By the time you’ve finished reading this post, you’ll be a Twitter goddess. This is a social media platform that creators should be utilising. Whenever I’m asked about social media, Twitter is always what I discuss. Sure, I know people who gain traffic from Pinterest and Instagram. But Twitter allows you to pull everything together. And it brings results. How do I know this? Well, I’ve done it myself. So today, I’m sharing a list of ways that you can improve your presence on Twitter and up your social media game. Many of these ideas can be done constantly, and some will definitely overlap. So I encourage you to take each step one at a time and pick the ones that are most suited to you.

#1 Always Use an Image

Social media is becoming a visual platform. Instagram, a purely visual tool, has taken over Twitter with its amount of users. It has 300 million, whereas Twitter has 284 million (source).

This doesn't mean you should forget Twitter and switch to Instagram. It means that the platform we're discussing here has much more variety and volume for growth. If only people took advantage of it.

Using images on Twitter is something to take advantage of, whether you're a blogger, business owner or company worker. Did you know that tweets with images are 94% more likely to be retweeted? (source).

They're that powerful.

One of the main way to really up your Twitter game is to include images in your tweets. But I bet now you're asking, "but how do I know what size image to create?"

Well that's where Canva comes in.

Canva was recommended to me by one of my lovely Twitter followers. I was in this exact situation. I needed to crop my blog post images so they looked good with a tweet. But I had no idea how to do it. So I asked Twitter. Someone responded and I've been using Canva ever since.

This design tool is so great. It has a template for each social media platform. So all you do is upload your image, adjust it to fit the size of the templates, save it (I store everything on Google drive) and then add it to your tweets.

STEP ONE

STEP TWO

STEP THREE

Why Not Try This?

When you create an image for your blog, use Canva to create a Twitter picture for it too. Include it in your tweets and see what happens. You'll definitely notice a difference.

#2 Don't Forget Weekends

This is something I've learnt the hard way. At weekends, I take a break from social media entirely. For me, weekends are spent with family, not browsing through Twitter. But by ignoring this platform for two days, I see a drop in my follower progression and interaction, plus a drop in traffic to my blog. Yes, this could also be down to the fact that I don't publish content at a weekend. But if I promoted the week's content, at least it would be directing people to my blog and therefore encouraging views and interaction.

Why Not Try This?

Schedule all your tweets for the weekend if you can using Buffer. Don't worry, there'll be more on this later.

#3 Re-write Your Bio

Does your Twitter bio really say what you're about? Does it encapsulate your brand message? If the answer to this is yes, then feel free to skip this point. If not, it might be time to revisit your Twitter bio.

Your bio is like your blog's 'About page' - only in much fewer characters. Twitter is saturated. There are so many people out there like you and me. It's so important to make your bio stand out.

Buffer has some great tips for creating a great Twitter bio:

Tell people what you do
Use words that make it sound impressive
Use those same words to attract people like you
Write an accomplishment
Use @'s or hashtags

Here's an example. This was my Twitter bio before:

This is what it looks now that I've implemented these rules:

It's better, right?

Why Not Try This?

Have a go at rewriting your Twitter bio following the pointers above. Come up with three to five different ones and pick your favourite.

#4 Use Hashtags

Ah hashtags. They're quite a controversial subject. Some people love them, some people hate them. I for one am quite a fan, but I was unsure how to go about using them.

Instead of using pointless hashtags at the end of a tweet, I've found it more beneficial to include them in the body of your tweet. Say, for example, you're a digital marketing agency. You're tweeting about the latest post on your company blog. Your tweet could look something like this:

"Today's post on SEO is creating some great conversations. Read more on the blog."

Or, it could look like this:

"Today's post on #seo is creating some great conversations. Read more #ontheblog"

And you've still got room for your shortened link and an image.

Usining relevant hashtags is helping you target the people you want to target and has the potential to double the engagement of your tweets. You can't get much better than that.

Why Not Try This?

Try and turn two words in your tweets to hashtags when you're promoting a blog post. Keep an eye on any new followers you reach out to.

#5 Engage

This is the most effective way to use Twitter. More than self-promotion and more than promoting others content. The strongest Twitter profiles are ones that do both of these things, but more this anything, they have strong engagement.

What's important to remember here is that sure, you can reach out to everyone. But that's not the best way to do it. If you can interact with your audience, similar people to you and influencers in your field, you have much more chance of upping your Twitter game. Simply because you'll be able to talk about a niche topic with them, and this will help the conversation flow. I gain a lot of my Twitter followers by sharing useful content, some of which is my own, a lot of which isn't; and interacting with people. I see brands that are missing out on this on a daily basis. They're missing out on the opportunity to create a strong, loyal audience. The three things we've just discussed are the recipe for a perfect Twitter profile.

Why Not Try This?

Try to set yourself a goal to interact with three new people everyday on Twitter. These could be people you've just come across, or a blogger you've always wanted to chat to. Whoever they are, make the first move and reach out.

