Connecting Twitter to TVs or projecting it on a screen at your events will add a whole new level of audience participation. Plus, you can grow your list of followers at every event. Creating a live Twitter feed to aggregate tweets sent to users, from users, or including keywords or hashtags can be quite a task.

You can run a real-time search using TweetDeck but it isn’t really optimized for screen and your audience will be squinting.

You can try to build your own Twitter feed widget but it’s a pretty daunting task involving JQuery, JavaScripting, CSS and HTML knowledge.

There’s an easier way. StreamTwitter is a little script designed for streaming tweets in real-time to any video source. Just open the script, change your search term, switch the graphics to be your own (optional) and connect your laptop to your video source. It’s optimized for TV screen resolution and looks amazing. It updates automatically with beautiful jQuery sliding effects. It can filter out bad words if desired. It is the easiest and best way to have a live Twitter feed streaming tweets including your desired search term at your events. It also comes with easy-to-follow instructions and 3 months of support if you have any questions.

If you’ve got experience with StreamTwitter, or any questions, please feel free to share in the comments!

© 2008 TwiTip Twitter Tips.



Stream Twitter on TVs in real-time at events, concerts, presentations and more.

Twitter is a lot like the wild west of social media. The venue is relatively new, many people are unfamiliar with the etiquette and an even larger number of people could care less about the few rules in place. Which is why I am quick to my trigger and hit the block or unfollow button the minute people’s poor Twitter manners cross my path.

Here are six ways to become a Twitter pariah with me (and I imagine a lot of other people):

1) Send out offers on how to increase Twitter followers. Especially if you have less followers than me. Come on.

2) Repeat the same self-promoting tweet over and over. One follower I have seems to repeat the same tweet every time I sign on about something I couldn’t care less about if I tried. We get it, you don’t need to tell us about this “incredible  limited time offer” eight million times. Obviously, the offer can’t be too incredible or limited if you’re tweeting about it every time I sign on.

3) Send me porn. Only on the web do you have complete strangers offering you free pornography. I’ve never been walking down the street and bombarded by sexy women throwing themselves at me, though I would have killed for that when I was a teenager. Spam, viruses and shadiness aside, porn on Twitter is just plain tacky.

4) Send me a link to your business without having ever tweeted to me before. Nothing makes me hate you more than a blatant and unsolicited tweet to “check out” your site. Seriously, every time I get one of these, I secretly hope that whoever sent it is cursed by a disease which prevents them from typing. This is bad, not to mention, lazy marketing. Unless I am asking for information about the product you’re selling, keep your tweets to yourself.

5) Tweet only slightly less than you breathe. Seriously, if I’m looking at your avatar every time I open TweetDeck, you’re tweeting too much. Go for a walk or crack open a book, just take a break. And PLEASE, don’t tweet, “Off to take a break from Twitter.” Just go.

6) Act like a robot. It’s okay to use an automation tool here or there, but if your Twitter feed is being run by Skynet, people can tell. I want a human on the other side of the tweets, not a robot scheduled to say “something funny” at 12:06.

In the real world, it isn’t so easy to put up with the personalities that annoy us. On Twitter it is as easy as the click of a button. Make sure you are tweeting in the way you would expect others to tweet.

© 2008 TwiTip Twitter Tips.



Six Quick Ways to Becoming a Twitter Pariah

I can’t help it…sometimes my Twitter feed makes me want to scream. I’m reading through my DM’s and wondering what people are thinking when they send me this stuff. I don’t want to make 4,000 per month with Twitter (I do this fine on my own thank you), I don’t need 1,000 followers by the time I wake up, and I don’t need any gifts, free-reports, or webinars. Look, there is absolutely nothing wrong with pitching people on Twitter, but this DM madness has got to stop. While we are on the subject, let’s get specific about how not to pitch on Twitter:

• Only sending out affiliate links
• Attaching people’s names to your affiliate links (i.e. @nhangen @problogger http://myaffiliatelink.com Great Tips!)
• Using automated software to auto-tweet your links based on search in batches of more than a few per hour
• Auto-DM’s with an affiliate link, free-report, or anything else mentioned above

There’s a right way to pitch and a wrong way, but for some reason most of the people on Twitter take the most annoying and least effective route as possible. I don’t get it, but maybe this post will help.

