My Twitter 911 call is below, but first off: Don't miss uber-awesome Lola Sharp's epic give-away contest. Her recent vacation in Maine inspired the prizes up for grabs, including Stephen King's On Writing, the scariest fridge magnet you've ever seen, featuring that freaky clown from It (the movie), a bottle of Lola's signature scent (Marc Jacob's perfume sharing her name), AND a surprise prize from Maine, (I'm hoping it's a lobster, but that's just me :D).
You have to be a Sharp Pen/Dull Sword follower to enter (and she's one of the wittiest, most creative bloggers I know, so you "win" just by following!)
Contest ends August 20th! Enter HERE!
Now...I need your help.
I joined Twitter...and I'm a little confuzzled and would love some help figuring it all out.
Anyone with answers and/or tips regarding the following, please feel free to comment below or email me at heftynicki(at)writing(dot)com:
* Is there some sort of main page where everyone's tweets stream in real time? Or do you only see what's on your home page timeline, ie: the tweets by the people you follow?
* If I search in Twitter, do I have to know the hashtag, or can I type any subject/keyword in there?
* Is there a place on my Twitter homepage where I can store people's usernames, so I don't have to go to their page to remember their @username?
* And if so, how do I add their @username at the end of my tweet? (Gawd, I'm such a Twitter newbie *blush*)
* What in the hell is #FF????
* ANY tips on Twitter etiquette are greatly appreciated, including:
-- Do I thank people who follow me? ...how?
-- Do people direct tweets at other people, or only respond to general tweets people send out?
-- What's an example of being rude on Twitter?
-- What's the general "follow back" policy?
Okay, that's enough questions, for now. If these spark ideas in areas I didn't cover, don't hold back! Share your thoughts in the comment area!
Huge shout-out to everyone who's already noticed little me over there and clicked the follow button. I appreciate you so much!!
39 comments:
First, THANK YOU, my sweet friend, for the pimping, and for being you. I'm honored to have you in my life.
AND,as you know, I only joined Twitter last week, so I can't answer many of your questions (and am looking forward to reading the answers you get here)...BUT, I know one answer (thanks to Summer):
#FF means Friday Follow (I think they're pimping their friends, which is nice)
Happy Friday, Nic!
Love,
Lola
Lola, I didn't know you just began twittering! And #FF -- Ohhhhhh, that makes sense! So the idea is to generate new follower-ship for your Twitter friends, correct?
I ain't no follow-back girl. And by that I mean that I absolutely do NOT abide by the auto-follow form on Twitter (neither on Blogger, but Twitter is worse).
Your home page shows the tweets of only those whom you follow.
If you want to note someone in your tweet, just say: i melted outside today @NicDwrites --kind of like a tag, you know? Or you can do it at the beginning. It's a stylistic choice, in my opinion.
I'm not the best person to answer the other questions, so I'll leave those to someone more Twitter savvy than I.
PS: You're going to get a lot of spammers who follow you. I usually go back to their profile and block them.
Twitter is SO confusing when you first join, I totally understand your questions. It took me a while to find out.
Uh, this may get long. Just be warned.
So, ahem, I guess you could store usernames as in a "list" if you want, and then refer to that? Basically you click options under people's avatars and then add then to a new list. It stores people in a group, like some people have one for literary agents etc. That could work?
Nextly, I think you can easily type just the subject into the search bar e.g. typing "Follow Friday" will take you to the hashtag #FF. So it could work.
:)
You can thank if you want, by sending a Direct Message (which can only be sent to people following you) or publicly. You don't have to, some people do and some people don't.
If you directly reply to a person using an @reply only you, them and people following BOTH you and them will see the message. If you want to generally reply so everyone can see what you said, some people put the name at the end of the tweet.
Um, I guess being rude would be sort of the same as on blogger, you know? Just maitain respect for others and have fun :D
I'm such a self proclaimed twitter failure, I'm really not one to answer any of these. LOL
BUT... I don't follow back who follow me, just because they followed me. I think that's silly. I do go look at their feed to see if I like what they tweet.
