~ Twitter start up tips

So you want to get started on twitter!

Preparation

First decide if you want to use twitter for personal use, professional use or both.

If you want to use it for both purposes are you happy to combine in one username or would you rather keep your personal tweets and professional tweets separate. There is no limit to the number of usernames you can have as long as you have a different email address for each one

Consider which email address is best to use. That probably depends on your answer to the previous question

Think up a username for yourself. Try thinking a bit differently by adding numbers or symbols. The chances are ‘janesmith’ or ‘physiojane’ will already be taken

That’s your prep work done so now for the set up

Set-up

If you have a smartphone or tablet you may already have the twitter app on your device. If so just click on the app to start the process.

If you don’t have the app pre-loaded you will need to download it from your app store. If using pc or laptop go to https://twitter.com/

Click on the sign up button then fill in the form with your name, email address, username and a password

If your username is already taken then you will get a red message that tells you this and you need to choose an alternative. Once you choose a unique name you will see a green tick

Once all the fields are ticked green you can click the ‘create account’ button

Congratulations - That’s the minimum you need to do and you are signed up to twitter J

Using wittert

Now you can add as few or as many details about yourself as you want to. It’s a good idea to add a profile picture as the default is an egg and no-one wants to talk to an egg! If you don’t want a head shot then pick an object or something instead.

Any additions to your profile can be made by clicking on ‘me’ in the left hand column then the symbol that looks like a cogwheel is for settings

Next you need to start following people so that you see their tweets

Following people:

In the top right corner of the screen there is a magnifying glass symbol, click this to start a search.

If you know someone’s twitter username then type it in – for example @acppld. The options will then come up in the drop down menu, click the person you want, then click the +follow box. That’s you following them. You can do any number of searches using the above method.

If you don’t know the exact usernames you can search for a persons name or a keyword e.g. physio which will give you a list of options that all relate to physio

Once you are following a few people you can look at their home pages and see who they are following. Chances are you will have things in common so you may also wish to follow the same people and you can do that just by clicking +follow on any person on their list

Unfollowing

If you decide you don’t want to follow someone any more, all you need to do is go to me then click on your following list, then click on following till it gives you the unfollow option – Easy J. Using this method you can experiment with who to follow & easily unfollow if their tweets are not interesting you.

Note – the other person will get a notification when you start to follow them but they won’t know if you later unfollow them.

On lots of occasions once you follow someone then they follow you back hence you build up your network.

Once you are following people and have your own followers you just need to sit back and read the tweets or write your own tweets

 

Tweeting      

To write a tweet, click the symbol in the top right corner with a feather

inside a square. Tweets must to be no more than 140 characters. If you want to alert your tweet to someone specific you can add their name in your tweet e.g. Looking forward to todays lectures at learning event @acppld @thecsp  

There are loads more ways you can use twitter but first you just need to get used to reading it regularly, tweeting when you have something to say and finding new and interesting people or organisations to follow.

Hashtags

Hashtags are labels which are used to group tweets with a specific theme or content. The hashtag can be used to highlight keywords or topics, and you can use it anywhere in your tweet. Twitter then uses the hashtag to link together all the tweets with the same hashtag. If someone clicks on the hashtag or searches for it, they will be able to see all tweets about that topic that have included the hashtag. The most popular hashtags become trending topics – you may have heard the statement “xxxx is currently trending on twitter”

For example in 2012 #London2012 received 6.5 million mentions while #TeamGB picked up 2.8 million in a 2 week period. Hashtags are by no means essential to tweeting but it helps you to find topics you are interested in and it helps you to identify like minded tweeters.

Closer to home, we have registered #LDPhysio to try and generate a bit of a trend. This is also the way that the Physio talk social media chats work. Everyone involved in the chat uses #physiotalk during the hour long conversation and it means people from all over the world can participate in one conversation. If you want to know more about PhysioTalk see newsletter article in May 2015 issue.

If you wish any specific help or guidance please don’t hesitate to contact me

HappyTweeting J

Amanda Leech

ACPPLD Website and Social Media officer