The first thing you need to realize on Twitter, is not that it is like a party (is anyone else gettting sick of hearing that phrase?), but that there are accepted protocols. I’m sure I’ll get a lot of backlash about how there aren’t any rules on Twitter, which is also true. However, the protocols I mention here serve to help you sell better without being marked as a spammer. It goes like this:

• Don’t just sell – If every Tweet in your feed is a pitch, then you aren’t going to do very well. Mix it up a little bit by Tweeting blog posts, RT’ing other people’s stuff, and replying.
• When you do sell, be casual – Pitching someone at their kitchen table is different than pitching them at a bar. There is a right place  for the hard sell, but Twitter isn’t it. Mention your product as a proud creator, not as a telemarketer. Do this enough times and people will start to notice.
• Get your friends to help you out – Leverage your network to help you promote your product. Social proof in the form of other people pitching your stuff works much better than you trying to pitch it on your own.
• Link to testimonials, blog posts, and opt-in forms, but transparency is crucial – Tell people what you are linking to or they won’t click the link. When they do click, they don’t want to feel like they were tricked, so be honest and up front.

Don’t be afraid to send out an affiliate link from time to time, but be careful. If you trick someone once, they are likely to unfollow you or simply ignore future requests. Don’t use the 140 to pitch, let your web copy or blog post do that for you. It doesn’t take a lot of effort to sell good stuff on Twitter, but it does take some patience.

You can also use some of the cool Twitter video services, like Twiddeo and Twitcam to talk about your products. Just don’t forget that the key to marketing on Twitter is to sell yourself first. Once people like you, they are much more likely to buy your product, even if they don’t need it. People want to buy from people they connect with, not some random eBook avatar screaming out affiliate links. When it comes to pitching on Twitter, if you let discretion and transparency be your guide, I promise you’ll have success. People will buy your product, but 9 times out of 10 they’ll buy it because of the connection rather than the copy.

[image via freezelight]

© 2008 TwiTip Twitter Tips.



The Proper Way to Pitch on Twitter

Many people have pondered the question: how can Twitter be used as a marketing tool? Twitter is becoming a powerful tool to market your websites, content and products. If you’re running a niche website, Twitter is an indispensible tool in your marketing arsenal.

When I launched Webinar Central last fall, a directory and calendar of upcoming webinars, I was faced with a dilemma. I needed to market my site to as wide an audience as possible with no budget other than the cost of spending my time. I decided to turn to Twitter and it has become a key tool for building readership and interacting with my readers. Not only have a I built a strong readership, but networking with other professionals has created partnership opportunities that have been very exciting.

Since Webinar Central was launched in October, 2008, I’ve gotten almost 25% of my traffic solely from Twitter. During the early launch days, it was responsible for most of my traffic until the site rose in it’s search rankings and I started generating traffic the old fashioned way. So, it’s great for creating quality traffic, when your site would otherwise be inactive, while it waits for indexing from the Google Gods.

Setting Up Your Twitter Backbone

I recommend being methodical when you go about initiating a Twitter Marketing campaign. It will save you time, which is your most valuable asset. Here’s a guide to the back end you’ll need for marketing a niche site on Twitter.

Setting up Accounts

I would advise against using your personal Twitter account to market your niche website, especially if you post about personal topics on your Twitter feed. It will look more professional in the long run to have a dedicated feed. There are exceptions to this; like if you’re building a personal brand. For Webinar Central, I simply setup @webinarcentral.

Customize Your Profile

I chose a cute logo as my avatar to draw attention to it, and it’s proved popular. I also matched the color scheme of the profile to the logo and filled in all the sidebar information about the website. You don’t have much room to say a lot, so be sure to get your point across as succinctly as possible.

Badges on your website

So visitors to your site know they can follow your feeds on Twitter, I recommend putting a Twitter Counter badge as well a Twitter Grader badge near the top of your website, usually in the sidebars. I would not recommend putting your Twitter feed directly on your site; you will run the risk of being redundant.

Set-up Feeds to Monitor

Twitter’s search function is incredibly powerful and perfect for monitoring the entire network for what your site is targeted at. Think about the key phrases that your website targets. Once you run a search, Twitter makes it really easy to turn it into an RSS feed that you can throw into your RSS feedreader of choice. As an example, I monitor the phrases ‘webinar,’ ‘webinarcentral,’ ‘gotomeeting,’ etc. For my Anglophile blog, Anglotopia.net, I monitor for the word Anglophile and follow anyone that mentions it.