#FF is what Lola said, it's where you recommend your favorite people to others, so people who follow you can decide if they want to follow them, or not. It's like saying, these are my favorite tweeps, go follow them. I always forget to do it.
SOME people send a DM to people who follow them. A lot of people don't like that.
I don't know about storing their @ names, I generally tweet from phone, and when I start to type @Soandso it remembers it for me, it makes it so much easier. I notice as I sit here, twitter on the web doesn't do that. (Yea, I had to check.) Twitter on the web doesn't do a lot of things. IF I tweet from the web, it's generally in reply to something, so I just write my tweet around their name so I don't mess it up. heh.
Oh I'm so glad you asked about #FF. I was too embarrassed to ask for myself. Mia and THMafi are the smartest twitter geniuses I know.
Summer~ Where's the auto-follow form? I looked in my account preferences, etc. and can't find it.
And thanks for alerting me about spammers. I haven't found any...yet :D
Mia~ Thanks for all this great info! I appreciate it more than you know. I've wondered about the lists option, and will try that out.
Especially thanks for clearing up the difference between putting @username in the beginning and the end of a tweet. Very helpful!
I use TweetDeck (google it and you can download for free) which keeps everything in real time and you can filter what you want to follow or not. It's fairly simple to use, once you play with it a bit. And no one on Twitter will hurt you or stop following you if you make a mistake. :) It's a friendly bunch!
Crystal~ Thanks a bunch! I love reading your tweets, btw. Always fun! I wish I could use my mobile phone, but for now I only work from my computer. :D
Matt~ I was embarrassed to ask! LOL People say there's no such thing as a stupid question...yeah, right!
The more you use it, the more you'll figure it out. The hope is that you don't get frustrated with it before that time because there is some really good things about Twitter.
I especially like the chats that you can find, ex: #scribechat - it happens on Thursdays and writers of all genres get together to discuss and share various writing tips/advice. You can also find other groups like #querychat, #askagent, #yalitchat and so on.
Just have fun!
Hi Kristi~ Yes, I was wondering about TweetDeck. And, there's another one like it, right? Does using TweetDeck help you avoid getting bumped off Twitter for "site overload" issues? I noticed during high volume hours Twitter tends to go down momentarily (or longer, as was the case last night).
Anybody else have thoughts on this?
Jaydee~ Really? How cool! Gonna start hunting them out today! Thanks :D
I borrowed TWITTER FOR DUMMIES from the library, though I'm still trying to figure things out. I recently discovered that if you click on your @ on your page (e.g. @stinall), it shows all the tweats with your link. Which means you can see when someone sent you a message. I missed a lot of messages until I figured that out. ;)
Stina~ That is a GREAT tip! Last night I signed on and noticed, purely by accident, that someone had sent me an @NicoleDwrites. The tweet was buried under a page of other people's tweets that came in while I was away. Thanks for telling me how to check in and not miss anything!
And thanks for the follow! I followed ya back :D
I agree - that is one SCARY magnet!
Sadly, I'm not on Twitter so I can't help you. I keep saying I'm going to join.....
Ok, I <3 Twitter. And honestly, most of my friends just tolerate it. But I love it. So here's what I've got for you, though I know you've received some of these answers already. And sorry that this is OMG Holy long.
*No. On your home page when you sign in is just tweets of people you follow, including @replies from those same people to you or between people who you follow. If someone you follow replies to someone you don't follow, you won't see that tweet unless they put a period mark (".") before the person's @username and then it becomes like a regular tweet.
*you can just type the word. It will pull up any tweet with that word in it.
*No place to "store" usernames. However, they are all in your following/followers lists. Also, if you use an app like Twitter for Blackberry or something similar and reply from that, as soon as you type @ and start the name, it will bring up a drop down box of names you can pick from. Not on Twitter/Tweetdeck, though.
