I believe a far better way to measure your effectiveness on twitter is around the idea of influence and interaction. How many people retweet or ‘@reply’ you? How many folks are talking about you or with you? Those are the real questions you should be asking. Your goal on twitter should be an authentic community, not a huge fake following.

*Twitalyzer is a great app for analyzing your twitter influence.

Photo Credit: woofer_kyyiv

Don’t do this. Not only is it annoying to others and hurtful to your brand, it simply doesn’t work. Social Media is an “opt in” marketing medium, in other words, no one has any incentive to listen to you. If you start blaring your message over and over anyone who was remotely interested will leave. It’s kind of like going to a party and talking about yourself the whole time. Your accomplishments, your good looks, your reason for being, your life story, your agenda. You, you, you blah, blah, blah. Eventually everyone gives up attempting conversation with you. Sure you may have a few hundred followers but the only reason their pretending to listen to you is in hopes that you’ll listen to them. They don’t care about you or what you’re offering any more than you care about them.

Stop screaming.

Chat with people. There’s a reason this is called ’social’ media. It’s like a big party: everyone talking, laughing, sharing ideas, throwing out suggestions, and yes even listening. The key is to strike the right balance between sharing about yourself and being interested in others.

Photo Credit: Felipe Bachomo

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Photo Credit: archiemcphee

1. REVISE

If there is one thing I would recommend doing above all else, it would be revision. Sure, Twitter is a great way to vent about your day at work or laugh at the people who don’t know how to act, but in light of keeping your self, aka your brand, in mint condition, you might want to think twice and revise. Imagine how embarrassing it would feel to meet a new friend (or a client for that matter) and they bring up something you twittered that makes you cringe inside. Not too good right?

2. RESPOND

This boils down to having simple manners. You wouldn’t just ignore someone who stops you on the street to say hello, would you? Geez, I hope not. Well it’s the same notion here when someone takes their time to stop and engage you online. This is especially crucial to those who are brand new to Twitter, who may already have some prior anxiety. Something so easy will gain you the respect you deserve. Which leads me to the final R.

3. RESPECT

How’s that old saying go? “You don’t get respect, you earn it?” Well the same applies on Twitter. It takes time and finesse to pull in your audience and make them aware that what you have to say is worth their time. A good rule of thumb to achieving this is avoiding spanning your messages across multiple tweets and avoiding self-serving (spam) messages. If you ever find a sudden drop in your audience that may be a good sign that you’ve frustrated your listeners somewhere along the line. But no worries, simply subscribe to our feed and you too can tweet with confidence knowing that we’ll be here to rely on.

Now get out there and tweet it like you mean it.

Guest Author: Kyle Steed is a web developer/designer living in Irving, Texas who is in the process of developing one of the Nectar tastes that will launch on November 3rd.

1. Self-promotion and image crafting

If you were to Google ”Brett Tilford” a year ago, the only thing you would have turned up was a two-sentence bio on my old employer’s website and some archived race times from my high school competitive swimming days.  Pretty pathetic.  A recent survey found that over 75% of employers were Googling the names of perspective employees and that 35% of those surveyed have eliminated a prospect because of what they found.  After a year of  blogging, along with a healthy dose of involvement in other social networking sites, a search for my name yields plenty positive of results.  Notice my use of the word positive in the previous sentence.  One factor to be very aware of as you launch into the blogging and social networking world is that this can be a double edged sword.  In other words, don’t act like an idiot online.  The idea is to promote and shape your online image.  Be authentic but always put your best foot forward on your blog.

2. Relationship building

The ability to leave comments and interact on a blog really opens up the opportunities for connection with a wide range of people.  Initially, the only people likely to frequent your page are family, friends, and colleagues, but over time you’ll notice names popping up in various comments that you don’t recognize.  People from different states and even countries may interact with your content and have their lives enriched by it.  Send them an email thanking them for their thoughtful comments and in no time you’ll have connections that span the globe.

3. Stand out from the crowd

You’ve probably heard the term information overload and the havoc it’s wreaking in our lives.  It’s as if we’re drowning in a sea of information with no land in sight.  Our problem isn’t too little information, it’s too much information.  When you write, you’re developing a necessary and powerful skill in our current world: the process of taking in information, synthesizing it, and then infusing it with meaning.  If you can learn to effectively collect, synthesize, and infuse information you begin to set yourself apart from the competition and strengthen your personal brand.