 days.

4 Have fun and share your experience with someone else.

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Let’s Get Started!

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Getting Started

This plan includes 4 tutorials Create Account Following Participate Go Mobile

It is best do complete the tutorials in order Each tutorial will take approximately 30 minutes

or less to complete At the end of this presentation, you will find a list

of resources that you may find helpful

Go to Tutorial #1: Create Account

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Tutorial #1: Create Account

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*Let’s take a look at an example of these items on the next slide…

Tutorial #1: Create Account If you haven’t already, please read the

Twitter for Business Overview Before we get started, you will need a few

things readily available user name preference*brief description of yourself for your profile*

Please make sure you have a reliable internet connection

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Tutorial #1: Create Account (cont)

What’s a user name? Your user name like a screen name is how people come to know you on

Twitter It appears in your profile URL (i.e.: www.twitter.com/yourname)

How do you come up with a user name? Think about how other Twitter users will look for you Consider the purpose of the Twitter account Here are a few suggestions:

If you’re using Twitter primarily for personal use, use your name or a combination of your first, middle, and last name (note: there are a lot of Twitter users already…your first choice may not be available, especially if you have a common name. Have some variations available)

If you’re using Twitter to promote a company, use the company name If you’re using Twitter to self-promote, use the name of your website or blog

Sometimes pictures help. Let’s look at an example on the next slide…

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My first user name choice was NicoleJohnson. It wasn’t available, so I used my middle initial and chose NicoleLJohnson instead.

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Twitter let’s you customize your account. In this tutorial, we will add a profile bio.

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Go to www.twitter.com Click on the “sign up now” button Have four pieces of information available:

full name username (what we talked about earlier in

slide #3) password e-mail address

After you enter this information, click on “create my account”

Note: After you create your account, Twitter will prompt you to see if your friends are on Twitter and to follow some pre-selected Twitter users – you can click on the skip this step in both instances

Go ahead and create your account.

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You’ve just created an account! Congratulations.

Now let’s customize it a little bit…

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This is where you update

your status – up to 140

characters at a time.

You’re probably dying to Tweet…

try to hold on until we

get to the participate tutorial

Click on the “settings” link to customize

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Tutorial #1: Create Account (cont)Click on the account tab. Notice the time zone and bio fields.

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If you haven’t already, click on your settings link Click on the account tab Under the account tab, let’s do two things

First, double check your time zone Choose the correct time zone from the drop down menu

Second, enter something about yourself in the “one-line bio” field This is a little something about yourself that others will see. When people are

searching for people to follow, they will often read this snippet. What you say can have an impact on if people choose to follow you or not.

You can show your personality here or describe your strengths and interests. You’re limited to 160 characters. My bio reads: “Digital Strategist, Instructional Designer, Runner, and New Yorker.”

If you want to add some more personality, you can also click on the picture and design tabs. You can upload a picture and add a design to your background. You can also skip these steps and come back at a later time to personalize your Twitter account.

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That’s it for now! This concludes tutorial #1 Let’s find some people to follow – go to

Tutorial #2

Go to Tutorial #2: Following

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Tutorial #2: Following

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Tutorial #2: Following

If you haven’t already, please: read the Twitter for Business Overview complete Tutorial #1: Create Account

In this tutorial, you will learn how to follow other users on Twitter

A couple of quick terms: Following. This is the group you’re following – their

tweets will appear in your "feed" or "stream“ Followers. This is the group who is following you

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Tutorial #2: Following (cont) The people who subscribe to your tweets are called your

“followers” If someone follows you, you can choose to follow them

back or not You can click on their profile and read some of their recent

tweets If you like what you see, start following them If their tweets don’t interest you, you’re not obligated to follow

them back Be selective and follow what’s meaningful and compelling to you Don’t worry - your followers may come and go -- that’s okay Keep sharing tweets that are interesting and you’ll start building

a following

Let’s choose some people to follow…some recommendations are on the next slide

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Tutorial #2: Following (cont)

