Here let me give you an example:

Take this article that we wrote at WPBeginner – 55+ Most Wanted WordPress Tips, Tricks, and Hacks (has 944 tweets)

This was the example text I wrote 6 days ago when I first tweeted it:

55+ Most Wanted #WordPress Tips, Tricks, and Hacks – http://bit.ly/7EfP1W (Pls RT)

You see the magic word at the end. Pls RT, got the article tweeted many times. Now because it was a quality article, it took off and people started retweeting it left and right. I cannot emphasize enough how important the content really is.

But I did not just stop there. I have some very close friends on twitter which everyone should. There is no way that you can follow 3000 people. I have a group of 40 friends that I really keep track of and chat with. I sent out messages to each of them asking them to retweet this. It got retweeted more times.

Again, all I am doing is just ASKING. It really depends on how you ask because some of these top guys get hundreds of requests daily, so you have to be smart. Don’t make your article spammy, always ask nicely, and acknowledge them in your tweets. You absolutely CANNOT go ask someone you do not have a previous relationship with. If you do you will just come off as a spammer.

Use twitter the right way and you will have plenty of friends that actually know you, and you actually know them.

But all to all, it is a really simple formula.

Quality Content + Ask = Tons of Retweets

Think about why people use twitter. I use twitter to connect with friends and other users who share the same interest as me. I use twitter to find new articles, and resources. But since there are thousands upon thousands of articles being tweeted every day, I can only pick the ones that grab my attention with the title. This applies to majorly everyone. You don’t really get a creative title with Auto Tweets. Sometimes your title is too long and you have auto tweet setup, so it will cut the title of. Most of the times, it starts with a generic statement saying: New on ….

This type of statement would not only make people ignore that tweet, but if you do that more often, people will begin to ignore you on twitter as well. So one of the reasons why you should always tweet the messages personally is because you can come up with creative ways to attract users. You can post the same article a few times and space it out with other tweets and use different titles to approach different type of audience.

Twitter uses hash tags and that is one thing Auto Tweet cannot do for you. If you tweet the link manually, you can not only make the best title, but you can also use hashtags for the keywords like “Designer”, “WordPress”, “Blogger” or what not. You can either incorporate these hashtags within the title, or at the end of tweet nonetheless these will get you targetted audience from twitter as people search for that specific hash tag.

What are you losing by posting tweets manually? Simply 15 seconds. But what are you gaining from posting tweets manually? A lot more targetted visitors and more credibility. Now there might be an issue with posting tweets on specific time. That is why you have programs like Hootsuite and others that will let you schedule your tweets, so use that and manually write your tweet. Don’t make excuses.

The answer to the question asked in the title is NO and if you read the post, you should know why.

The method of logging out each account and logging back in is very inconvenient. Well since I have multiple twitter accounts myself, I have tried out multiple services before I picked the ones that I use. This list has a lot of options, although I will highlight which ones I use.

1. Seesmic Desktop

It has no limitations on how many accounts you can use. Each account will be on a separate column makes it very easy to manage. It is a strong desktop client which is very efficient in running. It can also be integrated with Facebook. I tried this one, but I did not like the look of it, but it has gotten a lot of positive reviews on other websites.

2. HootSuite

HootSuite is a very powerful web based script which allows you to have as many accounts as you like. The best part is, that you can have multiple administrators as well. It works out well if more then one person in the company is working on the twitter accounts. HootSuite also lets you schedule tweets ahead of time which is very convenient because there are sometimes in the day when more people on twitter are active. HootSuite lets you post to ping.fm as well. If you use their url shortener, ow.ly, it also shows you the link stats. I am currently using HootSuite to manage my twitter accounts because it is remote as it is a web based script. It is completely free of charge.

3. CoTweet

Cotweet is a very powerful software which is still in Private Beta. I unfortunately have not tried it, but I saw a lot of good reviews on the web. This is a software that many major companies are using such as Pepsi, Starbucks, Ford, Microsoft, Sprint and others. It adds a strong business layer which means multiple users can use the same account. It prevents duplicate tweets, allows scheduling, allows assigning of tweets to coworkers and users can leave note for each other. Since it is in Private Beta you must apply and hope you get accepted.

4. Twhirl

Twhirl is one of the most famous powerful desktop client that gives Tweetdeck alot of competition. Twhirl stands at #6 in Twitter Client Stats. It allows multiple accounts and cross posting to ping.fm

5. Twibble

Twibble allows users to manage multiple twitter accounts. It also includes viewing options, location awareness, and keyboard shortcuts.

6. Tweetie for Mac

Tweetie for Mac is a very cool software for Mac OS. It also has a version for iphone. Tweetie for Mac does an excellent job managing multiple accounts and keeping the screen less cluttered. The powerful keyboard shortcuts are just what power users love.

7. Nambu

Nambu is great for managing multiple accounts at Twitter, Identi.ca, and Laconi.ca. Nambu account holders get to use tr.im to shorten their urls and pic.im for better quality photos then twitpic. It also includes Twitter trends, saved searches, filters, link aggregation, and groups. Nambu all to all is a great software. It is also free for iPhone.

8. Tweetlater

Tweet Later lets you manage multiple accounts, and have bulk scheduling options. It can also let you set up an automated DM for your new follwers. Remove people who are not following you. And it has more options for professional accounts which is paid.

9. TwittBot

Twittbot allows you to update multiple accounts at the same time. It also allows multiple accounts to update one account. It sets up bots that looks for @replies to be reposted to an account specified. The security levels of these bots can be adjusted. This is perfect for twitter accounts that aggregate stories from multiple places.

