Web Traffic Tips: Twitter
Feb 15
Please stop groaning. Twitter really can be your friend, and it can be a great way to drive traffic! I love twitter. I love that it drives very qualified visitors to my website. I love that it gives me a break through the day and let’s me get into conversation with adults. I love that it is so easy, and it’s really fun.
- Image via CrunchBase
So how can you make Twitter work for you?
Before we get started, Twitter is not going to be the best traffic strategy for micro niche sites ~ it also probably won’t be perfect if you’re doing a ton of different product lenses (although there are ways you could do this too).
Twitter works best when you have a niche, or topic that you will be working on long term.
How does twitter work?
Twitter is not about just blasting your message out there. Twitter is about building relationships. It’s about helping people, answering questions, creating mutual benefit.
If you don’t have an account yet here’s a great post that will show you how to set up a twitter account. Once you get your twitter account set up here’s a few tips that will help you get traffic to your site using it.
1. Create your profile ~ pitch free. Your purpose is to create a relationship, not be a smarmy salesperson. 
2. Add your link to your site in your profile. One link is more than enough. When people want to get to know you better they’ll click through.
3. Upload a real picture ~ people will trust that you are a human being and not a smarmy salesperson or robot if you have a real picture of yourself. It’s also much easier to form relationships with people when you can see their face.
4. Send non promotional messages to start. Before you send out even one message promoting your website send out 10 to 15 tweets about your topic, answering questions, getting involved in the conversation.
5. Add people to your account who are interested in the same things as you! You can use the search function, put in your keywords and then follow people that come back for that search. You can also find someone in your niche who has a lot of followers and then follow those people. When I do this I look for a couple things before I follow someone ~ a real image, not just the default, a recent tweet ~ no sense adding people if they aren’t using twitter, you can see their last tweet ~ if it’s a marketing message of any sort I don’t follow them. I know terrible but true.
Another easy way to find people interested in the same topics as yourself is Twellow. Sign up for an account ~ easy as filling in your twitter account details and confirming an email. Then you can browse through the categories of people by interest. You can add people directly from the list. Gives you a bio and a follower number. Quick and Easy way to add people for your 10 minutes a day. (Don’t forget to add yourself to 10 categories that are related to you/your site so people can find you as well!
Here are some great tips you can read if you want to learn more about getting started at Twitter.
6. Look for people you find interesting and then reply to their tweets. This is a great way to get someone’s attention and begin a conversation and a relationship. To reply to someone you simply use @theirusername . When you reply by using the @ it will send the tweet to the reply area of that person’s account. I know for one I closely monitor my replies so I can get back to people quickly.
7. Make sure you’re sending out tweets that others will find interesting and helpful. @JeffHerring teaches tweeting about LIFE. Life of course being an acronym ~ Links Information Fun and Events. You can read more about his philosophy of tweeting life here.
8. Be consistent. I didn’t say spend your whole day tweeting, but the more consistently people see you on twitter, the more consistently you engage with your twitter friends the more you will get out of it ~ and yes, that means traffic. Once you create solid relationships people will be more likely to retweet your tweets as well as tell other people about you, or recommend you as a source for good information on your topic.
Twitter can be a time suck!
But it doesn’t have to be. Here’s a few tips and tricks to make the most out of twitter without blowing your whole day on it.
1. Get a desktop application. I used seesmic for a long time, but recently switched to tweetdeck. I did this because tweetdeck allows you to pull your twitter lists in, and Seesmic didn’t. That’s the only reason. If you don’t have or know anything about lists then either one will work. Using a desktop application you can put all your accounts in one place and follow everything from one central location. It saves a lot of time and energy.
2. Set up a little schedule or routine for yourself. Now what works for me, may not work for you ~ so here are a couple options to try on.
- 3 times a day for 10 to 15 minutes. You could tweet in the morning, noon and evening for a few minutes.
- Twitter breaks (10 minutes ~ set a timer if you have to). This is what I do. Since my mean boss won’t give me coffee breaks I use twitter for a quick break between tasks. It’s important to watch the time because you can get sucked in and end up spending hours on twitter.
That’s no good.
- Any variation of these that works for you ~ just do it daily.
