Twitter is obviously a hot topic right now. Everyone’s using it, or at least trying it out. It’s becoming part of business’ daily operations, and I’m looking for stories of how people have used Twitter for their business. What’s worked? What hasn’t?

I’d love to hear your success stories and your horror stories. Leave a comment below!

It took me quite a while to figure out where this ability was in the Twitter interface, so I wanted to share it with you. Did you know you can grab the permalink for a single tweet? A permalink is the permanent URL address on a website. There may be times when during your Twitter experience when you want to link to someone’s tweet. Because people may read your tweet a day, week or month later than you posted it, if you reference someone else’s tweet, it’s a good idea to include that permanent link so people can follow the conversation and understand what you’re talking about.

On the Twitter website, go to the person’s profile and look for the time stamp on the tweet you’re linking. See the example above: “about 12 hours ago”. That will give you a page with just one tweet and nothing else. This way it’s very clear which tweet your referencing.

My 12 Days of Twitter tips series has come to a close. If you missed any of the days, I’ve gathered them below so you can access them all in one spot.

Lots of questions and topics came up in conversations due to the series. I’ll be posting more tips and tricks in the near future. If there’s something I can help you with, leave a comment below!

Introduction to the 12 Days of Twitter
Day 1: The Secret Code: What are all those initials and symbols?
Day 2: Use TweetDeck to Manage Conversations
Day 3: Share Your Funny Anecdotes While They’re Still Funny
Day 4: Follow Responsibly
Day 5: 3 Newbie Mistakes Made by New Tweeters
Day 6: Use Twitter Search to Connect and Find
Day 7: Twitter Mobile
Day 8: Five Awesome Things You Can Do with Twitter
Day 9: Mix It Up!
Day 10: If You’re Not a TweetDeck, You Might Be a Seesmic
Day 11: Twitter for Prizes and Profit
Day 12: Schedule Tweets in Advance

Follow Cali Lewis on Twitter

12 Days of Twitter :: Day 12

(What the heck are the 12 days of Twitter?)

Every day, I tweet a This Day in History tidbit. That wasn’t a plan. I did it randomly a couple times and people started asking for it every day. I actually love doing it now, but it’s an obligation (I use that word in the best possible way). I let myself become obligated. Every day I wake up knowing I need to pick a historical item for that day. What if I could sit down and do all that at once and automate the process? I could do the thing I WANT to do, but free myself from the obligation.

I haven’t done it yet, but FutureTweets is the tool for scheduling a tweet that I plan to use.

Whether you’re wanting to schedule a company announcement, a birthday wish, or a link to a blog post, services like FutureTweets can make your life easier, one tweet at a time.

First, register for an account. You’ll then need to grant FutureTweets access to your Twitter account so it can post your messages. Once you’re in, click Schedule and write your post. Now, choose whether you want this tweet to be a one time tweet, or have it occur every week, month or year. For example, you might want to publicly tweet on your anniversary how much you love your wife or husband, fully aware that you’re likely to forget it’s your anniversary. FutureTweets will tell the world and maybe remind you that you’re romantically inclined.

Just choose the desired date and time of your tweet, and you’re done! If you decide you need to make a change to the tweet text or date, you’ll be able to edit it after it’s saved. Beware, though! It won’t ask you for confirmation if you click the delete button.

Obviously, you won’t want to use this for every single tweet, because spontaneity is good, but it’s a great tool for helping you use Twitter for effectively and efficiently.

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Read More

Introduction to the 12 Days of Twitter
Day 1: The Secret Code: What are all those initials and symbols?
Day 2: Use TweetDeck to Manage Conversations
Day 3: Share Your Funny Anecdotes While They’re Still Funny
Day 4: Follow Responsibly
Day 5: 3 Newbie Mistakes Made by New Tweeters
Day 6: Use Twitter Search to Connect and Find
Day 7: Twitter Mobile
Day 8: Five Awesome Things You Can Do with Twitter
Day 9: Mix It Up!
Day 10: If You’re Not a TweetDeck, You Might Be a Seesmic
Day 11: Twitter for Prizes and Profit

12 Days of Twitter :: Day 11

(What the heck are the 12 days of Twitter?)

There’s been a lot of controversy lately about Twitter spam. I’ve already talked about the kind that we don’t have to want. The kind you can get rid of by unfollowing or blocking. Tonight though, I’m writing about something that many people might argue isn’t spam at all. It’s stuff in the gray area, and if it isn’t spam, at the very least, it’s Twitter pollution. You’ve seen it. It’s everywhere. Companies create a contest that encourages people to tweet with a branded hashtag. I’m a capitalist. I’m all about free speech, so I think if a company wants to do that, they should have the right to do it, but my hope is that the Twitter community will say no by not participating.

Twitter is a great place for community, and communities are a great place to do giveaways to promote a product or service. Giveaways are fun for community members, and get lots of attention for companies. If you spend more than five minutes a day on Twitter, I’m guessing you’ve seen multiple tweets with #squarespace and #moonfruit in them lately. The tweets have absolutely nothing to do with the companies Square Space or Moonfruit, though. The included hashtag is purely an effort to enter a contest put on by those companies to win something, and the rules typically specify that you can tweet about anything you want, as long as you include the branded hashtag.

In full disclosure, Square Space is coming on board as a new sponsor of GeekBrief.TV. While I like the service they provide, I don’t agree with any company using hashtag spam to create interest in a contest. If you’re one of the people who doesn’t think it’s specifically spam, I think you’ll agree that it does add clutter and confusion.

Now, I want to be clear on something. I love giveaways! I love the use of Twitter for giveaways. I just think there’s a better way.

I’ve use a service called TwitRand to do giveaways. I let everyone know I’ll be doing a giveaway in the next month (or whatever the time frame is … usually a Drobo). They have to be following me in order to enter, then I let TwitRand randomly pick a follower. I have nothing to do with the outcome, so I can’t be biased in picking a winner, and I don’t have to do any extra work in collecting information from the contest entries. It’s much cleaner and much simpler.

The downside to this option is it doesn’t get people involved. There are ways to get people involved that doesn’t clutter up the space, though. You could ask a trivia question, you could ask people to comment on something and pick the funniest response. You can also use TwitRand to pick a random person that has retweeted a particular phrase or keyword. There are many options that encourage your followers to be active without cluttering up Twitter and confusing people who aren’t clued into what’s going on.

When you’re building a business, the only thing that really matters is your reputation. MoonFuit and SquareSpace are good companies. Their Twitter spam damages them more than it helps. On Twitter, you want your message to be who you really are. Companies will always offer you incentives to be something different, but no amount of money is worth adding and abeding the twitter spammers.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on contests and Twitter. Leave a comment below!

Follow Cali Lewis on Twitter

Read More

Introduction to the 12 Days of Twitter
Day 1: The Secret Code: What are all those initials and symbols?
Day 2: Use TweetDeck to Manage Conversations
Day 3: Share Your Funny Anecdotes While They’re Still Funny
Day 4: Follow Responsibly
Day 5: 3 Newbie Mistakes Made by New Tweeters
Day 6: Use Twitter Search to Connect and Find
Day 7: Twitter Mobile
Day 8: Five Awesome Things You Can Do with Twitter
Day 9: Mix It Up!
Day 10: If You’re Not a TweetDeck, You Might Be a Seesmic
Day 12: Schedule Tweets in Advance