10. SplitTweet

This is originally designed for businesses that want to manage multiple accounts. It allows tracking of brand mentions, but this software is not as good as HootSuite or as CoTweet defines themselves. I suggest you try HootSuite instead.

11. Digsby

Digsby is a one in all solution for all your needs. As Digsby combines IM, Email and Social Networking at one place. It allows you to manage multiple twitter accounts, and it can handle your other social profiles as well. It has features that lets you manage your IMs from all different messengers. You can also manage your emails from different service providers as well.

12. Matt

Matt is a fully carsonified version of updating multiple twitter accounts. It is a simple web app that lets you update multiple twitter accounts.

13. Tweet3

An advanced, Web-based Twitter client that supports grouping, Facebook, stats, multiple accounts,
pretty pictures, trending topics, and all sorts of other cool, awesome, and fantastic stuff Thats what I got from their website. Never used this site before, but I heard integrating with Facebook is one of their strong points.

14. TwitterFox

Twitterfox is a firefox extension that lets you add multiple twitter accounts in the bottom right hand corner of your browser. You can browse through them in a single column view as you choose. I have this installed in my firefox. I had it activated, but then I unactivated it because I am a true HootSuite user for the most part, or WEB Directly.

15. Twitterrific

Famous for its superb quality iphone app, they also provide a desktop client for Mac. It is a free app for iphone that lets you manage multiple accounts in a very organized way. It also has advanced search features. Same features are in the Desktop Client for Mac.

If I have missed any software or application here, feel free to let me know in the comment box. Also if you have used any of these, and you have a preference, please share it with others, so they can learn from your experiences.

Before you do anything in this post make sure you follow me. Also make sure you follow the people whose advice that you liked because they were kind enough to put it out here.

@iamkhayyam

No one can tell you how to use Twitter It’s unique and made especially for you. Just experience it and adjust to the pulse.

@mlane

1. When you first sign-up, Twitter will recommend some celebrities to follow. Don’t do it. I believe this has a lot to do with Twitters supposed high turnaround rate for new users. I mean, feel free to follow them later if you’re into that sort of thing, but they won’t follow you back and that closed, one-way streamis not the value of Twitter. I think in the end, this confuses new users about the service and gives them the wrong impression. I believe Twitter’s value lies in the reciprocal connections you can build with it. 2. Find people with similar interests and jump into the conversation. Search for topics that matter to you, personally. Check out the dozens of directories of people on Twitter out there and start following them. But don’t just sit there waiting for someone to talk to you. Find a conversation that might interest you.

@mistygirlph

Write you bio properly and have a personalized avatar and BG!

@cheth

Be yourself! always remember the Rule ” I tweet therefore I Am”

@curiouslt

Start @ing people, it gets you involved & it shows you’re worth following b/c you’re not just about you. Show you talk 2 me, not at me!

@blellow

Seek out & follow people who share your interests, get involved & be genuine. There is so much we can learn from each other! thx 4 asking

@andysowards

Share your thoughts, words, ideas, resources, advice. Basically speak your mind and SHARE!

@mayhemstudios

Be Helpful to your Friends.

@pxdvadesigns

@syedbalkhi What you do is a great example for Twitter beginners. Link to useful blog posts and tuts, and people will follow you.

@BartGatsby

1)Twit about things your passions in life, things that you love doing. 2)Interact with other twitter users. Reply to them, ask for their opinion. 3) Fill in your bio. Don’t leave it blank. Tell something about youself or what you twit. 4)Show some creativity. Customize your twitter profile. Choose a background that will relate to your personality.

@amabaie

Treat Tweeple just like you would anyone else in a stand-up reception (with a microphone dangling overhead).

@Catnboots

Get a picture & a profile up right away, before you set out to get thousands of followers~won’t happen otherwise.

@hellogreenstar

Do NOT push your services/products on your followers. Engage in conversations and the relationships will build in a positive way

@SayzLim

Tweet based on your profile. If you’re designer, tweet something about design. Dentist? Tweet about how to brush teeth.

@blauehavik

Read lots first and follow the leaders for great examples.

@syedbalkhi

Don’t feel obligated to do anything. If you feel like tweeting, tweet, if not don’t. If someone follows you, you don’t have to follow them back. Do what you think is best, and be considerate of others.

Twitter is the new name of Social Media. It is everywhere, in paper media, news, websites, and in the dinner talk of alot of people. More and more people are joining twitter which is causing others to get unique custom backgrounds for their twitter account, so they can stand out among so many members. Well if you are one of the people who are thinking about getting a custom twitter backgrounds, well then you should check out some of these for inspiration.

Without any further delay, I present to you the 50 Best, Most Creative, Stunning, Beautiful, and Amazing Twitter Backgrounds.

1. Syed Balkhi

2. Brian Paulowicz

3. Farrhad

4. Ronald Bien

5. Calvin Lee

6. Go Media

7. Misty

8. Studio3k

9. David Leggett

10. Stuart Robertson

11. Lee Maplesden

12. Scott Clark

13. Dickie Adams

14. Gerardo Obieta

15. Ed Dale

16. Paul Boag

17. Vanessa

18. Twestival Jozi

19. Brandingsalon

20. Andy Sowards

21. Presetsheaven

22. Kevin Crafts

23. EliteStyles

24. Bill Weaver

25. Steven Pitts

26. Jeanneleez

27. BigJonEvans

28. Curiouslt

29. Brandon Cox

30. Bkmacdaddy Design

31. Danijanev

32. Chris Spooner

33. NoLuckNeeded

34. Abhinav Chokhavatia

35. Jason Bradbury

36. MrStrider

37. Art Webb

38. LBOI

39. Kyle

40. Xsyn

41. Simone Grant

42. Matt Davis

43. Walter Apai

44. Tutorial9

45. Josh Austin

46. Travis Bucholtz

47. Matty Craig

48. Ruud van Wijngaarden

49. Christina Iannuzzi

50. The Domestic Diva

Even though this is a long list of great backgrounds, I probably have missed some of the great ones. If you know good ones post them in the comments so others can see them as well. All of these bring a new idea to the table. A fresh look of these profiles make me wants to follow them.