3. Use a little bit of automation. I use socialoomph.com to set up some tweets each morning. This site allows you to schedule tweets so they will come out whenever you want them to. I usually put out tweets about the topic of my blog post that day ~ ask questions, give tips that are related to the topic, and then link back to the post. I also go through my RSS reader and look for interesting posts my followers might like, and post those (making sure to use the @ feature in the tweet to grab the attention of the person who wrote it ~ and they may retweet it getting my name out there too).
Just be careful with this:
This can not be your only form of communication. This fills in the gaps while you’re working, but you need actual interaction through the day.
Don’t send out promotional tweets, the same tweet, all your own stuff all the time.
4. Set aside 10 minutes a day to follow new and interesting people.
I have yet to find a software program that I’ve felt was worth the money to add followers to my account, and I’ve tried a few. It is about the relationship and I like to glance at people before I follow them. It’s not the fastest way to get more followers, but if you do it consistently your account will grow.
The key to getting more people to follow you is to provide useful information and helpful, fun, friendly tweets. To get your account started though, following people who you would like to follow you is a great way to get started. Usually when you follow someone they will take a look at you, your account **and your website** and if they like what you show them they will follow you back. That’s what you’re looking to do.
There are some people who have programs going that just autofollow people when they follow them, so you will get people following you if you just follow people. Stick with people you would really like to get to know, and follow them.
How do I really get traffic from twitter?
It’s really quite simple.
1. Participate.
2. Provide useful, helpful information (yes that can come from your site, with a link to your information)
3. Find interesting people and follow them.
4. Interact with them. (Oh yeah that’s kind of like #1.)
5. Get to know people, and as people get to know you they will click through to your site. If your content is good they will stick around.
I recently started a new site ~ and before it was even indexed in I was already getting between 25 and 50 pageviews a day from (a brand new) twitter account and blog commenting. It works if you do it consistently and think about your “followers” a little more than you think of yourself and what’s in it for you.
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Hey, twitter is a great place to build traffic. Alright, I wont go telling people to use automation but I have to agree that you should use some interesting RSS feeds to help you out in Twitter. When there was the Twitter boom, I used it almost every 5 minutes but realize that it was sucking up too much of my time. Those time are better off doing something else, so like Jackie said, about 3 times a day should be well worth it. Will definitely follow this plan and see how it goes over time!
-jamie
Great timing of a post Jackie!
I started a twitter account a while ago but never did anything with it. I started my blog back in December of 2009 and just created a new Twitter account about 2 weeks ago. I have made zero effort to get any followers but I seem to get a follower once a day. I have 18 now with literally zero work.
Spending 10 minutes a day twittering will not at all be a problem… it will only help my business and add more fun!
Excellent ezine article about LIFE. I will definitely be tweeting according to this guys plan.
Thanks again!
-Todd
Follow me @acnefreelife on Twitter!
Hi Jackie good day to you,
Nice sharing on twitter and as you said to set aside 10 to 15mins… is the habit to be hard on our time that will help to do other things after 10mins.
Anyway, my first thing i did in online was blogger and then twitter. Twitter is fun place to learn and explore also meet new friends with special ideas and niches.
Thank you once for a great post Jackie
Follow me @jamessamy on Twitter!
Hi Jackie. Great post as usual. I too am one of those people that have a twitter account but don’t use it. I am going to increase my twitter presence by finding some interesting people to follow.
However I am also writing to thank you for hipping me to Bookswim. (In the sidebar) I am a voracious reader but hate going to the library. This is a Godsend. Thanks.
YES!! I am loving Bookswim. We’ve had a little issue with turnaround time, but they just moved their warehouse to a new place to improve that ~ it happened to be the weekend of that huge snowstorm in the NE ~ but I think it will be right on track now.
Follow me @momtohanna on Twitter!
Thanks for the wonderful tips.I will start a twitter account.It will help me.
I can totally see how this will work, provided like anything else, you put the effort in. I am also one of those people who has a Twitter account that has never been used but you have made me realize the power of Twitter in the right application., thanks.
Timely! It’s time for me to get back on the horse. My very next post is asking my community to choose my user-name…with incentives of course.
Some awesome tips here, really. Mostly common-sense, but oh how that’s so needed. Thanks for the link to Jeff also…if he’s as good with twitter as he is with article marketing, this should be a treat!
Follow me @DennisEdell on Twitter!
Jackie, thanks for the in depth post. I must say it seems like a hell of a lot of work and I’m not sure its right for me as a one man band. I know some people love Twitter so it’s a social thing as well, so for those guys its not so bad.
