10 Twitter Tips for Writers

You've created a Twitter account and are tweeting. Now what? Here are ten tips to help you build followers and maintain your account.

1. If you want to gain followers, you need to be social. Make sure that you like and retweet others' tweets. Share information that will help others. It can't be all about you.

2. Find people who are like you or have similar interests. Follow their followers. For example, if you write cozy mysteries about dogs, look for groups of dog lovers, mystery readers, and cozy readers. Also follow who they are following.

3. Always include at least one hashtag in your tweet. This tags your tweet and makes it easier for those with similar interests to find you.

4. You need to periodically review your list of followers. Some people follow you and then unfollow you just to get their numbers up. And some people never follow you back. I manage four Twitter accounts, so I finally broke down and invested in Tweepi's paid version. It helps me unfollow those who are not following me. It also has a variety of other cleanup tools for abandoned accounts.

5. I schedule tweets while I am busy during the day or during the overnight hours. I've picked up a lot of followers who are active in the wee hours. Right now, I use the free version of TweetDeck. There are a variety of tools that will allow you to schedule your tweets in advance. You should schedule at least one tweet a day with a link to your latest blog post.

6. If you are going to tweet links, you need to use a tool to shorten them (or the URL will take up all your tweet). I use Bitly. It's free, and it lets me track clicks. This feature allows me see quickly what catches peoples' interest.

7. Use your analytics to spot trends. Twitter lets you see your top tweets and when they are most active. This gives you an idea of when your audience responds. Schedule an extra tweet or two during those timeframes.

8. Mix up your tweet content. People pay more attention to pictures and videos than they do text and links.

9. Make sure that you have a photo on your account. If you're an author, it should be your recent headshot. You want folks to be able to recognize that it's you.

10. Look at your biography or description. Make sure it's interesting and grabs peoples' attention. Include a link to your website and your information about your latest work. Your banner graphic should be similar to your blog, webpage, and other social media sites.