If getting more retweets is your case, then check out the study called The Science of Retweeting by Dan Zarrella. After having spent 9 months in analyzing 5 million tweets and 40 million retweets, he has now published his Nine tips and tricks on how to get retweeted on Twitter.

To those who are still wondering in why we need retweets, Dan Zarrella explains that retweets may seem like a small idea, but are applicable to the viral concept for other media.

Well, here are the key conclusions of his study:

1. The shortest links get the most retweets.

Retweets contain 3 times as many links as normal tweets. New URL shorteners such as bit.ly, ow.ly, is.gd are more popular than longer ones such as tinyurl.

2. Ask for retweets.

Contrary to popular belief, it is favorable to you if you openly ask people to retweet you. According to Dan Zarrella, the words “please”, “retweet”, “check out”, and “new blog post” are often to be found in retweets.

3. Be pertinent.

Facts such as you may not have slept well or are drinking wine right now do not interest anyone. If you do not have anything interesting to tweet, you better do not.

4. Do not use abbreviations.

Retweets contain more syllables per word than normal tweets and are more difficult to understand.

5. Use punctuation marks, but avoid semicolons.

98% of retweets contain punctuation marks, while 86% of normal tweets do. The most popular punctuation marks in retweets are: the colon, the period, the exclamation mark, and finally the comma. Punctuation marks to avoid: the hyphen, the question mark, the ellipsis and the semicolon.

6. Tweet original content.

This may sound banal, but is still important to mention: original content is retweeted much more than already known and popular information.

7. Use names.

Retweets mostly contain nouns, proper names and verbs in the third person (example: Lindsay Lohan escapes from rehab facility; ).

8. Be pertinent.

Tweets about work, religion, money, media and celebrities are retweetd more often than tweets containing vulgarities, negative emotions or ones that talk about the author himself.

9. Wait for the ideal time to tweet.

Tweet on Friday afternoons at about 16:00. The proof is below…

Are you ready to tweet now : )

Few days ago i discovered Yahoo! Know Your Mojo – a site launched by the Yahoo! portal, claiming to know who you are on Twitter.

The twist is very simple, the user has to enter their Twitter username and then in turn is analyzed by being compared to the 16 possible user profiles.

According to online testimonials, however, the site does not do what it promises to, as you sometimes do not get the same mojo if you try it several times with one username.

No matter the effectiveness of the site, it still represents a victory for the hegemony of Twitter and its ability to generate buzz. There is an obvious proof for that: the US Internet leader uses Twitter to promote their new homepage.

To take advantage of twitter magic you need to log on to the site using your Twitter login and password. There you have list of spells and other magical elements of the Harry Potter universe. Once you choose a spell your potion is prepared and is up to you to whom of your Twitter followers to send it. They will then receive your link which leads to an animation based on your the spell you chose. Upon clicking on the link the user will think that his Twitter page got enchanted, but actually what he will be seeing will be a clone of his page on a different URL.

The recepient will also be invited to watch the new Harry Potter trailer or send a spell to some of their Twitter followers .

In a nutshell, this is a great and simple example of  a campaign that combines buzz marketing and social media.

Twitter was due for maintenance during the Iranian elections, but for some reason maintenance was postponed. It appears that the US Government may have had to deal with this. Twitter were asked to delay the maintenance so that Iranian people are allowed to communicate with each other while this difficult period. This shows, yet again, that Twitter as well as other new media can have a very important role in society. Just recently Facebook launched a Persian version of the site in order to facilitate communication for Iranians.

The other buzz is related to Volkswagen and has nothing to do with politics. Volkswagen have launched an interactive banner (you can check it HERE) that lets you find which Volkswagen car is mostly suitable for you. To find out all you need to do is to enter your Twitter user name into the banner. Then it analyzes your profile/tweets data and suggests you a VW model

It is inevitable to ask ourselves, however, whether Twitter is necessarily the best choice for a brand’s communication. Surely, Twitter, has skyrocketed its number of users in a very short period of time, but there are still a lot of people that have never heard of Twitter and would not be interested in this banner ad, at all. By using Twitter for this ad, Volkswagen voluntarily excluded a huge part of their target audience, but on the flip side, those people that use Twitter and are fans will highly appreciate the creativity and the interactivity of the ad.

]]> http://psykoid.com/2009/06/latest-buzz-on-twitter-vw-and-iranian-elections/feed/ 4 http://psykoid.com/2009/05/just-created-a-twibe/ http://psykoid.com/2009/05/just-created-a-twibe/#comments Tue, 19 May 2009 11:35:29 +0000 psykoid http://psykoid.com/?p=748 In short Twibes are Twitter groups. As any other groups, groups are on topic. For now every twitter user can create up to 3 groups. The tool is really interesting, found it today and just created a group named EXPOSED.

