What is Twitter?
Twitter is a micro-blogging service that allows users to post short messages that show up in the Twitter feeds of the people who choose to follow your account. Twitter offers instantly updated information for just about anything you can imagine.
Here’s the catch: Twitter allows only 140 characters per post, called a tweet, so tap into your creative side to make your message fit.
What can Twitter do for me?
Twitter is an effective tool for University of the Pacific, McGeorge School of Law organizations and departments that need to share frequent content about meetings, events, news, and even emergency information.
How do I use Twitter?
Start by creating an account on Twitter.
Optimize your account for Twitter searches:
Note that a username and a name are two separate items. For example, PacificMcGeorge is the username and University of the Pacific, McGeorge School of Law is the name. Usernames are character-limited.
A carefully selected name is the most crucial part of being found in searches. This is because most users will not search for you by your exact username and will add spaces that do not match your username.
Make sure the name includes words you believe will be used when searching for the profile; McGeorge, Law, etc.
Enter your email address, password, and agree to Twitter’s Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy.
By doing so, you must not:
- Impersonate others through the Twitter service
- Publish or post other people’s private and confidential information
- Publish or post direct, specific threats of violence against others
- Use the service for any unlawful purpose or for promotion of illegal activities
- Create serial accounts for disruptive or abusive purposes
- Engage in username squatting
- Use Twitter.com’s address book contact import to send repeat, mass invitations
- Publish or link to malicious content intended to damage or disrupt another user’s browser or computer or to compromise a user’s privacy
- Use the Twitter service for the purpose of spamming anyone
- Use obscene or pornographic images in either your profile picture or user background
Customize your profile
Use the column on the right side of your account page to upload a profile picture, write a short bio, and set up Twitter on your mobile phone so you can post tweets from anywhere.
The one line bio will appear with the username and name in search results. Use this area to note your relationship to Pacific McGeorge School of Law if your username and name have not already made this clear.
For example, only using “Pacific” may create confusion since our sister schools may use the same term.
Start tweeting
Stay under the 140-character restriction.
Use shorthand and post links that provide more information.
Include links.
Drive followers to your website section or page from tweets. Inbound links also improve your page rankings with search engines.
Links can be long and quickly take over a tweet’s 140-character limit.
Use bit.ly or TinyURL to shorten them.
Tweet regularly.
Appoint more than one person to tweet if possible if that is what is needed to continue regular content.
Understand why people follow you.
If your followers want information about the group you represent, they probably don’t want to know your daily activities.
Follow others.
This allows communication between you and your followers and is part of Twitter etiquette.
Re-tweet!
Tweet the content posted by another Twitter user.
Use hashtags.
Hashtags consist of using the # symbol followed by subject words such as #mcgeorge. They help organize information, make tweets searchable, and are conversation drivers.
Incorporate other Twitter users.
If you wanted to incorporate the law school, you might tweet: “The program is run out of @pacificmcgeorge.”
Use other tools.
Research external applications that are designed to help Twitter users enhance the Twitter experience. The Twitter website itself is prone to going down based on heavy traffic so consider skipping Twitter.com to manage your Twitter accounts and check out more reliable management services including TweetDeck and Hootsuite.
Use photos in your tweets. TwitPic allows users to upload photos from the web or a mobile device and post them on Twitter in a very easy fashion. Other picture tools include yfrog and Plixi.
Additional resources