How to Grow a Targeted Twitter Following
If you’re like me, you might be a little wary of automated solutions that allow you to grow your Twitter list exponentially, but also have the potential of getting your account shut down. So instead, I thought I would share with you my simple strategy for slowly and steadily growing your Twitter followers.
This isn’t about getting a huge number of just any Twitter followers, but a smaller concentration of Twitter followers that will be interested in your content.
Tweet Links with Author’s Twitter Handle
If you read and tweet blog posts a lot, chances are you are using the Tweet button on the post or an app like Buffer to schedule your tweets. But one thing you might be missing out on with either approach is adding the blog post author’s Twitter handle to your tweet. Let’s say you were tweeting a post off of Mashable, for example. It’s not likely that @Mashable will notice your tweet considering they have dozens of posts daily that are getting tweeted around 1,000+ tweets each.
The people who might notice your tweets, however, are the authors of those posts. Simply click on the name of the author to get to their author page.
There, you will find a link to their Twitter profile.
When you tweet the post, be sure to include the author’s Twitter handle in the tweet and also follow the author.
Does this work all of the time? Of course not. But if you’re already tweeting a blog post, you might as well take the extra moment or two to find the author’s Twitter handle and include them in on the tweet. As a bonus, if you do establish a good relationship with a regular author on a major blog, you could ask them to introduce you to their editor to get a great guest posting gig for yourself!
Follow People Who Tweet Your Posts
Do you notice the same person regularly tweeting your posts? Simply follow them and thank them for tweeting you! This personal interaction may get them to follow you back if they are not following you already.
Follow People You Converse With
Do you get the occasional Twitter question from someone who isn’t following you? If they’re talking about your niche or industry, be sure to answer and follow them. They’ll likely take notice and follow you back since you’ll be fresh on their mind!
Monitor Keyword Discussions
Not sure where to find new followers? Try this approach. Search for a particular keyword on Twitter to see who is talking about it.
You can save your searches on Twitter itself or, better yet, save this search in a Twitter management tool like HootSuite so you can continuously monitor it.
Whenever someone asks a good question, answer it and follow the person. Since you’re helping them out, they’ll likely view you as an authority and follow you back for more information!
Include Hashtags
Last, but not least, make sure you get the most exposure for your tweets by simply adding a keyword hashtag to them. You know things like #seo, #socialmedia, and #blogging are popular. But if you’re not sure about others, use Tospy Analytics to search hashtag ideas to see which ones get the most usage.
Beneath the graph, you can see the types of tweets that are shared with that hashtag and the number of influential users that use it.
By doing this, the people who follow that hashtag will see your tweet as well as the people who create Paper.li papers and other content based around the hashtag.
How Do You Grow a Steady Following on Twitter?
These are just a few ways to build a slow and steady following on Twitter that shouldn’t backfire and get your account penalized. What other methods do you use to build followers?
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22 Comments
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I totally agree with you. If you want a twitter following that is going to keep following you they need to like what you are doing. If you build relationships with your followers you will have more long term followers that care about you because you care about them.
Exactly! Too many people build a following that isn’t interested in them, and that doesn’t help in the least!
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Kristi Hines recently posted..Your Essential Guide to LinkedIn
This is such a great post! Tagging actual authors of posts (vs. just Mashable) is something I need to remember to do more often, thanks for the reminder!
@michaelwithana
You’re welcome! I just started doing this a few months ago, and I notice I get a lot more response from the authors than the main blog itself.
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Kristi Hines recently posted..Your Essential Guide to LinkedIn
Some great tips and I’m definitely going to start monitoring keywords as it seems like a good way to find people to build a relationship with.
By the way, its nice to hear that there are other people using hootsuite out there. Seems tweetdeck is the current rage.
- Josh
Josh recently posted..The Occasional “Thank You”
I’ve always been 100% team HootSuite. When I started out looking at both, Tweetdeck only had a desktop version. Now I’m too committed to HootSuite to try anything else!
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Kristi Hines recently posted..6 Indispensable Free & Freemium SEO Tools
Slow and steady wins the race…
One thing that I was always reluctant to do is to follow too many people. I just get overwhelmed seeing too many tweets in my timeline.
I know I can create lists and all, but then I forget to check them.
Other than that, definitely love and use most of these tips, Kristi!
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Ana recently posted..Market Samurai
Over-following can lead to information overload on the tweet stream. That’s why I like following authors of sites I read – the blogs I follow are in my industry, so I know the authors will likely be discussing things I’m interested in.
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Kristi Hines recently posted..6 Indispensable Free & Freemium SEO Tools
I find it really hard to steer clear of tools that help you to grow your Twitter following automatically. I mean, we are all attracted to the easy button solutions in life, right?
Carrie Simpson recently posted..Why Do I Sweat So Much?
Very true Carrie! It’s easy to get caught in the hype.
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Kristi Hines recently posted..6 Indispensable Free & Freemium SEO Tools
I really loved this post! I’ll be pinning it on pinterest!
George recently posted..Speaking your truth: it’s not just for you
Thanks George! I appreciate the pin!
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Kristi Hines recently posted..6 Indispensable Free & Freemium SEO Tools
Everything is in the process, if you really wanted to gain a lot of follower you need first to built up a kind of tricks were you can make your name be known with most of us… Success is a matter of tricks/ strategies…
Lacey12 recently posted..Get Money that you need Now with Fast Cash Loans
This posting has been remarkable helpful. Maybe that’s because I know so little about Twitter, but I haven’t been using hash tags and I’ve had the account for six months!
Charles Fyler recently posted..Free Legal Advice To Help Save Your Identity
I still forget to use hashtags sometimes Charles.
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Kristi Hines recently posted..6 Indispensable Free & Freemium SEO Tools
Great tips Kristi, I found that using hashtags and using people handles are the best ways, specially if you can help people directly.
Jamie Northrup recently posted..The Lil Wayne Guide to Producing Content
Thanks Jamie! Glad to hear that strategy is working for you too!
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Kristi Hines recently posted..6 Indispensable Free & Freemium SEO Tools
great piece .. it’s heart warming to have my crazy tweeting habits confirmed as having some real purpose .. thanks kristi ( p.s. i’ll have to include you in my twitterfeed as well )
tbaoo recently posted..why not vote for tbaoo @ blog engage
Great tips, I know this kind of strategy is very effective that can bring a huge help for getting the beautiful change on the stuff…
nicole recently posted..http://muranoplace.com
What a great strategy, I know that these several tips can bring a huge help to all of us…
Audrey recently posted..Rôle du notaire lors d’une transaction immobilière
Thanks for sharing with us this great idea, this strategy is cool and I know it will bring huge help to all…
Trisha28 recently posted..Construire du muscle vite
I do love to pin it with my friends, truly indeed post that surely bring the best…
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