Use these as an inspiration to make your own custom background. If you need any help, contact me via the form, or DM me @syedbalkhi and we can work something out.

Don’t forget to Retweet this post on Twitter by using the button above and make sure you use my service ekey.us to shorten your URLs. If you still have not joined joined twitter, then check out 25 Reasons Why You Should Join Twitter because It will Convince You.

P.S. Make sure you follow Dom at @iloxy he is a cool guy.

Well obviously I replied to him via twitter, but I thought since I wrote an Ultimate Guide to Retweet, I should write a post about FollowFriday as well because this is something that is getting bigger and bigger by every week.

What is #FollowFriday

FollowFriday is one of the most popular Twitter Memes. It is a group thing where everyone suggests the people they care about to others. People they think are cool, People that are interesting, People who are resourceful and so on.

The idea is that you refer good people to others, and everyone is doing that. So you can make more connections during Friday then any other day because you see new people. But there is also a trend that you will see that some of the popular users on twitter get mentioned in just about everyone’s followfriday. No matter what, you will also see a few new interesting people each time.

History of #FollowFriday: How did FollowFriday Started

It wasn’t long ago that this concept started. Actually to be exact it was started on January 16, 2009. When Micah Baldwin tweeted:

Almost immidiately afterwards, Mykl Roventine suggested to add hashtag to this idea, and the next thing you know is that hundreds of thousands of people are doing it. They are all recommending their good friends to their other followers and making the network bigger.

How You can #Followfriday

There are really no rules to it except try to add a hashtag #Followfriday. You can suggest as many friends you like. Or just suggest a few people. It is entirely upto you. You can write detailed stuff about your friends in a tweet for example:

#FollowFriday Check out @syedbalkhi – Good Designer, Blogger, SEM, WP Geek, and most importantly a Great Friend.

Or you can simply just make a huge list of friends in a tweet:

#FollowFriday @syedbalkhi @mayhemstudios @mlane @paviles @andysowards @curiouslt @devongovett @mistygirlph @Bites85 @brandonacox

These are just two examples I am mentioning. You can be creative and do it however you want it done. Just make sure you add the Hashtag #FollowFriday

Advantages and Disadvantages of #FollowFriday

Like everything there is advantages to FollowFriday and there are disadvantages to FollowFriday. Lets begin with the advantages first.

Advantages

- You Increase Your Follower Count and Build Your Network

Obviously when you are being mentioned by other people, their followers and friend will see it, and they will most likely follow you. This way your follower count will increase. But most importantly, you will make new friends and possibly connections for your business.

Disadvantages

- You Lose Followers

Yes FollowFriday can make you lose your followers also. For instance, I am following 900+ people, and I have over 1100 followers. I can’t list all of them in one friday, my whole day will end. So some people get pissed off because you didn’t mention them, which will result in them unfollowing you. Another way you lose followers is if you fill your entire page with #FollowFriday tweets which gets annoying for some of your followers. Which will lead them to unfollow you.

What Policy I take?

Well I am not one of the people who won’t opt-in because I appreciate my followers. I try to share the followers who contributed the most for the current week. Users who I had the most conversation with during the week. I think everyone should opt-in to this Tweet Meme and share the love on the Fridays.

Well now you should know everything there is to know about #FollowFriday. I hope you keep me in your minds when you do the #FollowFriday today on twitter If you haven’t already join twitter, then see 25 Reasons Why Someone Should Join Twitter. And once you join don’t forget to Follow Me at @syedbalkhi.

The art and sciences of “retweeting” is best described as taking someone else’s twitter message, and reposting it on twitter again. In the course of doing so, you mention the original poster, or your source, and the link which is often associated with it.

In this post, I will share how to properly retweet because not only beginners don’t know how to retweet, but alot of users who are on twitter for a good while often doesn’t use the right technique of retweets. I will also share the advantages of retweets for webmasters and bloggers. Lastly, I will share the tools that you can use to track your tweets.

How to Properly Retweet?

There are multiple of ways of retweeting. You can use different labels to post retweets. The common ones that you will see mostly used are RT: or Reading: which are both fine.

Next thing you need to make sure that you credit the original source, or the source that you got the resource from. You can do so by saying @originalposter, so if you are retweeting my tweets, you should say @syedbalkhi in that tweet.

Critics might say that by adding someone else as your credit, you are losing your followers to them, no you are not. You are just helping them build connection also. Giving credit is a good thing that is why you are required to do so in books, papers and other scholarly information as well. By mentioning someone else’s argument or point, you are only strengthening your credibility.

Some Good Examples of Retweets:

RT @syedbalkhi 25 Reasons Why Someone Should Join Twitter – http://ekey.us/w7Ig827kn

25 Reasons Why Someone Should Join Twitter – http://ekey.us/w7Ig827kn (via @syedbalkhi)

Reading: 25 Reasons Why Someone Should Join Twitter – http://ekey.us/w7Ig827kn (via @syedbalkhi)

You can change the title if you think it will make it more attractive for your audience. For example:

Share it with your friends, 25 Good Reasons to Join Twitter – http://ekey.us/w7Ig827kn (via @syedbalkhi)

So there are more than one way of retweeting, you can’t get it wrong. But people still do. So make sure you analyze each tweet carefully before you RT because not only will it be worthless to your users, but to the original poster as well sometimes.