#6 Add A Call To Action

Did you notice what I did with the tweet I used as an example earlier? I could've simply left it as:

"Today's post on #seo is creating some great conversations."

But instead I put:

"Today's post on #seo is creating some great conversations. Read more #ontheblog"

'Read more on the blog'.

That my friends, is a call to action. We're using Twitter for a reason. So like our blogs, if we want our Twitter followers to do something, we need to ask them to do it. When you're directing them to a new post, say 'read more on the blog' or 'click the link to read more'. If you're asking a question and want feedback, say 'just reply and let me know'. This way you're not leaving something hanging. You're being specific about what you want them to do. Which means they're probably more likely to do it.

Why Not Try This?

Start adding a call to action to one post a day and see what happens. If it works, try switching them up a bit to increase engagement.

#7 Use Correct Grammar and Spelling

I'm going to be honest here. I used to follow a lot of blogs who had huge amounts of followers. Now I don't. Why?

Because their spelling and grammar was awful.

I mean truly awful. I can't deal with it. Good spelling and grammar comes as a given in the blogging industry. It means something. If I made a spelling mistake in a blog post that went live on my company blog, I'd be pulled up about it. Part of my job is looking for spelling mistakes and errors. You can have a career in proof reading for a reason.

It sounds obvious, but even just reading over your tweet before you publish it will help keep everything consistent. My mum pointed out a tweet of mine the other day that had a spelling mistake in it. I deleted it straight away because it didn't encapsulate what my brand was about. Like we all say, it's all about consistency.

Why Not Try This?

Give your tweets a quick proof read before you publish them. You never know what word you might spell wrong.

#8 Think About Retweets

Not only do we have to leave 23 characters for a Twitter image. We also need to leave around 20 to 40 for easy retweetability. So 140 characters actually goes down to between 70 to 100, including your message, mentions, links and any hashtags. Tricky, right? But tweeting in this way really pays off. You're limiting yourself to create something that's really attention grabbing. If there's no room for them to retweet, they won't retweet. If there is? Do it and see what happens.

Why Not Try This?

Try to aim to create tweets that are around 100 characters in length. That way you're saving room for your perfectly sized image any any users who want to retweet your great content.

#9 Schedule Your Tweets

Along with images, this is the most fail safe and effective way to improve your Twitter presence. This section deserves a dedicated blog post, but I'll try and summarise it as best I can.

Scheduling tweets means you've got an endless flow of content being distributed to your followers at peak times during the day. You can plan a mixture of promoting your own content and promoting other content. And when you come across something you can add to it as you wish. Scheduling the majority of your tweets means, for 9 -5 workers like myself, you can forget about it and let Buffer do its thing. If you're managing your business's social media, you can schedule tweets for the day which allows you to get on with other tasks.

Of course, I still try and do the odd one or two personal tweets each day. But just think about how much time this will save you each day.

Why Not Try This?

Use a tool to schedule your tweets for a couple of days. Make a note of the difference it makes.

#10 Keep An Eye On Your Stats

We can pay as much or as little attention to stats as we like. But they’re never unavoidable. Especially if you want to seriously up your twitter game. Buffer gives you a great list of stats which include retweets, favourites, mentions, clicks and potential for each tweet you schedule. I also get an email from twitter each week which reviews the week I had on the platform. This data is great in terms of experimenting with timing, your headlines and the type of content you’re sharing. As for followers, it can be useful to make a quick note of these each month. Then you see if the features you are putting into place are working.

Why Not Try This?

Keep an eye on your twitter stats whilst you’re making more of an effort with twitter. After a month, analyse them to see what worked and what didn’t work. That way you can amend your plan and try other methods from this list.

#11 Take Part In Twitter Chats

Chats are one of the greatest things about Twitter. This is something that more and more people are noticing. These days, I don’t really take part in chats like #fbloggers or #fblchat. I prefer the ones that lean more towards creators rather than bloggers, as I think that’s where serious bloggers are heading. There’s chats such as #cbloggers and even people who host their own chats such as #jennypurrchat and #ellechat. These are great because they’re aimed at creators. They’re not a link spamming community. They’re solely for interaction and inspiration. To grow your Twitter presence, taking part in one or two of these a week is one of the most beneficial things you can do.

Why Not Try This?

Find a twitter chat that’s coming up that interests you and take part in it. Answer the questions, interact and check out other people’s profiles. Follow as many people as you want. You’ll see the benefits for yourself.

Are you using any of these methods in your Twitter strategy? Fear not. They’re so easy to implement and are guaranteed to bring results. My hope is that this post will give you some great ideas to start working with on your Twitter and will help you think smarter about how you use it for your brand presence.

To finish off, here are five Twitter users that use this platform to the best of its ability

Do you use any of these tips in your Twitter strategy? Are there any other secrets you know?