Twitter: beyond the basics (in plain english)

There's a lot being written about twitter these days, but I still think that the language used can be complex and potentially off-putting to new users. Writers also dwell a lot on the advanatages of using twitter, but not enough on HOW to use it.

In my last twitter post I described how to get started on twitter. For those of you who've now dabbled a little, here are a few pointers on how to use it more effectively, and efficiently.



Direct Messaging (DM)

This allows you to send a private message to one of your connections. It's similar to an email except it's done through twitter by typing D before their username (e.g. D kwroisin How are you today?). If the recipient is using one of the packages below, they'll see the DM on their screen. Otherwise they'll get an email telling them to log into twitter to view their new DM.

NB: Don't confuse this with putting an '@' before their username: this addresses your tweet directly to that person (e.g. @kwroisin how are you today?) but everyone else can see this message. Unlike this, DMs are private.


Using Hootsuite (or similar) for twitter

The http://www.twitter.com/ website is not the easiest way to use Twitter. It shows the last tweets by your followees in order of most recent first, and not a lot else.

What you might want to do is sign up to one of the twitter 'clients' which allow you to view several information streams at once. Hootsuite is very popular, as is Tweetdeck. I chose Hootsuite because you just need to register an account: Tweetdeck requires a software download to your computer.

I now have three tabs open on Hootsuite. The first tab (or my home page) has three columns displaying: New Tweets, my Direct Messages, and Mentions (of me or of my tweets).

One thing that puzzled me before using Hootsutie is if someone addresses me directly (e.g. @kwroisin, see above), I won't see it if I'm not using twitter at the time. However, Hootsuite stores these messages in its Mentions column, so I can see them any time, whenever I log in.

If you use MS Outlook all the time for your email, then you can download this software which allows you to use and manage twitter in a similar way to how you use and manage your Outlook emails. If you use gmail then you can use Twitter Gadget to interface with twitter. And of course you can use your phone and your iphone and more...


Using Hootsuite (or similar) to view all your social networks

The second tab open in Hootsuite shows my Facebook page, with all my Friend's updates. The third tab shows my LinkedIn page, and all the activity there.

This means that (1) I'm more up to date with what's going on in my networks and (2) I spend a lot less time logging in to various networks, entering my username and password forty times a day. What a relief.


Using Hootsuite (or similar) to schedule your tweets

If you're going to be out of the office or busy at work and you don't want to be very silent on twitter then there is a solution. Hootsuite (and other twitter clients) will allow you to schedule your pre-written tweets for whatever time you'd like to post them. So, for example, I'm at an all-day meeting on Thursday. On Wednesday, I compose four tweets and instruct Hootsuite to post them at two hourly intervals the next day. It now appears to others that I'm always at my desk and consistently coming up with interesting things to tweet about.


Finally...

There are even more tricks to using twitter efficiently but the ones above are more or less essential. For more on twitter ettiquette and how to benefit most from twitter, watch this space.