Today, I’m very excited to welcome a guest blogger who I’ve come to enjoy reading over the past few months.  Known as The Naked Redhead, Sarah Storer brings an honest and witty perspective, blended with an entertaining sense of sarcasm that keeps readers coming back to her blog.  Want more?  Sarah also brings the same delightful mix of humor, passion and energy to audiences as a public speaker based in Columbus, Ohio.

I’m pleased to pass her the keyboard for this post…

HOW TO Use Twitter to Win Friends and Influence People

I have a confession to make: I am a former Twitter skeptic. I mean, I’d signed up in the beginning just like everyone else. But USING it? No. I didn’t get it. I didn’t see the appeal of millions of people squawking at each other in real time. And I definitely hated the idea of limiting myself to 140 characters (I like to get VERBOSE, mkay?). But all the “experts” were using it, so I thought, “Why not?”

Unsurprisingly, I did everything wrong…at first.

Initially, I thought that Twitter was a good way to market my blog. Accordingly, I set up one of those auto-tweet thingies to get people to read my latest posts. Some referrals trickled in. I then decided to add personalized tweets about my blog to the auto-tweets. The results for those were a little better, but I still wasn’t seeing encouraging results (in terms of numbers).

That’s when I had my big revelation – the one that every self-starter goes through. The simplest thing in the world – that only about 2% of people trying to “make it” in the Interwebosphere understands – when it comes to social media is this:

It’s not about me.

That one, little phrase changed absolutely everything – and I mean EVERYTHING – I did surrounding my blog, especially when it came to Twitter. So what did I do? How did I nearly quadruple my followers and blog visitors in just a few months (without buying a fancy program, tutorial or webinar)? How did I do it? How can you do it?

Here’s what you need to do:

Change Your Attitude

Here’s the main beef I have (and some will disagree): Twitter is NOT marketing. Period. Twitter can be USED for marketing, but at its core, it’s a conversation starter. I mean, it’s called TWITTER, and you TWEET. Both words suggest smallness, snippets and tiny phrases. So if you want to call it “marketing,” that’s fine. Just be aware that when you tweet solely about yourself, it’s more like you’re a rooster in a flock of songbirds. You’re a lone fowl trying to belt your own off-key song, while everyone else is making music together.

Remember, it’s not about you. Stop sending auto-DMs that are about you. Stop sending tweets that are only about your service and products. You’d never do that in a real conversation, right? I sure hope not. If someone came up and introduced themselves on the street, you’d never immediately respond, “Hi, I’m Bob. Wanna see my website?” That’d be creepy. Conversation involves listening first, then responding appropriately.

Start Local

If you’re looking to build a good, loyal, conversational following, I say it’s best to start with your own local home base. I could have punched myself in the face for not thinking of this earlier on in my blogging career, because my hometown is now one of my largest referral bases. And guess what? It’s SO easy, because you have a built-in commonality with these people.

Did someone mention your favorite restaurant? Jump in on the conversation and mention their best dish. Did someone ask where to go to find kid-friendly activities? Recommend your local park. Believe me, everyone loves a hometown hero. If you start contributing to conversations in your hometown, your influence and reach will grow. They will retweet (RT) your posts, recommend your service and LOVE you.

Give, Give and Give Some More

On Twitter, you can spot the takers. They’re the people whose very first @reply to you will be, “Hey, I have this business opportunity…” It’s a tweet written under the guise of giving, but you know it’s not someone who is being philanthropic. If you honestly want to win friends and influence people on Twitter, however, the masses will adore you, as long as you’re giving lots and lots and lots of stuff away for free. “Stuff” doesn’t have to be products or content (you gotta make a living somehow, right?). I’ve found that there are three other ways to give:

1. Give through conversation. Having simple conversations on Twitter will win you lots of friends. For example, I had this exchange the other day with most unlikely of Tweeps:

Swan friggin’ Cleaners! Yes, the exchange was about something silly – snacks. Yes, it was an incredibly dorky conversation that had multiple Lord of the Rings references. No, the conversation absolutely did not mention a thing about dry cleaning. But guess who I followed immediately? And guess who I’ll take my dry cleaning to from now on?

2. Give through information. What’s the easiest way to do this, you ask? Tweet what you’re reading. HootSuite has an applet you can put right on your toolbar that captures the information about what you’re currently reading. Try to stay relevant to your target audience. Nate always tweets about social media and tips for small businesses, because he knows his readers want the same information he does. I tweet a lot of humor pieces, along with lifestyle articles, how-to’s, etc – articles that would be right at home on my blog and that my audience can identify with. It’s quick. It’s easy. You’re reading it anyway, so give it away!

3. Give through promoting others. You don’t have to clog up your feed on Follow Fridays to promote others. Why not do it throughout the week when you read a particularly funny or pertinent tweet? How about when one of your followers has written something brilliant or might be selling his or her new product? How about when you have one follower who you know would benefit from something another follower offers? Why not introduce the two?

In case you’re worried you’ll never be able to use Twitter to promote yourself, you still can. Just keep in mind that it’s not (all) about you.

Here’s what I do:

• I have good, fun, giving conversations throughout the day.
• I research peak times that people seem to visit my site, and I tweet new content during those times (and only those times).

That’s it. It works out to tweeting specifically about my blog around three times daily. The rest of the time, I’m trying to entertain, connecting locally, doing my best to give and, of course, promoting my fellow Tweeps. The result? My inbox is filled with new follows every single day. I get involved in new conversations and my blog numbers continue to grow.

Look, the bottom line is simple: There’s really no big secret. Twitter is no different than any other conversation you’d have with a person on the street. Be kind, introduce yourself, listen, offer helpful information and feedback, and you too will win friends and influence people on Twitter.

[The Naked Redhead (TNR) writes under the assumption that life is more fun when you're honest (naked), when things are funny and when people get together to try to do the right thing. She is also a speaker, storyteller, social media nerd, community enthusiast and authenticity hound. It is also possible that she may or may not have a slight obsession with Kraft dinners. You decide.]

nateriggs

Like what you just read and want to get my posts delivered to your inbox? SUBSCRIBE HERE

More Posts

Follow Me: