Twitter Guide To Social Media Sharing

Twitter – The Short Message Social Network

Twitter is the second largest social network in the whole world of social media, ranking just behind Facebook. Twitter content streams news, images and videos based on just 140 characters. It was the first social network to introduce #hashtags and @handles for better search and networking options. Twitter recently implemented some changes to its 140 character limit to give posts a little more space. Even though Twitter is currently stretching its 140-character limit, it will remain in core a short message service.

Twitter facts & figures:

310 million people worldwide use Twitter
It is visited 930 million times a day.
That is why it is important to always get right to the point when you tweet a message.

So, what exactly is a successful and engaging Tweet? What structure should it follow to get the maximum engagement and retweets from users?

What to share on Twitter:

For us, Twitter is mostly business related. We run Twitter accounts for our various clients; one for our company and also a personal Twitter account, but this account is also for business purposes, too.

How to share on Twitter: “There is a lot you can put into 140 characters”

Keep it even shorter: Tweets around 110 characters increase interaction up to 17%, Tweets with 80-110 characters work best.
Share images: Tweets with images generate up to 150% more retweets than those without. Tweets with images work best with 20-40 characters.
Include links: Tweets with links get 86% more retweets.
Use #hashtags: Adding up to 4 hashtags get more reactions, Tweets with up to 2 hashtags generate more direct interaction with users.
Use @handles to give credit or to message to specific Twitter accounts.
Call-to-action: words like pls. RT, help, read, check, follow get more results. Ask for RTs results in 12 times more retweets.
Use trending # and seasonal hashtags for newsjacking and agenda surfing.

When to post and how often to share on Twitter:

The lifetime of a tweet is about 18 minutes. So it might be a good idea to share your blog post more than once on different days and at different times. Post it up to 4 times during the first 36 hours, then slow down on a weekly frequency. Afterwards, you can post it as evergreen content (every 2-3 months), but always mix your posts with curated content and other relevant content and re-tweets.
The best times to post on Twitter:
The Twittersphere is most active during the daytime hours between 8 a.m. – 7 p.m. in your audiences time zone. Tweets posted during that time will generate 30% more interaction. Tweets on weekends generate 17% higher engagement than on weekdays. The best times to tweet are:
morning hours from 8 a.m. – 10 a.m
middays from 11 a.m. – 1 p.m and
after work from 4 p.m. – 7 p.m
How often to post on Twitter:
- Boost your blog post up to 4 times per day for initial promotion.
- Re-post your content with different comments once a day over the next few weeks, then slow down to once a month for your evergreen content.
- Please Note: For every 3 pieces of creative or promotional content, post 5 pieces of curated content from other sources and 2 pieces of personal content (that can also be replies and RTs with personal comments).

Twitter Tools:

Twitter can be a huge productivity drain, so automation tools will help you to schedule and queue your messages in advance, especially for off office hours and on weekends and holidays.

Tweue.com: Queue your Tweets
Twuffer: Twuffer allows you to compose a list of future tweets, and schedule your releases.
Tagboard: helps you to monitor hashtags
Tweetdeck:monitor streams, mentions and keywords in order to respond and discuss in real time
Trending Hashtags: shows the 30 most popular hashtags in any language