TWITTER Crash Course

Your Twitter page

Home (your Twitter feed; this shows all the tweets of the people you follow)• Profile• Tweets• Following• Followers

@Connect

Me (same as Home/Tweets)

Twitter Etiquette• Figure out who you want to attract and engage based

on keywords and target audience.

• Find them on Twitter (Twitter.com/search – Advanced search) and follow them.

• People see that you are following them on Twitter. The polite response (for you, too!) to a new follower is to to review their profile and recent tweets for relevancy, then follow them back (avoiding pushy sales people and pornography). This is one way to gain followers.

• When you are starting out, it is a courtesy to thank followers with a DM or, I prefer, an @ message.

@ v. DM

@girlontheroof, Thanks for the follow. Open for everyone on Twitter to see, though it is directed at girlontheroof. (Don’t lead with @ unless you are directing a tweet to someone.)

Donation pledged by @girlontheroof for every new follower to @ResearchAtCRI. This is how to refer to users on Twitter, directed to open audience. (Don’t over use your own handle; done here for sake of RTs)

DM @girlontheroof, Thanks for the follow. Private message, sent only to @girlontheroof

Tips on Tweeting• Keep it to 140 characters (including spaces and punctuation),

preferably less. If someone RTs you, the end could be cut off.

• Use hashtags (without spaces or punctuation) when possible to identify subject matter that other people may be searching for. This is another way to gain followers.

• Write content that people want to read.

Avoid selling your own product or organization too hard.

Tweet about other related topics (e.g. mental health statistics, coping with stress, drug abuse in teens).

Tips on Tweeting• Include links to articles and web sites. HootSuite will automatically

shorten links to save characters.

• You can also use bit.ly to shorten them.

Great article on stress @centerstone bit.ly/8889

• Retweet other people (especially but not exclusively those who retweet you). This is another way to gain followers and encourage them to retweet you to their followers.

• Follow people who follow you, but also keep in mind that Twitter ranks your influence based on your ratio of followers: following. Ideally, you want more followers than you follow. (This is much harder when starting out and trying to build a base of followers.)

• Monitor “@ Connect” from your home page. This shows others’ interactions with you (new followers, RTs, @ comments, etc.).

Tips on Tweeting• Always thank people who retweet you, preferably publicly. When

possible, include the original tweet for more exposure.

• It’s also good to thank new followers, especially those with influence (large number of followers).

Tips on Tweeting• Respond to people who ask you questions or direct statements

at you (unless solicitations).

Tips on Tweeting• Start and join conversations. Ask questions and engage people.

Use Reply option to keep the conversation in a collapsible chain.

Tips on Tweeting• Monitor trends. Listen in on keywords. Ask questions and engage

people.

• Take part in events

Tips on Tweeting• If it’s important content that you want to make sure people see,

tweet it repeatedly (but use different words) over the course of a few days, in different time slots. And use analytics tools that help you determine when your followers are on Twitter.

Tweet different sentences from the same article or press release and add the link to each tweet.

Thank people who were part of a successful project to give you a reason to keep talking about it.

Tips on Tweeting• Tweet often.

Twitter is extremely fast-paced. Something posted 2 minutes ago may not be seen by anyone 1 minute from now. Frequency is required to build a presence on Twitter.

Aim for at least 2-3 tweets a day in a typical week. During a big week (news, conference, campaign, etc.), it’s better to tweet 10+ times per day. This can include retweets.

Unlike Facebook or LinkedIn posts, you really can’t tweet too much if your content is professional (avoid the mundane, “Just had my third cup of coffee” tweets).

Track your metrics over time to see what days of the week and what times of day you are most likely to pick up followers and retweets.

Tips on Tweeting• Don’t get sucked in.

Use a tool like HootSuite (or another similar platform) to schedule tweets in advance (e.g. On Monday morning, schedule 3 tweets per day for the week).

Check back in Wed/Thurs to thank people who retweeted you, to retweet others and to follow new followers.

If you are stuck waiting at the DMV, doctor’s office or airport, check in on the conversation and engage.

During a campaign, you will need to put in more time (check in at least twice a day to engage, more if there is a lot of active discussion on the topic).

Facebook for Business

Insights and Tips

Facebook for Business• Only Admins can post to the wall, but anyone who “likes” the page

can post a comment.

• Be careful to double-check “you are posting as ______” before adding a comment, “liking” or otherwise interacting on the page.

• Do not use hashtags on Facebook.

• Don’t “like” your own post, but you can “like” people’s comments on it. It’s good to engage with people.

• Images will strengthen any post on Facebook. Most third-party links will put in their own image; scroll through to choose the most appropriate image.

• Giving a specific call to action (“like,” “share”) dramatically increases the likelihood that people will do it.

Facebook for Business• Experts vary in opinion on frequency of posting, but most say 2-5x

per day is best if you really want to engage people in a particular discussion for a set period of time. If you want to sustain, 2-3x per week is fine.

• If you click on the Share icon on a post on your page, it will tell you who has shared it and how many times it was shared from that person’s page. You can read comments, too. This IS impacted by people’s security settings, so not everything will appear there.

• You can use HootSuite to post on Facebook, but construct it specifically for FB.

• Resist the temptation to respond to trolls.

Facebook for BusinessInsights

• Hold mouse over question mark to get definition of “Reach,” “Engaged Users,” “Talking About This,” etc.

• Click on header to sort by that metric. Sometimes data in the backend shows higher numbers than what is shown on the page (for “shares,” “likes,” etc.). Facebook says this is due to security settings but offers no further explanation.

• Facebook Pages App lets you monitor on your cell phone. Data varies, compared to the computer version.

• Insights can give you gender, age range and location of Likes, those Reached and those Talking About.

Facebook for BusinessPromoted Posts

• Allows you to pay to have your post included in someone’s news feed. This may include people who like your page and/or friends of people who like your page.

• You set the budget and the duration. We did this on one post for C4MH. For $10, it did increase exposure over a nearly identical post.

Facebook Advertising• Although advertising on Facebook is very targeted and

inexpensive (and can be based on click-thrus, not impressions), I am hesitant to recommend it for a nonprofit.