Twitter Mini MasterclassSue Beckingham @suebecks

#tweetupSHU

Common abbreviations

@ = precedes any usernameRT = RetweetMT = modified tweetDM = direct messageHT = hat tipIMO = in my honest opinion| = useful separator

Getting the lingo

Mention = your name is included in a tweet Favourites = save a tweet as a favouriteLists

Creating a clear bio

Who you are/represent and a link to your blog/website

What is a #hashtag?

A hashtag, or “#”, denotes a keyword or topic on Twitter. It’s any string of characters without spaces.

Hashtags can occur anywhere in the Tweet – at the beginning, middle, or end.

By searching for a hashtag you can collate all the tweets containing it.

Hashtagged words that become very popular are often Trending Topics.

Trending #hashtags

Change to view by Trends by Town

View Trends by Country

Hashtags

Local• #highered• #ff• #sheffield• #university

Specific Areas• #careers• #b2b• #graduates

#Hashtag Best Practice

Choosing a phrase and making good use of capital letters

On the death of Margaret Thatcher #nowthatchersdead was used but read by many

as #NowThatChersDead

#Hashtag Best Practice

Checking availability

#smh = shakes my head

#Hashtag Best Practice

Don't over use them - a maximum of two per tweet

Don't include spaces or punctuation as it will break the link

Don't make them too long - you only have 140 characters for your message!

Searching

#Discover

Gathers the tweets that are breaking on Twitter amongst the people you follow and those they

follow.

Advanced Searching

Driving traffic back to SHU

Be found in search

It is important to stay active - tweet, retweet and @reply/mention regularly to gain resonance amongst your followers so that search results are up to date.

Include @sheffhallamuni and Sheffield Hallam in tweets

Dan Zarrella 2012

Call to action

Listening and responding

Set up alerts to your phone for mentions and DMshttps://twitter.com/devices

DashboardsHootsuitehttp://hootsuite.com/and Tweetdeckhttp://tweetdeck.com/

SEO = search engine optimisation

http://searchengineland.com/seotable

SEO = search engine optimisation

Content

#Quality: well written#Research: the keywords people may use#Engage: make it interesting

SEO seems like alchemy to the uninitiated. But there's a science to it! Search engines reward pages with the right combination of ranking factors.

URL shorteners

URL shorteners

https://bitly.com/

1.

2.

3.

http://goo.gl/

http://tinyurl.com/

http://ow.ly

URL shorteners

Google Alertshttp://www.google.co.uk/alerts

Shared Sites: Admin Rights

Agree within your team who has access to the user name and password

Agree where you will store this informationUse a team email address rather than a

personal one - individuals move on!