*If you're replying to someone and it's just a conversation between you two, you can just @username them at the beginning, but really, so long as you drop the @username in anywhere in your tweet, it will show up in their stream under their @replies (also referred to as mentions)
*#FF = #followfriday = a list of users you suggest other people to follow, done on Fridays. Also, there is #WW = #writerwednesday. Same principle, applicable to writers.
*Etiquette: It's pretty general and basic, but here's some "it's always nice" pointers.
1)if someone gives you a #ff or #ww shout out, thank them by simply replying or RT, which is retweeting with a thank you.
2)The great thing about Twitter is you can have the most random conversations with people you've never met, so just make sure that if you are @ in a tweet, that you reply. It's nice not to be ignored. But you can @ anyone.
3)Rude on Twitter is basically being trollish like on any other site. Don't think people are being rude if it takes them a while to reply. Not everyone is on Twitter all the time, so be prepared to have responses to tweets come hours, sometimes days after the fact.
4)There's no "follow back" policy. Follow who you want to. No one's going to think lesser of you if you don't follow them back. :)
**Also, I saw a note about someone who uses Tweetdeck in your above comments. I also use Tweetdeck, in addition to regular Twitter.com and Twitter for BB, but Tweetdeck is NOT real time. There's a delay of up to 10 minutes depending on settings. But no matter what, it is not as fast as Twitter.com or some of the phone apps. But it is a great tool to keep organized in Twitter. Only downside is it limits how far back in Twitter you can go (timeline wise).
Hope that helps. Again super sorry for how LONG this is!
I think most of your questions were answered, which is good, as I held few answers for you!
Theresa~ I always said I didn't want/need to use Twitter, for the same reasons I don't FaceBook, ie: there's too much drama in my immediate family (four sisters, yeah) and I didn't want any part of it. Then, don't know why, the other night I just signed up for Twitter. Simon Larter (*waves to Simon*) was there, on Twitter, and after he finished laughing at me ('cause I told him numerous times I'd N.E.V.E.R twitter), he sent a "go meet Nicole" tweet and within ten minutes I had two handfuls of followers and a page of well wishes...and so far I lurv Twitter!
Come on, sign up!
(But I stand fast against FaceBook...really, I mean it. And don't tell my sisters I'm on Twitter, either. LOL)
Wendy~ OMG, first, I'm printing out your comment for reference. (Thanks!!) And then I'm off to follow you on Twitter. Thanks for your help!!!!!!
Alex~ Knowing you want to help is all the support I need! (*smiles*)
Hey, Thanks for asking these questions. I just joined Twitter and have no f**k idea what to do with it.
But I'll be a follow-back guy. Someone's nice enough to take the time to follow me, I follow them. To me it's just good manners. But I have that '64 mentality. It's the same with my blog.
Thanks for the post! I just started on Twitter as well and felt totally lost. The comments here have helped a lot and I'm following you on Twitter. Now if I only knew what to say on the darn thing.
ooh this was helpful. I'm not on twitter, but if i ever hit that bandwagon i know i'd have the same questions
Hey Gardner~ Looked for your Twitter button on your blog but couldn't find it. Ask Terry to pass on your Twitter alias(es) and I'll follow you!
Brenda~ I hear ya! In the past two days, I've never felt so un-clever. And I think I've developed ADHD in the process. Off to follow you back!
Sarah~ It's actually a lot of fun, and so many familiar faces over there. Come on, the bandwagon's waitin' on ya!
By the follow-back form, I didn't mean a literal form--sorry! I just meant the form that some people follow, ie, you follow me, I follow you. That's all. :)
PS: just wait until you start tweeting with certain "buzzwords"--the spammers will come... :)
Thank you for asking these questions. I started Twitter about 3 days ago and am a pretty big loss.
Also, thank you to everyone who replied, now I'm at less of a loss!
Perfect timing for me!
TweetDeck! TweetDeck! TweetDeck!! I used Twitter for about 3 months without TweetDeck... finally downloaded it and my tweeting life is so much less confusing, more fun and just more pleasant in general. Now... off to find you in the Twitterverse.