I INVITE ALL OF YOU WHO ARE INTERESTED TO JOIN THE GROUP.

Via this tool i will be able to update you more frequently with what i find and will surely post much more links than i post here. You will be welcome to post links with what you find as well and i will also be very happy if you invite more people interested in particular type of products and show them together that they do not need to pay for crap. The place will also be open for any other topic you’d like to discuss. If we network together we can learn and be informed better – many small ideas can be better than one idea – remember that : )

If you would like to join this twibe just visit:

http://twibes.com/exposed

As a result other people started providing the needed tools (sold via clickbank of course) to generate more and more followers, viral tweets, etc.

Inevitably the following question occurs:

Is Twitter yet another platform which “marketers” (in this case i’d rather say “spammers”) are going to corrupt?

For a really short time a majority of people got to generate more than 10 000 followers and flood twitter with their affiliate and cpa offer links. This made me stop following back people who have more than 1000 followers, unless i know them personally.

By nature Twitter is a simple social appication and everybody loves it because of its simplicity. As i have written some time back – people love Twitter, because there is no right or wrong way to use it – there are people who use Twitter to just update statuses, others to chat, others to coordinate events, and recently there are people who try to market on Twitter.

I’d ask the latter if they know what is the difference between a marketer and spammer?

Marketers build relationships no matter the channels they use to market. Real marketers value their potential customers and this is why they are less likely to disappoint their customer. Real marketers are not aiming at your one-time spent 20$ – they want you to come back for more, which means – they will not scam you.

Spammers – they do not have customers. They are just looking for a way to earn some quick money.
Spammers target at larger audiences since it is more likely to make, let’s say, 3 people to buy out of 30 000; hence the fact that Twitter is getting crowded with spammers.

What drivers spammers in Twitter is the idea that – When you follow someone, they are very likely to follow you back.

They use software to follow 30 000 people, for example, and at least the half of them follow them back. Then spammers start blasting some affiliate/cpa links and hope they’d convert. Even if they do not – it does not cost them anything to try.

I’d definitely advise spammers to stop blasting only affiliate/cpa links and start talking like real people from time to time. Remember – as it is with mail lists – your relationship with these people is much more important than the size of your list. Focus on building on relationships with people.

And i would also advise the regular Twitter users to pay attention whom they follow, do not let yourself be flooded.

I WANT TWITTER BACK!

Have you ever asked yourself the question why you love Twitter so much? Personally i do not get addicted to any online platform, i tend to be more of a rational person and i use many platforms with equal appeal, but recently i find myself wondering for what to tweet next!

I know many people who have never been in any way tempted by the web, but yet they use Twitter, and nothing else.

There may be different reasons for people to love Twitter so much, but here are mine:

1. Social Conversation Made Easy

Unlike other social platforms (blogs, facebook, etc), Twitter is easy and very quick to sign-up with and takes relatively a small time investment. Getting started is easy, it is not complex and it supports just enough, straight-to-the point features.

2. Mobility

“Tweets” can be sent as well via Mobiles as via PCs. Its mobility makes it a powerful tool to stay in touch with an extended group of people (followers) when you are away from your “box”.

3. There is no right or wrong way to use it!

Well, Twitter is a place for any kind of people. Some just tweet what they are doing, others chat, exchange links and co-ordinate events, and others even market with Twitter. Using Twitter depends only on your personal appeal.

4. I can connect my blog to Twitter

Today i came across TwitterFeed – a plug-in which updates on a regular basis my tweets with the latest posts from my blog. I heartfully recommend it. You will need an OpenID to sign-up with it.

5. I can use it for business

Using Twitter for business is not something new. Every social platform, actually, is used for business more than it is used from just regular users who just want to SHAREEEE ; ) Using twitter for business is a different topic, however, but i recommend you this article HERE. I came across this blog accidentally today, but i found it interesting. You can find its link in my Blogroll – Hype Free Internet Tips. Also its webmaster looks like a very nice guy.

So, why do you love Twitter? : )

Hello, thank God it is Saturday already:) When i woke up this morning and and had my regular coffee i decided to look up the internet and collect a list of Internet marketing gurus’ Twitter link so that i can follow them. Half an hour later i found an interesting article on
Marketing Pilgrim with a list of 200+ Social Media Experts, Internet Marketers and SEO gurus. You all should know that Twitter is a powerful versatile marketing tool.

Would it sound motivating if i tell you that if you follow these people on Twitter you will most likely be followed by them too?

So go checck the list, if you dont know who most of these people are, look them up, find their websites and blogs, you are surely going to gain valuable knowledge.

200+ Marketing gurus’ Twitter accounts