Marketing Resources Hot Media

@jonrich @marketingcharts @mashable

@whydotpharma @emarketer @rww

@maverickNY @manhattanresear @brainpicker

@shwen @forrester @smashingmag

@swoodruff @iMediatweet @technorati

@pharmaguy @comscore @wired

@skypen @marketingsherpa @cnetNews

@chrisbrogan @pew_internet @adage

@kevinkruse @adtech @adweekdotcom

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Click on the “Find People” link

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To find a Twitter user that you want to follow, click on the "find people" link

Twitter asks you to enter a name for who you are looking for Enter one of the names from slide #25 (you do not

need to include the “@” symbol) Once you enter a name, click the search button. If

results display and you see a Twitter user that you want to follow, click on the follow button

One you start following someone, you will see their tweets

See what this looks like on the next slide…

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TIP: Once I’ve established a group of Twitter followers that I enjoy following and gain value from, then I browse the Twitter users that they're following Through this exercise I select additional Twitter users

to follow

Continue searching for people you want to follow Find at least 20 people to follow

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Congratulations, you’ve completed tutorial #2 and you’re well on your way

Assignment: Follow at least 20 users

Go to Tutorial #3: Participate

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Tutorial #3: Participate

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Tutorial #3: Participate

If you haven’t already, please: read the Twitter for Business Overview complete Tutorial #1: Create Account complete Tutorial #2: Following

In this tutorial, you will learn how to participate A few quick terms:

@ replies. To send a message to another Twitter user, use the “@” symbol plus the user’s Twitter name within your 140-character post

RT. RT stands for “re-tweet”. When you like something another user shares, you can RT the message and all of the people following you will see the original message

DM. DM stands for “direct message”. If you only want the user you’re writing to see your post, send that user a direct message. Note: In order to send a DM to a user, that user must be following you

Hashtag. A hashtag “#” helps tag like content. The use of hashtags is popular at conference events

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Tutorial #3: Participate (cont) Are you ready? It’s time for your first tweet! Take a look at what some of the people you’re following

are sharing Keep a couple things in mind

Go back to your goals Why do you want to Tweet?

Is it to improve your job performance? What do you want to learn, and share? Who do you want to communicate with?

Don’t be afraid to be personal Create a voice for yourself. Do you want to be informative, funny, serious, edgy, or something

else?

Let’s take a look at examples on the next few slides…

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Tutorial #3: Participate (cont)

In tutorial #2 we picked some users to follow. I really likethe highlighted post. If you’re following tooyou can share youropinion or RT the

post.

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Replying back to another Twitter user: If you want to reply back to a Twitter user, start your

tweet with the @ symbol followed by the Twitter user's name

@ replies are public messages Everyone that is following you or the user after the @ symbol

will see what you write

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Re-tweeting a message If you want to RT a message, include RT plus the @

symbol and user name and cut and paste the message your want to share in your 140-character post

RT plus @ posts are public messages Everyone that is following you or the user after the @ symbol

will see what you write

Here’s a RT plus I added a little comment

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Starting a new message It’s easy to start a new message – just enter anything

that you want to say within 140-characters

Remember, people are following you to learn too Be thoughtful with your posts and encourage a

discussion

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Sending a direct message (DM)Sometimes you will want to send a message

to another user that you don’t want others to see

A direct message can only be viewed by the sender and the user that the message is sent to

In order to send a DM, both the sender and the recipient must be following each other

Let’s take a look at an examples on the next slide…

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Click on the direct message link

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Select name from send dropdown. Then type message

and click send.

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There are a few additional ways to participate that you should know about: First is marking posts as

favorites Second is searching for

information Twitter is a great search engine This is where hashtags (#) come

in nicely Third is following trends

Let’s take a look at how these work on the next slide

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When you rollovera post – the star

and arrow appearStar = favoriteArrow = replyClick on the star to add the post

to your favorites list(you can go back and review the post later)Click on the arrow to reply back to this user

Fav

ori

tes

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Tutorial #3: Participate (cont)Try out the search function. Type a topic you’re interested in learning more about.

