You’ve listened to the hype. You’ve read case study after case study. You’ve seen that little bird logo everywhere. And your brand could certainly use a little push. So, excitedly, you sign up for a Twitter profile for your business. And wait.

And wait. And wait. And nothing happens.

Does this sound familiar?

Read more

Thinking about jumping into Twitter? Or have you been a Tweep for some time now but yielding disappointing results?

In her recent ebook, Twitter 101: Everything you need to know about Twitter marketing, Lauren Dugan, co-founder and writer for AllTwitter.com and social media consultant, walks through a step-by-step process on how to harness the social media power of Twitter. Whether you’re new to the social web or a long-time Twitter user, Dugan’s smart advice is a must-read if you’re looking to maximize the benefits of the second-most-popular social information network.

Read more

Does Twitter have a legitimate place in the classroom?

Some 56 percent of Twitter-using college faculties allow the use of Twitter in class, and while it remains a contentious issue, studies have shown that, used correctly, the use of Twitter can boost student grades, as well as empowering those who are otherwise less likely to engage with their teachers.

Read more

It’s early Monday morning. You’re tired after a weekend that was long on thrills but short on recovery. You log on to Twitter, but you just don’t have the energy. What to do, what to do?

Fear not: here are ten things you can do on Twitter today – or any day – that will massively improve your experience on the network.

1. Help your friends understand how to use Twitter. Email them the link to my Twitter 101 tutorials, or if they’re already on Twitter, hook them up with tips to help newcomers hit the ground running.
2. Learn how to defend yourself from spammers, trolls and automated direct messages.
3. Understand why everybody needs a follow policy – eliminate those phony followers.
4. Want to get more retweets? Memorise your retweet number (and sharpen your pencil)!
5. Take a minute to fill in the description box on your Twitter lists – it really does make the feature significantly richer and lists with descriptions are going to attract more followers. (And yes – I mean all of your lists!)
6. Fight Club celebrated its 10^th anniversary earlier this week – find out what Tyler Durden can teach you about Twitter
7. Start a conversation with a total stranger – that’s what puts the social in ‘social media’.
8. Play around with the new retweet mechanism – while it’s not currently as good as the organic and original RT@ function, it’s here to stay, and will come with improvements in the future (including edits).
9. Take a Twitter poll! For example, how do you rate Twitter’s technical support? Would you pay $1 a month to access Twitter? How many celebrities to do you follow? What reasons do you need to block somebody? What kind of avatar do you like to see?
10. Having problems? Learn how you can submit a help ticket to Twitter.

BONUS: please, please, please – don’t be a metweeter.

What are you waiting for? Get stuck in!

On Twitter I am often asked by followers for information that can be passed on to new folk they have introduced to the network. Twitter can be intimidating the first time you sign up and unless you’re fairly proactive the benefits of the platform can easily be lost.

I’ve written many tutorials, guides and ‘how to’ articles on this blog, and felt it made sense to pool these entries into one convenient resource: Twitter 101.

Twitter 101 breaks down all the help articles within Twittercism into clearly-labelled sub-sections.You can access my guides on Getting Started, Twitter Etiquette, Finding Followers and  Statistics & Data, as well as tutorials on #followfriday and TweetDeck, tips on designing your profile background and instruction on how to fight off spammers and trolls.

You can find the link to this section at the top of the screen. The page will be updated continuously as new material is published.

If you have introduced friends to Twitter and they’re not ‘getting it’, please forward them towards my Twitter 101 page. The full URL is:

• http://twittercism.com/twitter-101/

Thank you!