Many people, in fact millions of people, are now using Twitter. That’s a whole lot
of people! If you could gain even a very small percentage of these people as your targeted
followers, you could market yourself and your products to them quite successfully. But
there are a few things that are important to cover before you can start amassing your
targeted followers. If you miss these steps, you’re not maximizing your efforts to get
followers and if you can’t get followers, how can you brand yourself, let alone sell
anything?
I’d like to first ask you to turn the tables… what makes you want to follow
someone on Twitter?
A Bio:
Having a bio on your Twitter page is very important. Don’t skip this step. If you
don’t know how to craft one, take a look at the bios of Twitterers that you admire or are
in your same field. Bios are a very individual thing, but you can get a feel by looking at
what others have done.
People like to tell with a quick glance what you’re about. If you don’t have any
bio, you’re shooting yourself in the foot because they won’t be back. So get one up as
soon as possible. What you put is important as well. If it’s just a pitch fest for your
products, it’s guaranteed to scare people off. Your bio should show what your business
interests are first, then some of your personal interests and possibly some humor.
The business interests will get you targeted followers as people will do searches
for these interests. Personal information in your bio helps people decide if they might like
you and have something in common with you. Humor is because people like to laugh.
An Avatar:
Yes, Twitter has a default avatar - a brown square with o_0 in it, but that’s
certainly not you. This is the spot where you show your real face to the world, so to
speak. If people get to associate your face with good tweets, they’re more likely to click
on your links. Not having a picture does not endear you to people and many won’t follow
you solely based on the no picture thing.
What’s in your Twitter Stream:
Do you send out promotion after promotion, or always send out random tweets to
no one in particular? Potential followers don’t want to see that, they want to be able to
interact and have conversations. They want to follow people who can help them with
their problems or answer questions. If your Twitter stream shows you haven’t “talked” to
people with @replies then you are seen as only caring about you.
Conversely, if your Twitter stream shows you’re interacting and building
relationships, you become more interesting to them. Once they get to know you, they’re
more likely to follow your links.