Episode 126
The Twitter Show
February 2, 2018 · Mike Murphy
EP126: THE TWITTER SHOW Today is Part 2 of 3 Social Media Mini-Series. Episode Summary: What is Twitter? How does it work? Is Twitter still relevant for content creators and personal brands in 2018 and if so, why? Do you recommend sharing content from all other social media channels and is there any best practices to follow? Can you explain the etiquette of liking posts, retweeting and sharing tweets?
Episode Summary: Part 2 of a 3-part social media mini-series with livestreaming expert Ross Brand — this episode covers Twitter fundamentals, key stats, and practical tips for content creators.
What You’ll Learn
- Twitter fundamentals: tweets, mentions, hashtags, likes, and retweets explained
- Twitter usage stats and the platform’s biggest accounts as of 2018
- Practical tips for using Twitter for travel, customer service, and content promotion
- How to use Buffer to schedule and space out promotional tweets
Part 2 of the social media series with special guest Ross Brand from LivestreamUniverse.com — Episode 125 covered LinkedIn, this one covers Twitter, and Episode 127 wraps up with Facebook Live.
What Is Twitter?
Twitter is an online news and social networking service built around short posts called “tweets” — a micro-blog by design. The character limit expanded from 140 to 280 in November 2017. Text, photos, videos, GIFs, and live video are all supported, with live video being especially popular during breaking news events.
Tip: when traveling, Twitter is a genuinely effective way to reach airline customer service — rebooking, cancellations, standby lists.
Bonus tip: for service businesses, Twitter is a real customer-service channel in its own right — social media customer service was fully expected by 2018.
The Story of Twitter
Founded in 2006 by Jack Dorsey (also the founder of Square), Noah Glass, Biz Stone, and Ev Williams (also the founder of Medium).
Twitter Fundamentals
You can follow anyone; someone must follow you back before they can send you a direct message. Each post — 280 characters or fewer — is a Tweet. The @ symbol mentions someone directly; hashtags (#) mark topics. Liking (heart icon) and retweeting are the main ways to engage with and amplify someone else’s content. The Twitter bird logo is named Larry.
The Numbers (2018)
Roughly 350 million users, over 500 million tweets per day, 80% of users on mobile, 80% of accounts overseas, 56% of users earning over $56K/year, and a company valuation over $16 billion at the time. Over 100 million tweets contained animated GIFs. Top followed accounts: Katy Perry (108M+), Justin Bieber (100M+), and Barack Obama in third — with the sitting president at the time ranked #20 with 47 million followers.
Q&A With Ross Brand
Is Twitter still relevant for content creators and personal brands in 2018, and why?
“Yes, absolutely. You need to be on Twitter. Anybody who’s in business or is a content creator needs to be on Twitter. It’s like wearing a suit to a job interview — you just have to do it, it’s part of the unwritten rules. People will look for your Twitter handle as a way to identify you at a conference, at an event, in any kind of roster in your industry. If for no other reason, you need to do that because that’s one place where people will go and search for you when they want to connect with you.”
Do you recommend sharing content from all other social media channels? Any best practices?
“I would share everything on Twitter. I try and share everything that I create at least one time on Twitter. If there’s a guest or somebody’s work that I quoted, I’ll tag them in it. The thing about Twitter is you could share it up to three or four times a day — and could keep doing that for a couple of weeks — and then continue sharing it every week or every other week and back off a little bit. But you can share it far more times than you would ever share something on another platform. Twitter isn’t a great platform to repurpose content, though.”
What’s the etiquette around liking, retweeting, and sharing?
“If somebody tags me in a tweet and I feel like they’re promoting me, or I just like what they’ve done, I’m going to like it and retweet it — because by retweeting it, it gets it into the feeds of people who look at my profile, and my followers will see it. I’ll also often write a response back to that person and thank them for sharing. In general, the lowest form of engagement is just hitting like, if it’s something you like but don’t necessarily want to endorse. If it’s something you want to endorse or really show your appreciation for, give a retweet — or a retweet with a comment added. And it’s nice to give people a reply to thank them for sharing your stuff, or to keep the conversation going.”
Twitter Power Tips
After the interview wrapped, Ross shared a few extra tips off the cuff:
- Post more on launch day. On the day a new episode goes live, tweet about it 4-5 times, then taper off over the following 3-4 days. Change the message each time on day one specifically — keep it personal, not repetitive.
- Use Buffer to schedule. Buffer is the tool Ross uses to schedule and customize tweets so they go out on a set cadence without manual posting each time.
- Reply with a video message. The standout tip: when someone shares your content, record a quick, personal video reply and send it to them directly — like a handwritten thank-you note, but on Twitter. A small, genuine touch that goes a long way, the same way a surprise personal message from someone you admire would.