Let’s take the scenario if one of your friend Direct Message you, asking to Retweet a URL. Direct Message reads:

Hey, I am promoting this article can you please RT – http://ekey.us/w7Ig827kn

Now what you should do is first check out this post to see if you like it, and then don’t just RT the direct message. Take some time writing the headline, or just taking the article’s headline and using that in your RT.

I have seen users not even spending enough time in retweets. They will just post:

I am promoting this article can you please RT – http://ekey.us/w7Ig827kn (@syedbalkhi)

Which not only makes the original poster look bad, but it hurts your own reputation even more because you didn’t take enough time to read the article before you suggest it to others. Which means that for all you can be sharing a virus site and pissing off your readers.

Only Retweet Articles that You Find Interesting

Retweeting is not just about sharing the love. You must find the article interesting in order for you to RT. Don’t ever feel obligated to Retweet because then you are jeopardizing the quality of your tweets and losing your loyal followers. First read the article, and then share it if you think it is interesting. Also consider, if the article is related to your followers as well. If it is something that will help them, or if it is something that they will enjoy.

Retweets help build Relationships with other users

Retweeting actually help you build relationships with others and the original poster as well. I have noticed whenever I retweet something, I usually get more followers. Because someone usually retweet that url with me as their source and it spreads. So people see that I am sharing interesting content, and they follow me. The original poster is also happy because I retweeted his post, and I am someone who will help him promote his site in the future also if he keeps writing these interesting articles. It is just a good act which you should do before asking others to retweet something for you. I have mentioned it in one of my tips to increase influence on twitter. By retweeting you increase your chances of being retweeted because most users return your favor, only if it is interesting though.

Retweeting increases other’s trust in you

The reason why I have said above to post interesting content which is relevant to your users is because it also put your reputation on line when you retweet something. If you retweet something, you are asking your users to check it out. When they check it out and it is superb and relevant to them, they will begin to trust you. They will check out everything that you post because they like the stuff you post, and they trust you. On the other hand, if you retweet something bad which is completely irrelevant, then you will often lose followers after such sort of tweets.

Retweets are Explosive form of Word of Mouth Advertising for FREE!

All you have to do is make your article interesting, and this is the best form of viral marketing you can get for yourself. Retweets are natural linking so it can be considered more like what google would like to see in text linking. People link to what they find interesting. So if I share something interesting, then people will retweet it without me asking for retweets. Although it does gives you a boost if you ask. I will say from my experience in recieving traffic from twitter, it is better than any text link that you will see. Twitter effect is much like a Digg effect if you get the right people to tweet. I know my post on 25 Reasons to Join Twitter has recieved over 29000 visitors on it from twitter which I find just phenomenal. I wrote this post and it got tweeted by some of twitter’s celebrity. Next thing I knew it was on facebook, reddit, and other social networks and I am recieving traffic from everywhere. Twitter is Viral and it can really help webmasters if you want to get tons of traffic to your website.

Not just the new posts, people who are coming from twitter are now tweeting my older posts from my archives which is also recieving good traffic. I have tweeted some of my older posts to get more exposure. I am getting textlinks also from bloggers who are now seeing my content. Twitter has just put me at a new level. And it is all the power of Retweets.

Tools to Track your Retweets

1) Retweet Radar – This tool collects ideas most tweeted on twitter in the form of tag cloud where you will see more tweeted ideas bigger. It claims to show you the trend of topics and ideas on twitter.

2) Retweetrank – Retweet rank is a representative of the number of times a user have been retweeted by others recently on twitter. It ranks the users based on the retweet amounts and gives you a percentile rating.

3) Retweetist – This service highlights the most tweeted links on twitter.

4) Tweetmeme – Similarly this service lists all the popular links that are being retweeted on twitter. You can track your own links here by just searching for the url. You can also incorporate their plugin on your website and see the retweet count of a specific article.

All to all I am saying that you need to know how to retweet if you want to get anywhere in twitter. This will help you build your own brand and trust among your followers, it will help you build good relationships with others such as original posters, and your friends who you retweeted. It will also help you increase your influence if you do it correctly. It will get you insane amount of traffic if your article is interesting and relevant to your audience.

Since you have learn’t how to properly retweet through this article, let me see you retweet this article properly. I am @syedbalkhi (original poster) follow me on twitter.

Why Increase Influence and Gain Followers on Twitter?

Higher influence can get you insane traffic to your website. Higher influence makes you a celebrity. High Influence gets you publicity. Higher influence gets you more followers. Having that said it is the influence that matters not the follower count. So don’t go after the tools that automates the process of following and lands you thousands of followers because half of those followers are not even active. You want to increase your influence to make an impact and get your brand noticed.

Ok so now you know breifly why you need to have higher influence and followers then lets get the show on the road.

Twitter Tips to Increase Your Influence and Gain Followers

1. Interaction is Essential

The most important tip you need to know if you want to have some influence and good reputation on twitter is that you need to interact. Twitter is not a monologue, so don’t just stop by to let people know what you are doing. Make sure that you respond to your friend’s tweets, and you answer people’s question. Twitter is like a big conversation between you and your friends/community. The more you participate the higher your influence will be because you will get noticed by others. Think of twitter like a forum, where if you don’t interact with others, you won’t be noticed.