If you are a total specialist in one niche I can see how it works but I cut across 20 niches at the moment so I don’t think its for me. I’ve book marked the page just in case I change my mind!
Yeah it would definitely be harder if you are in a lot of niches. I’m not sure it would be worth the time or effort either in that situation.
Follow me @momtohanna on Twitter!
Hi Fran ~ I meant to put that in the post yesterday sorry. (We’re having some family sadness and my mind is not working exactly right these days). Anyway ~
It’s a great way to help others easily spread the word. You can also put it at the bottom or other side of your articles. Just FYI.
that is the tweetmeme plugin. You upload it just like anyother plugin. Just make sure when you do the settings you set the @_____ to your twitter username. The default is @tweetmeme.
Follow me @momtohanna on Twitter!
Great advice as usual coming from you Jackie! I’m rather inconsistent
with Twitter and I’ll read the LIFE article (thanks)…
I wonder how you got the Tweet widget you have at the top of your posts?
Fran
Follow me @francivile on Twitter!
Yeah I am tossing up the idea of doing more kids type stuff and your idea for Twitter there is fantastic by the way. The only issue I have is much of the kids stuff the people buy online is relatively inexpensive so you need a ton of volume to make any kind of money.
I am thinking of seeing how the potty seat one comes along and I am going to target a different e-book type product next, bigger commissions and I think I have found a few keywords that seem pretty easy to rank with. Keywords are still my achilles heel but I keep plugging away.
Nice on the sales!! Do you plan to do other “kid” related topics for your sites? If you do you could start up your twitter account and target followers who are dads? moms? toddler parents ~ twellow.com has an entire category of toddler/preschool people.
Just a thought.
Follow me @momtohanna on Twitter!
Great post Jackie. I can totally see how this will work, provided like anything else, you put the effort in. I am also one of those people who has a Twitter account that has never been used but you have made me realize the power of Twitter in the right application.
I can totally see how it would not work for a micro niche site and since that is what my potty seat site has turned out to be I will save the Twitter details for the future.
On the bright side my potty seat site had 3 sales this weekend and all I have done so far is write 9 articles (one for each post) to EZA and then taken the first 6 of those 9 articles out to 5 other directories. Traffic has been minimal and sporatic but 3 sales on only 85 visits to my site is good conversion
Hi Jackie!
I have a Twitter account that I haven’t used in ages because I couldn’t see the purpose of Twitter, but now that you have explained it “in detail”, I might have to rethink my stand on Twitter!
Thanks!
Cindy
PS Are you going to share your new site with us??
Follow me @casurette on Twitter!
Great post on Twitter, Jackie! I love Twitter – it’s been an awesome way for me to connect with people. I am able to pull in my twitter lists in Seesmic, though. I’ve been thinking of switching since their latest update, though – because, of the way it opens everything (sent, dm, @, etc) in a new column! I can’t stand that – especially when I’m monitoring multiple accounts.
I also wanted to tell you about http://mrtweet.com/home – it’s a great way to find new people to follow. It is not automatic, it finds people it thinks you might mesh with and periodically sends you a list of them to check out. So you are looking at the people, their sites, etc. prior to following them. And following them is all up to you.
I love that thing about LIFE from Jeff – I hadn’t heard him say that before, thanks for sharing it!!
Follow me @lisamariemary on Twitter!
Thanks for the MR. tweet reminder. I have used that before and had forgotten about it! I’ll set that up for this new account I’ve got going!
How did you manage to get your lists to show up in seesmic? I couldn’t figure it out which is why I switched to tweetdeck. I actually wanted to follow the list from Lynn’s Elite forum and couldnt’ make it happen with Seesmic
Follow me @momtohanna on Twitter!
Thanks very much for the great advice. I have a twitter account that I hardly use – will step it up!
Follow me @relaxmusic on Twitter!
Great Twitter 101.
The way I approach twitter is tweet value, receive value. Tweet content and the sales or opportunities will follow.
Thanks for sharing.
Follow me @ryanbiddulph on Twitter!
I like that philosophy Ryan! Great way to put it.
Follow me @momtohanna on Twitter!
Thanks for the link to the LIFE article. It might be the best Twitter advice I’ve read!
Follow me @thatfigureswf on Twitter!