I once read somewhere that "a good tweet is like a mini skirt - long enough to cover the subject but short enough to keep things interesting".
After falling about laughing for about five minutes I got thinking that it couldn't be truer. Here are my top tips for creating the perfect tweet:
Think about your audience and what they want to hear. Chances are they'd rather be entertained or educated than hear your corporate messages vomited out in 140 characters. As with all social media channels, it's about building relationships and communicating with customers on their level, not spouting out corporate jargon direct from your latest brochure.
Most people are interested in tweets that will either educate or entertain them. As a guide, tips, advice, news and useful offers are always popular and can easily be tied subtly into your key messages.
Ensure you're directing people to further information (ideally your own website) by adding links. This is also the easiest way to monitor how people are responding to your tweets. Use an intelligent url shortener such as bit.ly or owl.ly, which is built into Hootsuite, and you'll be able to see how many people have clicked on your link.
Use the information to improve your communications - not to create pretty (but useless) pie charts to show your MD what a great job you're doing. Look at the tweets with the highest click-throughs and think - what is it about this tweet people liked? Figure it out and create more tweets like this.
An RT is one of the biggest compliments in the Twittersphere - it means your content is so good your followers want to share it with everyone they know. Make sure they can share your tweets by leaving space for an RT. Ideally this means an update of 90 characters or less.
Like the mini skirt quote, a headline needs to let the reader know what you're talking about without giving it all away. By telling the whole story, followers have no reason to click through for more information.
Tweets such as "How to recreate Cheryl Cole's signature up-do", "Top five tips on saving money on your electricity bill" and "Gary Barlow's threat to X Factor act" are all good examples of how to entice readers without giving it all away.
One of the biggest mistakes companies make with Twitter is to use it solely for pushing out their own content. The way you'll get the most out of Twitter is when you use it to communicate, build relationships and share with others.
I schedule all of Carswell Gould's tweets on a Monday morning so I can spend the rest of the week listening to what others have to say on Twitter, communicate with them and get involved in their conversations.
To find out how Carswell Gould can help you create and carry out a successful social media strategy call Ed Gould on 023 80 238001 or tweet him at @marcommcreative.
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