2. Spark Interest in your Tweet with Creativity

When I say creativity, it does not mean you have to take the most complex way. Instead creativity is all about simplicity, and that is what twitter is about. You need to make your tweets interesting. If you just ramble on your blog all day about the same stuff, you eating lunch at subway, playing basketball, and thats it. You will lose your readers instantly. Think of twitter as a blog just smaller. Gee, I wonder where the term micro-blogging came from. You need to find a way to spark interest, and make people react with your 140 characters. That is when your creativity comes in.

You can write: “Good morning”, or You can write: “Just saw the sunlight hitting my face through the window, I guess its fair to say good morning”

So it is really upto you how you make your tweets interesting.

3. Remember to be Yourself

It is said in dating that you should never put on a fake front because you can’t keep it on forever. You need to be yourself from the start. Twitter is the same way if you want to increase your influence. Don’t try to be something that you are not. If you use ain’t and gonna and wanna, then feel free to use it because twitter is anything that you want it to be. This way you will get the right type of followers. The followers who are like you. Trust me, people don’t want to follow a suckup. I would rather follow a guy who is himself and speaks his mind when necessary.

4. Treat others with Respect

You need to treat others with respect. Give them the same respect you would want to recieve. I personally hate everyone who sends me an automated direct message when I follow them because that it is just disrespectful. Most of them sounds like:

Hey Do you want to get 10,000 followers on twitter and make money – url

Only Spammers love spammers. I absolutely hate this behavior and I cannot tolerate it. If you send me this type of message, you will most likely be unfollowed. And it is not just me, any normal twitter user would do that as well. If you are going to send someone a Direct Message then put some thoughts into it. Same goes with twitterfeed plugin. This is a great plugin by all means, and I was using it for a while. All it does is that it automatically updates your twitter when you publish a new post on your blog. But the text is so generic that it makes the other person think like that you don’t care about them. Be respectful once again. Turn that off. If you think your link is worth sharing, then share it personally with some creativity. If you are not doing it for others sake, do it for your own because it is going to help you get more influence If you don’t do it and set multiple feeds to be posted on your twitter account, you will likely be unfollowed.

5. Be Considerate to Others

If you are going to have a back to back conversation with someone on twitter it is better to send them a Direct Message and get their Instant Messenger ID. It turns off your new followers who was about to follow you. Also it turns down your current followers because on their homepage they are seeing you having a conversation with someone else which is not useful to them. So they will most likely unfollow you.

6. Post Useful Content

You need to learn to post useful content for followers. People on twitter are looking for information. You can really increase your influence by posting useful content. Because when you post something useful, you are bound to get other people to Retweet that. The more people retweet it, the more people will see your name. When alot of people see your name, you will indirectly get more followers. Now some keypoints to remember when posting content is that you must use your hashtags # effectively [More about Hashtags].

7. Link to Your Own Posts/Articles

Yes, Use twitter to your advantage. Link to your articles. But link to them in a creative way. Make a strong pitch. Remember that it must be useful to your friends and followers. The reason why I say that this builds your influence on the web is that when you link to something your own and it is good, people really start to take you seriously. Besides most people don’t have enough time to search for good links. If you have a good link which is yours then share it make sure you use hashtags though because Twitter’s Search feature will help you get more followers.

8. Share the Love

You won’t get love back unless you share some. You need to Retweet if you find something good because it lets your friends and followers know that you are seeing their tweets. By retweeting you increase your influence because others will retweet your interesting tweets to return the favor. So this way you can really increase your influence across the twitter sphere. Also new followers like to see someone who retweets because they like to know that there is a human on the other side.

9. Balance Your Tweets

The user which is most influential is the one who have a balanced profile. If you just self promote yourself all day then people will begin to ignore you. If you just blog about your life repeatedly then people will also ignore you. Retweeting is good, but if you retweet alot then you will also get unfollowed. I remember seeing a tweet today:

@thesilly1: Too many Retweet’s by @johnchow … unfollow [view tweet]

So if you didn’t get the point, make sure you keep balance in your profile.

10. Solve Problems

I have grown alot of my traffic from forums by providing support. This is another thing I have started doing on twitter as well. I use the search feature to see if people are having trouble with something wordpress related. Then I help them solve the problem. I also try to help my friends as well and this increase my influence because more people favor me due to the fact that I am a helpful guy.

11. Tweet Regularly

If you want to have influence in any social media networks, you need to be active. Same rule goes for twitter as well. You need to tweet regularly. I rarely follow a person whose last tweet was 3 days ago because I know this person is not going to add value to my life. So you need to tweet often. But remember to leave space in between your tweets, so you can see some reaction. This way you can evaluate your audience and see what type of tweets they really like. You must remember if you are tweeting every 1 minute, you might end up losing followers because most people don’t like having their screen filled with one user’s useless content.

12. Tweet in Peak Times

Woah who knew there would be this effect also. We know that digg is more active on sometimes rather than other. Well same goes with twitter. Twitter is more active in sometimes than other. Obviously the service is global, so it is active 24 hours, but there are some peak hours. These hours are on EST. If you post around 8 a.m EST you are most likely to get more notice because people around the US can see you and people around other parts can see you as well such as Australia and so on. By peaking in these times, you are increasing the chance of retweets.

13. Link Your Profiles

The most effective way to get more followers is that you link your profile from all your other profiles and blogs. Most people who are on twitter are on other social media networks as well such as Digg, stumbleupon, and so on. Well why not link your twitter profile on your digg profile page because this way your digg followers can follow you to twitter. Do the same with your blogs. Promote your profile in your blog posts. If you haven’t noticed, on top of each single post page, I am asking my users to follow me. I am maximizing my potential by getting the most amount of loyal and worthy followers from everywhere.