PS- In response to your question about... I have not had any site overload problems with Tweetdeck.
1. You do NOT want to read the general stream in Twitter. It's frightening in its inanity and sheer volume of epic uselessness.
2. You can search on anything in twitter. I found the first few people I followed by seraching on "Hemingway."
3. You can make a List of your favorites and just go there to see what they have to say. Also, you could star their tweets and just check your starred list to remind yourself. This won't be an issue after a while: you'll just remember them.
4. #FF = #FollowFriday. Just a way to send shout-outs, highlight fun peeps you've found, etc.
5. I usually thank people who follow me via DM. If I don't want to follow back (marketers, spammers, etc.) I just ignore them.
6. You can respond to anyone's tweet you like, directly. They may or may not respond back. I'm still waiting for Neil Gaiman (@neilhimself) to respond to me. I'm sure with 1.5 million followers, he's noticed what I say about him.
7. I highly doubt you'll manage to be rude on Twitter, good lady. But if you want examples, just watch me for a while. I'm sure I'll manage it eventually. ;)
8. Follow back if you want to. There is no other policy.
Aaannnd that's about it. It's all what you make of it. Have fun! :D
hi miss nicole! sorry i dont know even a little about that twitter except that birds do it lots. ha ha. im gonna go see about that contest cause i love contests. i want to win that clown magnet for my cousin dan. hes a movie producer and now hes got one hes doing about clown history and why people are scared of clowns. that movie it was sooooo scary. i hope you have a fun weekend.
...hugs and smiles from lenny
I think once you get the hang of it, you'll love twitter. It took me a little bit, but I think it takes -everyone- a little bit to figure it out. When you do, it's great. I've had mine quite a while now, but am only really trying purposefully to actually use it. If that makes sense.
I'm glad you got #FF (not on Friday!) and I followed you! Ha!
Looks like you've got most of the answers. Like Valerie & Kristi I highly recommend TweetDeck - it keeps it all in line for you. You can add a column to it by a) using the + sign at the top and typing a hashtag (#yalitchat) or b) by clicking on the hashtag in a tweet you see.
You can move the columns around by clicking on the arrows at the bottom of each column.
@inkyelbows has a site listing a bunch of twitterchats for writers. Here's the link:
http://www.inkygirl.com/twitter-chats-for-writers/
Have fun!
Yay, welcome to Twitter. I'm still taking early steps in my tweeting, but it's fun. :)
I've been on twitter for a while and I'm still not sure what the heck is going on. :D. These answers have helped a bit. I think.
I'd like to know how to retweet AND reply at the same time. I see other people do it, but I can't figure it out.
Summer~ You're awesome to clarify! And I got my first spammer today :P
j.leigh~ I'm off to find you on twitter as soon as I post this!
Valerie~ TweetDeck is now at the top of my list of stuff to figure out this weekend. Thanks!!
Simon~ You rock! Thanks for taking the time to spell this stuff out for me. You have no idea how much it helps!!
Lenny~ I think a bird's twitter is priceless!
Crystal~ You rock!!
Jemi~ Thanks so much for the info, and that link!
Lindsay~ It is fun (and potentially addicting!)
Elle~ Yes, what up with that retweet/reply combo. Can someone shed some light over here?
And hey, thanks for the DM :))
Sorry I'm late getting back to ya! Yesterday was crazy.
It looks like you got a lot of good advice and some of it is helping me too! I didn't know the thing about the @username before or after the main tweet or the "." thing.
I've been on Twitter for about a year and there's always new things to learn. I've been using TweetDeck for an even shorter time but I love it so far (though I don't know what everything does on that yet either)! It DOES, however, help you with the @usernames. For instance, as soon as you type the @ symbol, you DO get a menu with usernames and as you type it it'll shorten your options. It's VERY helpful!
Hey Nicole, Thanks for the tip! I was waiting to figure out what I was doing. The Twitter bird is up and I'm following you. Don't worry, not as a PI;]
So you're my first. They say you never forget your first.
Nice drama, btw!I echo Ter's comment.
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