Setting up these feeds serves several purposes. The first is you can immediately follow people discussing the topic your website is based on. If someone talks about a webinar, chances are they are interested in learning about more of them, so they are worth a follow. Another reason to have these feeds set-up is so you can monitor the mood and trends for your topics, especially if there is a #hashtag for it.

Seek Followers

The most important aspect of Twitter Marketing is to gain followers. Not just any follower you can get your hands on but quality followers who will value your content and what you have to offer.

The first step is to monitor the Twitter feeds. Next, you can find people in your industry/niche and follow them. Follow their followers and so on. You can also use tools like Twitter Grader to recommend users that you should follow.

How do you measure success in this regard? If they follow you back, then they are a quality follower. If they don’t follow you back, you can weed them out later.

Twitter has limits for most new accounts. You can only follow up to 2,000 people at any one time. So, if you start reaching the limit, then it’s time to weed out the people who aren’t following you back.

I spent several days following as many people as I could until I hit the limits. Once I hit the limits I started cleaning out the account, to the point where my follower/follow ratio is very similar. This has left me with over 1,300 followers and growing by about 5% a day, without any further effort.

Working Smart – Twitter Tools to Use for Niche Marketing

Using Tweet Later

I’m not a fan of totally automating your Twitter activities, but I think it’s perfectly all right to automate parts of it. I’ve avoided having auto-replies and auto-follows set up, I think it’s important to screen who’s following you and to actually engage with them instead of sending them a DM that goes to your website or a product you’re pushing.

That being said, I use tools like Tweetlater lightly. For Webinar Central, I set up daily Tweets to go out in the mornings with a summary of that day’s webinars. If I have a new poll out, I’ll schedule a Tweet to go out in the afternoon to catch the bored in the afternoon crowd who may be looking for something to do. You can find out more about Tweetlater in this TwiTip Post about TweetLater.

Using Twitterfeed

Once you have a good following, you need to leverage that audience by making sure your site’s RSS feed is being posted on Twitter. You can use great free tools like Twitterfeed. Twitterfeed is a fantastic tool to automatically have your RSS feed posted on your Twitter Stream every time it’s updated. It’s free and very customizable. You’ll need to sign up for an account and set everything up. Everytime someone posts a new webinar to Webianr Central, it goes into the RSS feed and shortly thereafter onto the Twitter Feed. You can read more about Twitterfeed in this TwiTip Post.

That’s the extent of my Twitter automation.

Don’t Forget to Engage

Twitter marketing takes a huge investment of time to setup, but once you have it going, you should not stop. You always need to be looking for new followers and talking directly with your followers. To succesfully market your niche site on Twitter, engaging in the ‘grand conversation’ with your users is so very key. Don’t set everything up on auto-pilot and expect success to come your way.

The Golden Rules

My four golden rules for niche marketing on Twitter are: Be Useful. Be Timely. Be Willing to Engage. Don’t be Spammer.

Good Luck!

When Jonathan Thomas isn’t seeking the latest Webinars for WebinerCentral.net he’s taking a breather on his popular Anglophile Blog Anglotopia.net. You can follow him on Twitter: @jonathanwthomas or @webinarcentral

© 2008 TwiTip Twitter Tips.



Marketing a Niche Website on Twitter

Like many who publish a blog or read blogs, twitter has become a part of the morning routine. We jump on twitter sometimes before we even open our email programs. What are people talking about and what are the hot conversations taking place is usually what we are looking for.

For me and others, twitter has become a major source of what we read throughout the day. I have actually discovered recently, not only do I go to twitter some days before I open my email program. Twitter is scrolled through before I open my RSS reader, NetNewsWire.

Collecting Links to Read on Twitter

Over the last few weeks, I have found a large chunk of what I read being provided by the links of those I am following on twitter. Many of those I follow tweet links to blog post or articles they are reading. And most are sending their own blog’s RSS feed to twitter.

The great benefit of or perhaps the natural evolution occurring by the growth of twitter is the fact most of those blogging are also on twitter. And we are using twitter as a way to publish what we are writing about.

• How do you as someone on twitter collect links to read?
• How do you find the hot topics on twitter to read?