14. Promote Your Profile in Person

If you go to web conferences or meetings then feel free to let others know about your twitter profile. I remember when I was in Izeafest in 2008, I let others know about mine. When I go to meetings with my client, I often say, if you need quick question send me a message on my twitter profile. Then they end up joining if they are not already there and follow me.

15. Launch Contests

Shoemoney was having a huge giveaway when he wanted to reach 20,000 twitter followers a while back. You can have the same. Run contests on twitter if you want to increase followers. Market Leverage has been sponsoring alot of contests, and in most contests they put a condition to follow them on twitter. This is one of the very creative way of getting more followers on twitter.

16. Free Giveaways to get more followers

The most successful thing I saw was Sitepoint giving away their high quality book in a ebook format for free. This 200+ page book was free to anyone who follow them on twitter. They have a whopping 30,000 followers now. Giveaways with anything works. People has been using giveaways to build their email list, you can use it to build your twitter followers.

17. Use An Interesting Username

Believe it or not it does matter. If you are not the most creative person on the face of the earth, just use your name because that is the safest way to go. But if you must then use something creative. Buybooksdotcom is not a good good username for anyone. Most people will not follow you if you use something ridiculous like that. By using a good username or your name, people don’t think you are a spammer (atleast they don’t judge you before seeing your tweets).

18. Change Your Profile Picture

If you think you are going to have any influence in the twitter community, you need to change your twitter picture than. People with the default profile picture shows others how lazy they are, and they will most likely be ignored. Because why should someone put an effort to follow you when you can’t put an effort to change your own profile picture. I say use your own picture, but if not use something cool. Something that represent your brand which is YOU!

19. Custom Twitter Background

If you haven’t noticed, most popular users have custom twitter backgrounds. No you should not get one just because they have one. You should learn why they have one and then get a custom background. By getting a custom background, you are branding your page even more. This way you will set an identity of yourself and your twitter page. I know not everyone is a designer, that is why there are services like Twitter Image which charge you $100 to make you a twitter background. Or you can just contact me, and I will make one for $20

20. Use Your Bio Effectively

I have seen people leaving their Bio Section Blank. That is one of the most important section on your page. How would I know the initial info about you before I follow you? I always look for an interesting bio section, and if your bio is convincing enough, I follow you. So put some effort in writing yours. Here is how my bio reads:

I am a Social Media Maven. I am a #Blogger, #Web Designer, #SEM, #Florida Gator, and one cool guy who you should know on the web.

21. Use Your Location Wisely

I understand some people are afraid to share their location. So you should be more generic. I mean I didn’t put down exactly where I live, but I put down that I live in Florida. This will help you get more followers and more targetted followers. I looked for bloggers and designers in florida through the search features to look for some of my followers.

22. Follow People You Know

To increase followers, one way you can do is by following people you know because they are bound to follow you back. A good way to start out is by going to the Find People Tool on twitter and searching for people you know.

23. Look for Good Followers

There is nothing wrong with you initiating the process of follow. You can find interesting people on your niche using the Twitter Search feature. I searched for keywords like blog designers, and it came up with all the listings. I manually went through all the people and followed the ones that I liked. Most people follow people back if they are interesting, so you can follow and just have interesting tweets, and you will get follow back. Another way of doing this is through other people. You can use services like tweetmeme to see who retweeted your links, and you can follow these people back.

24. Follow the Top Guys

By following the top guys in your niche, you are increasing your chances of being followed by others. Reason is because most people look at the top celebrities and start following others in their list. So you might increase followers this way also. You can also learn alot from the top guys and see what type of content they post. By seeing that you can see why they are at the top.

25. Understand the Power of Quality over Quantity

Twiter is not about the quantity, but is rather about the quality. You can have 15,000 useless followers which you added via an automated software, or you can have 1000 loyal and good followers who will Retweet your tweets. I would take the 1000 because I know that if these thousand retweet my link, then their followers will retweet the link and it will become a chain reaction. So always go for the quality not for the quantity. Same goes for your updates. You can have 10 quality updates a day or 90 useless updates a day. Pick carefully.

If you have really and truly read this post, then you should’ve gotten the idea that I support more influence over more followers. So don’t try to get more followers, try to get higher influence. Because when you have higher influence, you will get followers on your own. And how you get higher influence is by posting useful and informative content and basically by following the tips above.

You can use tools like Twitter Counter to see your follower count and see how the trend is looking for you. Also you can use the tool called Qwitter which emails you everytime someone unfollows after a specific tweet. This way you can see what pissed off your follower.

Remember Twitter can be anything that you want it to be, so make it a better place.

Don’t forget to follow me on Twitter if you want more followers, and Retweet this post because you know it will be useful to your friends and followers.

1. It helps to make Connections

Twitter is one tool that will help you make connections with users that you will never have known before existed. You can get to know a whole different side of a person. You can know more about me by following me on twitter rather than just reading my blog post. Twitter is the key to make another door of connection. You might not be able to ever get to know me or have me link to your post because I don’t know you, but twitter lets you do that. Twitter lets you talk to people. I can ramble on and on, but I hope you get my point. If you don’t then Andrew Chuang puts it best.

“You should join Twitter to strengthen existing bonds, and make new ones.” ~ @Tsuyomaru

2. Quick Support

With the speed twitter is growing, more and more businesses are creating their user accounts. They are even hiring a person who is on their twitter account tweeting back at their customers. So sometimes you might not even get a response through your email, but you will be able to hear back a response through twitter. This works if you want to connect with top bloggers and marketers as well. These guys have insane amount of emails to go through daily, so your email will be ignored, but tweets since they are only 140 characters, they will respond because it doesn’t take them very long. You can get quick support if you join twitter.

