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Social Spotlight: Twitter

Twitter has become a source of contact with celebrities, politics, the arts and more. Housing accounts and hashtags for many people and topics, Twitter can be difficult to navigate with over 500 million tweets each day. However, Twitter can be a great way to project both your personal and business missions, as well as communicate with your audience. Depending on your audience, it may even be critical to your program for successful outreach. Here is how to establish and distinguish your brand in an influx of tweets.

Know the lingo. A tweet is a 140-character text that an account publishes. It will appear on its Twitter profile and the Twitter feed in chronological order with the most recent tweets at the top. A hashtag connects to the wider conversation, putting the tweet in a Twitter feed with all other tweets using that hashtag.
Cultivate your presence. Craft an effective profile that includes a simple username and professional, eye-catching profile and cover photos. Include a bio, location, and link to your website. Write tweets that give insight to your work and updates of new developments.
Connect to the world. Use hashtags relevant to your industry to make your mark in major hashtag feeds. However, don’t use too many hashtags; this looks sloppy. One to three hashtags is adequate to join the larger conversation without seeming juvenile. Follow accounts and like tweets from greater industry influencers and potential contacts (on the flip side, be careful with what you do follow and like, as these are accessible from your profile). Vary the content on your profile, offering a range of photos/videos, industry tweets and company updates.
Connect to your market. Launch a hashtag campaign to engage users and gain visibility beyond your own account. You can promote your campaigns online and in-person, such as with a sign at your next company event.
Use Analytics to track progress. If you are are using Twitter to advertise, Twitter Analytics is a great tool for statistical feedback. Otherwise, you can manually keep track of retweets, likes, and followers weekly. Stay tuned next week for a free social tracker download!