Just as twitter has evolved into a great social tool. We are seeing new twitter apps being pushed out developer’s doors daily. And some of the best apps are those which help you find what to read on twitter.

Twitter Search

Twitter Search works a lot like some of the other search tools in your browser.

Simple type in your search query and Twitter Search will go and find the tweets matching your query.

You can then continue to follow updates as it refreshes to bring in new tweets as they come in on your search term(s).

Tweet Scan

This app reminds me a lot of Google Alerts for twitter. You can setup your search terms which you want to follow and your results will be sent to you via email, RSS, JSON, and Twhirl. Smart businesses are using this tool to follow what is being said on twitter about them too.

TweetBeep

Similar to Tweet Scan, TweetBeep alerts you by email of conversations taking place which discuss your search terms on twitter. You can then use the results as you see fit. You might want to follow those discussing the topic or you might want to respond to them on twitter. You can even keep track of who’s tweeting your Web site or blog, even if they use a shortened URL like tinyurl.com.

Not only are the above mentioned apps available to feed you information to read, those you follow will do so too. Which is why it is important to follow those who will add to the conversation and provide relevant information on twitter. Many of those you are following will do what is called “retweet” tweets they have found on twitter they think their followers may be interested in. And many of those you are following will feed their RSS feeds from their own blogs to twitter. And that is why I have found twitter has become a huge source of my RSS feeds each and every day.

I know each morning when I first go to twitter some of those I follow will have either retweeted some great links they found interesting. Or they will have tweeted new blog post they have published, either the night before or during the day.

Feeding Your Own Links (and RSS feed) to Twitter

As a blogger, one of the ways to use twitter is as a “micro-blogging” tool. I have found I get involved in more conversations taking place since I am using twitter. And there is no way I can blog about them all on my blog. Another way to keep your followers informed and a way for you to provide information to those who are following you is to tell them what you are reading and what you are blogging about.

Like the search tools mentioned, there are a number of twitter apps which make this easy to do.

TwitThis

This is an easy way for you to send tweets about what you are reading, listening to, watching and more. And to make it even easier to use, you can put the bookmarklet in your browser tool bar and whenever you are reading something you want to share, you simply click the bookmarklet. TwitThis then shortens the URL for you and you click send and it goes out to those following you on twitter. It also includes the title of the blog post you are reading.

You can also put TwitThis on your own blog as a way for your readers to share your content on twitter. TwitThis makes it easy for your readers to share.

twshot

An application very similar to TwitThis in that you can use it to share what you are reading on the Internet. However it has the added ability to allow you to add your own take on the post or article within the limits of twitters 140 characters.

Easy Tweets

“EasyTweets is a set of tools that can help online marketers leverage the power of microblogging. You can use it to post to and switch between multiple Twitter accounts in seconds, check replies, and track new followers. EasyTweets interfaces through Twitter’s API.”

This is the one twitter app I have come to use a lot. It not only allows you to feed to twitter what you are reading. You can use it to feed your own blog’s RSS feeds to twitter when you update your blog with a new post. You can set it to send your updates immediately. And you can set it to send tweets to twitter at specified times during the day.

Easy Tweets also gives you the ability to tweet to your followers what you are reading. Just use the available bookmarklet and it will shorten the URL for you and give you a space to add your thoughts on what you are reading too.

Twitterfeed

Is another twitter app you can use to feed your blogs RSS to your twitter followers. Twitterfeed works completely in the background once you set it up for your blogs RSS feed. Each time you post something new to your blog, it will send a tweet out to your followers.

One word of caution on feeding your own RSS feeds to twitter. If this is all you are going to use twitter for, you will quickly find you will have no followers. While I would agree it is important to share with your followers what you are blogging about, don’t make this the only thing you contribute to twitter. Key to twitter are the conversations taking place. And the key to having a successful twitter experience is to engage in these conversations. More is involved in engaging in these conversations then just feeding your own RSS to twitter.

One of the keys elements to remember is that twitter is about interacting and learning from those you follow and who follow you. Finding the conversations, entering into those conversations and engaging in them is important. You can use the tools and apps mentioned above to find and engage in those conversations. And you can add to the conversations by providing your own RSS feeds to twitter.

© 2008 TwiTip Twitter Tips.



Links – How to Find Them and Share Them on Twitter