Is there a wrong way to use twitter?
by Alicia Franks on Jun.17, 2010, under Social Media, Twitter

Everyone does twitter differently
- some use it for personal, some for business, some for a combination of both.
- some tweet with a logo from their company, others with random crazy pictures and some with a good photo of themselves.
- some follow anyone interesting, others follow almost no one and others still auto follow everyone.
- some direct message people, others choose to only tweet or reply, and some do neither and simply share links.
- some use twitter as a large rss feed, others use it for conversation and some are just lost.
- some have protected tweets, some tweet about everything and others should have protected tweets.
No matter which person you are, you are using twitter your way, which is perfectly fine. Unless you want to use it as an add on to your marketing strategy, in that case, you need a method to your madness, and a method that your potential clients and audience will like.
So what do we suggest?
- Be a combination of business and personal. No one wants an onslaught of sales tactics…talk and share real life content in combination with business tweets.
- Be human – tweet as a real person, representing the brand. Unless you are a mega brand, people aren’t going to want to follow a logo and a company. They want a person with whom they can talk and connect. If you must use a company logo, make sure to use your real name and a bit about yourself in the bio.
- Follow people who fit your brand and marketing. Don’t follow everyone back, but don’t not follow people either. Finding a balance of the right audience will make tweeting easier.
- Use twitter to the full extent. Direct message, reply and retweet. Share and be shared. The more you participate and get involved, the more success you will see with twitter.
- Converse and share links. Twitter is about the discussion, not the end result. Just sharing links will annoy your audience and endless chatter isn’t worth a hill of beans. Make sure to blend your messages.
- Don’t protect your tweets. You want people to be able to easily access you and your conversation – adding protection on your tweets will drive the audience away.
How do you use twitter? What have you found to be successful for you?



June 17th, 2010 on 11:24 am
Is there a wrong way to use twitter? http://bit.ly/apdrWj
This comment was originally posted on Twitter
June 17th, 2010 on 11:29 am
RT @kirstenwright: Is there a wrong way to use twitter? http://bit.ly/apdrWj
This comment was originally posted on Twitter
June 17th, 2010 on 11:32 am
RT @kirstenwright: Is there a wrong way to use twitter? http://bit.ly/apdrWj
This comment was originally posted on Twitter
June 17th, 2010 on 11:42 am
I don’t think protecting my tweets has turned my “audience” away. It’s turned away a lot of the spam and bots that I could have garnered, yes but, with the melding of work and social media and the damn near forensic way they go about hiring people. I make it a point to protect my tweets, just because what I say CAN be interpreted differently.
June 17th, 2010 on 12:06 pm
But are you using twitter to build a business or just for fun? If you are using it to build a business – that is when I suggest unprotected tweets. Otherwise, it is perfectly fine to have them protected