Let’s face it, Twitter doesn’t work unless you have followers, but not just any followers, relevant ones.  So I have put together a list of what I think are a few important ways to get started on Twitter, to help and get the followers you need – to get your opinions, products or company out there.

1. Tweet! – I can’t tell you when a day doesn’t go by that I am trying to tweet about something.  Last week, I had a busy day, I couldn’t get to Twitter all day long. The next day I had lost 30 followers. I have to tell you, followers are finicky, if your not tweeting, they will drop you like a hot potato. Try to tweet a few times a day. If you can’t, get software like cotweet to schedule tweets or try installing a twitter app on your smartphone.  I enjoy UberTwitter for my Blackberry.  And If you don’t have followers, Tweet! you aren’t going to get any unless you say something interesting.

2. Bio – Bio is your chance to say something about yourself. It’s located up at the top right of your page, I always read the bio when I follow someone, if they sound like they are selling something or are spammers, I don’t add them! It’s important that your one liner look interesting. I also throw my address website up there, just in case

3. Tweet Quality – What is the quality of your tweets? ( And this is especially important for companies) If you only write tweets about what your selling or only shoot out links to your site, no one is going to follow you. Tweeters can spot a salesman a mile away. It’s okay to market on twitter, but you have to at least act like a human being once in a while.

4. Retweet (RT) – If you retweet someone, they are most likely going to follow you  (Unless it’s Ashton Kutcher -I’ve tried). Retweeting is a way of saying that’s interesting,  And I think the only way to say thank you for the retweet, is to follow you back!

5. Trend Topics  – Trend topics are those strange words that people make up that have a (hashtag) # in front of  it. #followfriday or #Michael Jackson. You as a tweeter can track these hot topics by clicking on them. I try to find topics that are relevant to what I am talking about.  Then I tweet a lot about that topic that is hot, always adding the “#”. When they come along, I find followers that I think I would like to add or that might find me interesting. This way you can connect with people that will most likely add you.

6. Reply (@)- engage in conversations, people like getting replies and if they see you are actually a human being, they may follow you.

7. Sign up for sites like twellow.  Twellow lets you put yourself under categories that define you or your company. People can search these categories and follow you.

8. Page Design- Okay, I admit I did follow a couple people just for their cool twitter page design.. What can I say, It can’t hurt to put up a cool looking page.

9. Spread out your tweets – There are a couple people on my account that send out 20 tweets at once, all links. It drives me crazy when I am on UberTwitter because all I see is this one guy with 20 links down my page, 20 links I will never click on because..oops.. I just un-followed him.

10. Just have fun. If you are boring, no one will want to follow you…

Tina Benjamin – WebOganic. 7.30.2009