“Twitter is a valuable and underestimated research tool; u can increase your “web of influence” & exchange with thought leaders” ~ @blogbrevity

3. Good Learning Tool

You can never have too much knowledge. Specially if you are a designer like me. Half of the people that I am following are designers. I see so many great articles and resources that help me improve designing skills daily. No matter what your niche is there is always someone there for your niche, and there is always resources for you. And if there is not, then man you are lucky because you can capitalize the zone, and take full benefit from the newcomers.

“Why join twitter? B/c I learn so much from the 20 or so people I follow.” ~ @lnxwalt

4. To Keep UP

No matter what you are trying to keep up with, twitter has the latest info of it. From technology to breaking news, you can find it all on twitter. Heck the earthquake in Italy was first reported on twitter before it was on CNN. You can follow the web trends, news, special sites, and more by being on twitter. As a webmaster, or just as a normal person, you don’t want to fall behind. So to keep up you should join twitter.

“I was completely skeptical. I joined reluctantly, to keep up w. web trends. Now, I enjoy it. (Despite being a bit intimidated)” ~ @lt3design

5. It’s the Next Big Thing

I don’t know if you notice, but twitter is everywhere. It’s on the web, it’s on the news channels, it’s in commercials, it’s in paper media such as newspaper. It is taking over the world right now like facebook and myspace did at once. If you are one of those people who joins things because it is the next big thing, then this is your chance. Twitter is the next big thing that you should join because everyone is here.

“You should join Twitter because it’s the next big thing.” ~ @JohnChow

6. It Helps Your Creativity

Marketing is all about being creative. Creative campaigns are short and sticky. That is how your tweets are suppose to be also. 140 characters max. You have to get your point across and if you want others to read it, you got to make it interesting. Basically it is an ultimate practice for you to elevate your pitch. No one likes to read a whole page of boring proposals. The best proposals I have agreed to were short and they had very catchy headlines. Twitter is a practice for you to write better and creative headlines, so after a while you will be a better blogger due to twitter because it is helping your post titles.

“You get pretty damn creative saying what’s on your mind in 140 char or less!” ~ @danib3

7. You can Share Your Knowledge

People join forums to share their expertise with those who are in the need of help. I comment on wordpress support forums for the sole reason of helping because wordpress is such an awesome script. Well you can share your knowledge and expertise on twitter one to one except this way, you can build a long lasting relationship rather than saying oo I know this person because he once helped me, you can become really good friends.

“For the opportunity to expand your knowledge and to share your expertise with others in ways that weren’t possible before.” ~ @jccameron

8. You can interact with your readers and get advices

Everyone need advices and suggestions. Well twitter is the best place to get these suggestions. You can interact with your readers ask them questions about your upcoming posts. Get suggestions and ideas from them about what they would like to see and so on. You can have them review your new product as a beta users. Twitter is the best way to get beta testers also for free majorly. Your users would love to try beta testers, but you only want exclusive ones, well you know how each user is because you know them on twitter. So you can contact them exclusively if need be rather than sending out a mass email asking for testers. This way you make your reader feel that they are valued at your website or blog, and their opinion counts. Win Win for both ends.

“To keep in touch with my blog readers and forum buddies” ~ @WorldsDresser

9. General Research / Surveys

You can ask random questions like I did with my followers why should someone join twitter and it helped me get this post together. It doesn’t necessarily have to be your blog readers. Open ended questions like this can be answered by anyone who sees it on twitter which makes your possibilites infinite. Twitter is a great tool for asking poll type questions.

10. To Get Jobs

O you thought that sites like monster.com or newspapers were the only place you could get jobs? Actually people are now tweeting about what they need. For instance Jim Kukral wanted help from a WordPress Expert and I replied to him and helped him out. Just like that people would tweet like: Need a new wordpress design, looking for designers, and you can just respond to the tweet and you just got yourself a job. Twitter is opening possibilites for everyone.

11. Get Traffic To Your Website

Twitter is the best place to promote your product or website right now because it is hot. With so many new tools now, you can easily get your new blog posts or new products get acrossed to thousands of new people every day. I mean just two days ago, one of my posts was retweeted 50 times, and I got around 2000 visitors from it. Which is very nice because normally, I would’ve seen around 500 to 1000 visitors. Twitter really helps boost traffic to your website and increase exposure.

“Great tool to network with others, market/advertise your business/website, and there’s ton of info to learn about from followers.” ~ @Schlossy

12. Get Social Media Benefits

Eventhough twitter itself is a social media network, by posting your urls on twitter, you are increasing your article’s chances to be submitted to other social media sites like Digg or stumbleupon. I know two of my articles were submitted to Digg by one of the powerdiggers, and they almost hit FP because both had over 100+ diggs. One of my article was submitted to Stumbleupon by a reputable user, and it received tons of traffic from there. You can ask all your friends to digg for you specially if you are a webmaster because there are alot of webmasters there.

“cuz there are lots of webmasters in here” ~ @atif089

13. Big SEO Advantage

Twitter gives you a big SEO Advantage because if you see almost all twitter pages rank really high for their keywords. I mean when I type Syed Balkhi, twitter comes up second or third usually. Which goes onto show that you can use twitter to help your seo with the keyword on your profile.

14. It Sparks New Ideas

For an entrepreneur, an idea is worth millions. Well twitter is giving it to you for free. Often times, you will get ideas from the most irrelevant talks. Or maybe relevant talks. I believe that thoughts inspire thoughts. When you read another person’s thoughts on twitter, you can have your own creative ones, and one of them could be a million dollar idea that you have been waiting for. You should use twitter as a trend where web and society in general is shifting towards, and come up with ideas to target the most amount of users in a better way. This is the sole reason why alot of companies are joining twitter because they want to see what their audience think, and they want to keep up with the trend.

