Twitter For Beginners: 11 Tips To Help You Get Started

Alert! This blog post is not for Twitter gurus (but we welcome your tips in the comments). This is truly Twitter for beginners — people who aren’t sure how Twitter works. If that’s you, here are 11 easy steps to get started.

1. Create an Account at Twitter.com

Twitter is totally free. All you need to sign up is an email address. Go create an account!

2. Choose a Relevant Twitter Handle

When you sign up, you’ll get to choose a username (a.k.a. “Twitter handle”). Ours is @madmimi. We’re also quite fond of @GoDaddy.

Twitter handles can be up to 15 characters long. If your top choices are taken, you might need to be creative. But keep in mind that your handle makes LOTS of first impressions on your behalf, so be sure to keep it professional.

Consider using:

• Your name


• Your business’ name


• Something that describes exactly what you do

2. Use a High-Quality Image for Your Profile Picture

Unless you’re tweeting as a brand (in which case you can use your logo), use a photograph of lovely you. Make sure the image says, “Follow me. I’m fun/smart/energetic/professional/_____.” Whatever you hope to convey.

3. Write a Standout Bio

You have 160 characters to explain who you are and what you do. Check out our recent post, “Write a Standout Twitter Bio.” Here’s an excerpt: “Be sure that the description of yourself is relevant to the tweets you are putting out there — and vice versa. If you’re touting yourself as a ‘business finance expert’ but posting nothing but cute kitten photos, you’re going to lose credibility and followers.”

4. Learn How Hashtags Work

Hashtags are keywords that are frequently used on social media (e.g., #email, #marketing). You can do several things with them:

• Use them in your own tweets to help people discover you.


• Search for tweets based on a hashtag you’re interested in.


• Watch the hashtags on the bottom left of your Twitter feed to see what’s currently trending.

5. Follow Some Interesting People

Sure, you want to use Twitter to get the word out about your work or or your brand, but the real benefit of Twitter? Learning!

“Following” someone basically means you’re subscribing to their tweets, which will be included on your Twitter timeline. In choosing whom you follow, you’re curating the stream of tweets that you’ll see when you log in. You might want to:

• Follow people who are talking about your line of work.


• Follow journalists who cover topics you adore.


• Follow brands and celebrities you admire.


• Following interesting people who show up in your newsfeed via retweets.

Use the search bar at the top of Twitter to search by names, brands, and hashtags. Then click on an interesting person’s name to read more and potentially follow her.

Twitter will also suggest people for you to follow. See “Who to follow” just below your profile image. Or, click “# Discover” just above your profile image. Then you’ll see additional options, including finding your own friends and viewing popular accounts.

6. Plan to Share Valuable Information

One of the biggest mistakes you can make as a newbie on Twitter is to tweet too many mundane details about your daily life. Sure, it’s okay to tweet about the most amazing sandwich you had for lunch — once in a while.

If you want to attract and retain followers, you’ll need to share more valuable information than that. So think about whom you’re trying to attract and what they’d find useful/interesting/entertaining/surprising. You can share your own content, or you can include links to articles you find online.

7. Post Your First Tweet

Drafting your first tweet is a piece of cake! On your Twitter homepage, click on the “Compose new tweet…” box below your profile photo. Type whatever you’d like to say within Twitter’s limit of 140 characters. Then click, “Tweet.”

8. Engage, Engage, Engage

We asked our own Twitter followers for some advice for newbies. Artist Jennifer Johansson (@jennifermullin) tweets, “Engage with those you follow. Reply to tweets.”

Not only can you reply to tweets to initiate a conversation, but you can also “retweet” the tweet and add your own editorial text. Or you can “favorite” the tweet (the person will receive a notification that you did so).

All of these options (Reply, Retweet, and Favorite) are available just below each tweet in your Twitter stream.

9. Share Images

People love images on Twitter — when they’re relevant, of course. For example, it might be fun to share an inside look at your organization. Or a sneak peek of your latest piece of art.

It’s easy to add images to your tweets. Click on the camera icon in the compose box. Then you’ll be able to upload an image from your computer.

10. Take it Mobile

If you want to be able to tweet when you’re out and about, be sure to grab a Twitter app for your phone …

There are a few options available:

• Twitter has its own apps for iPhone, iPad, and Android.


• There’s also a mobile version of Twitter.

11. Show Up Tomorrow

Be consistent! When people look at your profile, they may not follow you if your last tweet was six months ago. If you’re going to bother with Twitter, make it part of your daily (or at least weekly) routine.

Twitter For Beginners: 11 Tips To Help You Get Started