May 7, 2008 Comments (16)
There doesn't seem to be any way to "find" anyone unless you already know them from somewhere else. How do you make new acquaintances with similar interests? What's the point in marketing via Twitter if you can't figure out how to get heard?"
This is a real concern, but thankfully there's several resources that can help you expand your network of friends on Twitter.
This is what I have been looking since very long time, have just updated my followers in Twitter regarding your post. I guess they will find it useful too. How will you know me? I am http://twitter.com/merkal2005
Great post, Mack. Thanks. I'll try those ideas.
Now on to the really tough questions:
What's a "tweet"?
Are there any other new words we have to learn?
Also another resource, the Twitter page for Small Business Marketing Unleashed:
http://twitter.com/sbmunleashed
Many of the speakers and attendees from SBMU are on that page, you can follow us, and you can follow me at http://www.twitter.com/MackCollier
Al a 'tweet' is simply a message you leave on Twitter. And make sure that if you want to reply to someone, or address them directly, add the '@' in front of their name, so they will see it.
Nice piece Mack. Can't forget about http://summize.com/ though. It's a great way to find tweeters by topic. Search "SEO" and you'll find me ;)
Mack,
Great advice to the new Twitter user. I'll follow it up with this: If you're brand new, please don't follow hundreds, or even thousands, of people right off the bat. The Twitter community finds it suspicious, akin to spammer behaviour. So instead, update consistently for a while, @ people in conversations and grow your follow/following lists at a reasonable pace.
When you've got a handle on that, you can try this tool for suggestions on who to follow:
http://whoshouldifollow.com/
If you're interested in following the heavy-hitters on Twitter, you can consult:
http://twitter.alltop.com/
http://tweeterboard.com/top-100
http://www.twitterholic.com/
Good luck and welcome to Twitter!
@adelemcalear
And you can follow Melanie on Twitter here: http://twitter.com/status_girl
Great post, Mack. Wish I had this advice when I first started out.
One other thing that I find helpful when looking for like-minded folks is using tracking words in SMS or IM (I use GTalk). More info here: http://help.twitter.com/index.php?pg=kb.page&id=79
Neelie and Adele thanks for the great links! BTW guys remember what I have posted previously about thinking of your blog as being co-created content? The links from Melanie, Adele and Neelie are just as, if not more valuable than the ones in my post. Thanks again guys for helping out, like Neelie said, wish I'd had more links like this when I joined Twitter!
Thanks Mack, and everyone else.
I'm still a bit skeptical, but I'm really curious about this as well. This should give me a way through. Cheers!
"I'm still a bit skeptical, but I'm really curious about this as well."
That is the EXACT mentality to have! There's a new 'shiny new toy' popping up every week it seems in the Web 2.0 space. Be skeptical of the endless hype around the 'hot new thing', but at the same time, don't forget to learn about these tools and what they can do before you dismiss them. This is a lesson I have to remind myself of as well!
If you're looking to target folks in a certain Geographic area - try this tool: Twittermap.com. If you set your location in Twitter to your target location (just tweet "L: city, state" then open TwitterMap.com - you'll see location of Tweeple in the area and the public feed of every tweet happening in that location. Very neat for building a "local network" of Twitterers.
A great way to find people with similar interests is via FriendFeed. They have a good search facility so hunt down some people who comment on areas that interest you then look at their profiles to find their twitter username.
Well, I guess I'm missing out on a lot. I've been only following people that I know based on their avatars and names. Most of them are people I know from blogging or other social sites but I never really looked into searching for people with similar interests.
So, when do you STOP following them? Like if someone drops links all the time and that's it, do you take them off then?
Jay
"So, when do you STOP following them? Like if someone drops links all the time and that's it, do you take them off then?"
Jay great question, but it's one that only you can answer. My only criteria for following someone is that I receive value from them. It could be via conversation, or it could be because of the links they post.
Another example, when I really ramped up my Twitter usage late last year, I added every 'thought leader' I could find in the social media space. Many of these people began following me as well, but some didn't. I kept following these people because I wanted to know what they were up to. But as the number of people I was following went from 100 or so to now around 800, I found that I no longer have 'room' to follow people that aren't following me and that never 'talk' to me on Twitter. So I started unfollowing these people, to make room for people that WILL follow me and that I can talk to.
But I think we all develop a system for how we get(and GIVE) the most value out of Twitter as we use it more.
In my case, I always try to read the updates of the people I follow and see if they have replied to some updates..I then checked out the persons they replied to..if I find a common interest with them I follow them around..^^
Anyways these are great ways on how to look for people to follow on Twitter.
Twitter is a human feed thus RSS+human+chat. It's a very unique & new tool. One I believe is changing the average person into understanding RSS... without using the awful techie word RSS! I call it: RTS=Real Twitter Syndication. Thus, the way to *friend* on Twitter depends on *why* you are using Twitter. And that will vary by each Twitterer! Thus, it truly is about the power of *one.* Have a great time at Twitter and, as Mack says, just like any social site, you will get more value the more you use it.
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