15. It’s Free and Fun

Twitter is like a free way of sending group sms to your friends. I just can’t describe how much fun twitter can be. If you want a hobby online. You are tired of facebook and others, then try twitter. It is a good distraction that you get from your current tasks although it can be sometimes when you need to be focused. It’s like a random instant messages and people follow you based on your messages, so you have enormous amount of friends. The possibilites if twitter touches the horizon. It is basically like a world wide forum where you are the moderator.

16. Twitter is a substitute to Digg

You thought digg was interesting huh because of the cool links that you were seeing. Twitter can be a substitute to digg. You just follow the right people like @mlane, and RichardLaksana. They send me more interesting articles than digg design can ever see. Because the fact is you won’t see half the most interesting articles on digg because the articles that you see on digg are popular made by powerdiggers, so it is just a view of powerdiggers. And believe it or not alot of these articles are from selected sites that make the top of digg anyways. Such as Smashingmagazine, Nettuts, and so on. Not often that you will see a smaller blog hit the FP because they don’t have enough popularity. Digg is a popularity contest, whereas twitter is more like a quality contest. If your article is deemed worthy, then people will Retweet it even those who are not your friends or know you.

17. It’s a Good Place to Vent

Hey if you don’t know all the security features of a blog and how to make it private, so you can vent. Twitter is really easy to do so. You can make your profile private, so other people can’t read your tweets, and you can vent as much as you like. If it helps you calm down and control your anger, then this is just the thing that you need.

18. Word of Mouth Advertising

There is not a better example of word of mouth advertising on the web then twitter. If people like your brand, or your product they will talk about it. I know I talk about alot of things I see on twitter in real life also. So that is another cool thing the brand is getting out there. Twitter provides result that you want for your business. Just follow the people in your niche and you will see the power of twitter.

19. It will help you learn more about yourself

Twitter is a chance for you to get to know other people. Scholars study culture and people, so by studying their culture, we get to know more about our own culture and ourselves. Twitter does the same thing. You get to know more about yourself because after tweeting for a while, you begin to see yourself through the eyes of your followers. This is a great change that I experienced since using twitter. It makes you more thoughtful about your life.

20. Parents can stay updated with Colleges

More and more colleges and professors are joining twitter, and they let their students follow them, and have creative discussions. This is a great way for the parent to learn about what their kid is doing. I know there are some parents who want to know everything their child is doing, or how is their performance in school. Well this is the way you can do it. Simply Join Twitter.

21. You can see what people think about you or your business

You can see what people really think about you. Twitter is where people are. They are freely expressing their opinion. You can use the search feature on twitter to see what people are talking about each topic. You can write your own name and see what people are talking about you. Whether they are talking good stuff, or bad stuff. It is better than those customer evaluation sheets that Macys and JCPenny ask you to do because not everyone does it. So you never get the neutral view out of it. You either read reviews that are super good or super bad. This shows you the general view about yourself, or a product that you are looking for.

“for businesses – to keep track of the reputation, so they can know when someone is saying something about them” ~ @EmperorAnton

22. Twitter Can Save You Money

Just think about it. If you can send text messages to your friends for free through twitter. Why would you want to have both text messages and internet on your phone. Cancel the text messages and just use twitter. It saves you money. Not just doing this. Twitter have exclusive discounts that you would never know about. There are coupons for products rolling out that we don’t see normally. Like the other day, I wouldn’t have registered my 99 Cents .com domain at godaddy if it wasn’t for twitter. I saw one of my friends tweeted it to me, and I went ahead and registered a domain. Saved myself $8 there. There are also twitter accounts that are specifically for good buys and good deals on the web and in stores. You can follow these accounts and enjoy the benefit of twitter and save yourself some money in the recession.

23. It is good for hosting a party

Yes YES It is. If you are hosting a party and you want to meet more people in your area. Simply tweet it and add tags for the location. This way you can make your party more popular and have fun. This is more for college students than anybody else.

24. You can join for the same reason you joined Facebook or Myspace

If you need this many reasons to join twitter, I want to know why you joined facebook or myspace because twitter can do all that and better. So use the same reasons you used to join facebook or myspace and join twitter.

“for not considered as dull, my friends join without knowing what is it all about. Maybe like another Facebook/MySpace stuff.” ~ @sayzlim

25. To follow me, and Be my friend

If none of the above reasons have convinced you to join twitter, then you should join twitter to follow me and be my friend. You know how cool I am. You definitely want to see what is going on in my life. O wait a minute, were you about to say that you don’t know how cool I am? Well that is because you are not following me on twitter. When you do follow me on twitter, you get to know more about me and you will see how cool I am. Secondly, I take alot of Sweet Monday Link Roundup suggestions from there, so if you want a free backlink from Balkhis join twitter and follow me @syedbalkhi and send me messages.

This was surely a long post, but I was keep finding more and more reasons to write about. Well I hope by now I have convinced you to join twitter. I hope you join twitter and follow me at @syedbalkhi and let me know how I am doing on Balkhis because I can always use some appreciations or some nudges if I mess up. I would love to know everyone who is reading thsi site, so I hope to see you on twitter.

Also I would like to thank all my friends on twitter who helped me made this post possible by contributing their thoughts about this topic. I would suggest each and everyone of you guys to follow all the cool people that send me their view.

Last but not the least, Feel free to post your twitter profiles if you are already on twitter, or you are joining twitter after reading this post, so everyone here can follow you