Engaging on Twitter

Let me ask you one simple question, when was the last time you engaged with someone on twitter? I don’t mean just posting something or retweeting something. But actually engaging and talking to people, asking them questions, commenting, and starting out a meaningful conversation? If the answer is never, then you might be using Twitter wrong. Of course, you might be a person who just goes on Twitter and reads it like a newspaper in the morning, then this will not be that helpful to you. BUT. If you are someone who wants to generate business leads, or network to find a job or an opportunity, then I’m going to share a couple of useful tips on how to use Twitter for your advantage and actually getting the results you need/want.

There is a couple of different thing you can do on Twitter, aside from posting links to your blog or promoting your product (that is just being lazy and boring). Here are some tips on what to post:

Question: Ask an engaging question to stir conversation

Fact: Share a fact.. then share an opinion about it.

Quote: Grab a quote from article & turn it into social message

Add Intrigue: Write a teaser message that grabs the attention (Maybe from your upcoming blog post)

Add Image: Post an engaging image to grab attention to the content

If you want to build a relationship with people…  the best way is to grab their attention and help them first:

·       Make them look good by congratulating them on their successes, sharing their “earned media”, referencing them as experts, and recommending them to others.

·       Get them more visibility by writing about your top influencers, quoting them in blog posts and bylines, and amplifying their social content on a regular basis.

·       Solve a problem for them by answering their questions, giving access to your products and services, and helping get the word out about their upcoming passion project, product, webinar, blog, etc.

Then they would want to help you in return.

You don’t want to be that person who just asks for help and uses people to gain attention or profit, you need to care. One of my favorite things to do is to follow up with people who follow me or people who I follow to gain their attention to me. You want to send them a message and include:

-Warming hello

-Comment about their recent post

-Invite to connect on LinkedIn

-Also a link to your blog or an interesting post that might be of value to them.