I love Twitter. If you are serious about personal branding, Twitter is a very effective place to connect with people that share an interest in your value. In this video, I discuss some tips for attracting followers and finding others to follow.
Make sure your Twitter profile has YOUR name, a professional picture, and a good statement of your value platform – what you can do uniquely well to help others address opportunities or solve problems that matter to them. If you have a blog (and you should!), then link to your blog; if not, link to your Linkedin profile. The point is you want your profile set up such that when people find you they can determine your value quickly and decide if you are someone they want to follow.
Some people follow everyone that follows them, but I don’t. When someone follows me, I go to their profile and try to find their value. I click on the link to their website if they provide one and check out their page. I also look at their most current tweets. If I can find something that I would retweet to my community of followers, then I will follow that person. If I can’t find something that I would retweet to my friends, then I don’t follow them back.
When you find someone you really like following on Twitter, go to their profile and see who they are following. Read down their page of tweets and see who is engaging them in conversation. These could be great folks for you to follow!
Twitter lists is a great new feature that can help you quickly find folks to follow. If you are following someone you really like, go look at the lists they are on and you will find that others have done a lot of work for you identifying followers with common interests. When you find a dozen or so folks closely aligned with your value, create your own Twitter list and put them on it!
Don’t pay any attention to how many people are following you. If you consistently contribue valuable content, and acknowlegde those that do the same by re-tweeting their content, people will find you eventually.
Related Posts:
Personal Branding: How and Why I Use Twitter
Personal Branding: Some Simple First Steps
You should follow me on twitter here.