Try adding the #prior to a key word to find tagged content.

Try clicking on a trend and read about what others are talking about.

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Congratulations, you’ve completed tutorial #3 This is where your 30-day commitment comes into play

Learning how to tweet takes practice With clear goals for use in mind and through active participation,

you’ll start to see the value pretty quickly You’ll also gain more confidence to participate the more you do it

Assignment: Continue to participate with at least:

5 more RTs 5 more new posts 5 more DMs

Go to Tutorial #4: Go Mobile

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Tutorial #4: Go Mobile

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Tutorial #4: Go Mobile

If you haven’t already, please: read the Twitter for Business Overview complete Tutorial #1: Create Account complete Tutorial #2: Following complete Tutorial #3: Participate

In this tutorial, you will learn how to use Twitter on a mobile device

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Tutorial #4: Go Mobile (cont) One of the most common comments I hear

about Twitter is that it’s best used as a “mobile application”

What does this mean… Most of us aren’t tethered to our computers When we see something we want to share, using our

mobiles is the most convenient and timely approach When you’re waiting in line, commuting on a bus,

train, or in a taxi, or sitting in a doctor’s office, Twitter is a great tool to check in on news, network with your followers, and share what you’ve been up to

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Tutorial #4: Go Mobile (cont)

Most of us have mobile phonesSmartphones, like iPhones and Blackberry’s

seem to have the nicest apps for TwitterYou can also set up Twitter through SMS on

non-Smartphones

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Check with your carrier to understand your plan and if you will be charged text messages for use

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Twittering from an iPhoneGreat article on iPhone apps compared

I’ve tried a few apps for the iPhone and “Tweetie” is my favorite The description reads: “Everything in one app,

including multiple accounts, favorites, deleting, following, trends, location, re-tweets, photos and more”.

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Tutorial #4: Go Mobile (cont) If you don’t have a Smartphone, you can set up Twitter so you can use it

from your mobile phone Log into your Twitter account. Click on the Home tab, first in the Menu across the top

of your screen. Click on the Settings link underneath your Profile picture. The Settings Page should

show up with the ‘Account’ tab open showing your Twitter account information Click on the ‘Devices’ tab from within the Settings Page Enter your Mobile Phone number in the box provided in this format ‘447781488126′ Tick the box that says “It’s okay for Twitter to send txt messages to my phone.

Standard rates apply.” Click on ‘Save’ You should get this message: “Note: We currently don’t support sending SMS’ to this

number. You may still verify your phone and update Twitter, but we’ll never send you a message.”

The next page verifies your mobile phone number. Verify your number by sending a text (i.e. SMS message) with a code Twitter will display to the mobile phone number Twitter displays.

Once verified you are set up to send tweets from your mobile phone.

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Congratulations, you’ve completed tutorial #4

Assignment: Do some homework on your mobile phone

capabilities and plan Choose and install a mobile app or set up your

SMS capabilities Tweet from your mobile

Return to Overview

View Resources

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Appendix

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Resources

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Resources: Applications

Twitter Toolbar Downloading this free toolbar gives you instant access to Twitter. You can use the toolbar to access online Twitter tools, check your Twitter stats, post your updates and more. Versions are available for both Firefox and Internet Explorer.

Twitter Gallery A collection of free background themes for your Twitter account. You can use the one click installation or manually install them yourself. Lots of nice designs and colors to choose from.

Future Tweets Do you have something to promote on Twitter tomorrow but are afraid of forgetting to do it? With FutureTweets, you can schedule your tweet ahead of time for a specific date and time. Even schedule reoccurring tweets to post daily, monthly, even yearly.

TwitPic Share your favorite pictures on Twitter.

TweetBurner This site is designed to help you track your tweets. With Tweetburner you can shorten URLs and track the clicks your tweets accumulate.

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Resources: Links

Twitter Speak - 66 Terms

10 Ways to Find People on Twitter

Top 10 Twitter Tutorials on YouTube

29 Twitter Apps for the iPhone Compared

How to Organize a Successful TweetUp

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