Did You Start Off Right On Twitter?

What is your username?

Is it brand worthy? Does it brand the most important thing? You! Your username isn't just a phrase you're going to enter when you sign in. It will form part of your URL and will be visible whenever you promote your Twitter page.

It's like choosing a domain name for a Web site. Choose poorly, an you could affect your Twitter account's ability to gather followers and build a reputation.

Your username might be the first thing you enter, but it should be an item you think about deeply.

Your full name is a possibility, provided it hasn't been taken already, but another good option is to use your Web site's domain name. That would link your site together with your Twitter account and make clear that the one is just a natural extension of the other.

What ever you choose, just make sure that it's:

1) Short
2) Closely associated with you.
3) Easy to remember

If you keep it short, simple to remember, and closely associated with who you are and what you do, your Twitter id will go along way in helping brand the most important thing you have. You!

5 Ways to Attract People and Drive Traffic To Your Website

Here are 5 ways to attract people and drive traffic to your website.

1) Provide visitors with free content. Your content will be more attractive to your visitors if it's up-to-date or original. To take it a step further, you could also offer the option to reprint the content in their e-zine or web site.

2) Give visitors a free eBook. Don't worry, if you don't want to take the time to write an eBook yourself, you can always ask other writers for permission to use their articles. If you do write your own eBook, you could place an ad in the content and allow your visitors to give it away.

3) Hold a contest or sweepstakes contest and give visitors a free entry. The prizes should be something of interest or value to your visitors. Most people who enter will continually revisit your web site to get the results.

4) Hold free online classes or seminars. The classes could be held in your web site's chat room. The idea of "live" information will definitely entice people to visit your web site. This also presents you as an expert on the topic.

5) Last but not least, give away free consulting to people who visit your web site. You could offer your knowledge via e-mail or by telephone. People will consider this a huge value because consulting fees can be very expensive.

Twubble - Find Twitter Friends Through Your Current Twitter Friends

Twubble is a service that recommends new twitter friends to you based on the friends of your friends. It was created by Google software engineer Bob Lee in April 2008.

Twubble goes through 30 of your follows who’ve updated most recently, and suggests a maximum of 100 suggestions. It then ranks them

- taking the people you like = follow, AND
- checking who of your favorites (nr. 1) follow the up to 100 suggestions

But it is, of course, a bit inbreeding because it is likely that your favorites will appreciate the same type of tweets you would. Nevertheless, you can find a few important ones that you might have missed otherwise.

PS. limiting things to 100 suggestions prevents time-outs from API calls to Twitter (always an issue) as well as any crash if you happen to be following some heavyeights (e.g., TechCrunch)

TweetStats -- Statistics On Your Twitter Usage!

In the innovative world of Micro-blogging, TweetStats aims to organize it all.

TweetStats. This cool little app that gives you statistics, in graphical format, about your Twitter usage. Or the usage of anyone else on Twitter for that matter.

I tweet most often on Friday's and around noon each day. I like to talkt to @LoriPeckham.

To the left are my statistics as of today.

A couple of other cool things about this application is that it provides trends on the top 10 conversations and the top 10 most used applications on Twitter.

TwitterLocal - Do you use it?

One of the things that is interesting about Twitter is how many services and small applications have been built upon its simple interface to provide additional features. It seems that I discover a new application that ties into twitter on a daily basis. I have decided to add them to my blog as I come across them so that a comprehensive list is available in one spot.

Today's twitter application is TwitterLocal. TwitterLocal will allow you to track tweepl that located in a specific location. Now that they ahve gone to a Adobe Air Client, you can now watch as many location-based Twitter feeds as you want.

The Three Ways to Tweet on Twitter

There are three basic was to send a message "tweet" through Twitter.

1. Basic Twitter is just like shouting to a friend on the street. You just type your message in the "What are you doing" space. Be careful though... just like the street, the whole world can hear or see what you say. Choose your words carefully when you Twitter, so you don't have to eat them. You have the option to delete your Tweet if you really screwed up, but by then it might be too late.

2. @Replies are Twitter messages that you send back to someone who has Tweeted you or when someone replies to a message you sent to them. It's kind of like sending a text message from your cell phone. All of your Twitter followers can see this type of message, so once again you need to be careful what you say. Using the reply option is a great way to start a conversation or join one that is already happening. You can enter @ followed by the persons username (i.e. @ggraha01) to send a message to anyone, this helps to get their attention. These messages will also be stored in the @Replies section on your Twitter page so you can reference them later.

3. Direct messages are sent in two ways on Twitter. The first way is to just type the letter "d" followed by a space and then the persons username. You do not use the @ in this kind of message. The other way to send a direct Tweet is by replying to a Tweet in your Direct Messages section on your Twitter page. You can only send direct messages to your Twitter followers and no one can see these messages but you and the one you're Tweeting to. Still need to becareful of what you say, as the follower can still copy the text and repost it.

So, now that you know the basics on how to send messages with Twitter you need to get started building your list of followers. Now get out there and start Twittering

The Problem With Using Twitter

Twitter is not a difficult tool to use so there’s a low barrier of entry; Anyone can pick it up. What really matters is how it impacts your online habits and daily life. For many, Twitter is a distraction, albeit one that is very much welcome.
It saps your attention and pulls your focus away from other tasks. Kathy Sierra goes a step further and talks about the very real fear of being disconnected:

"Ironically, services like Twitter are simultaneously leaving some people with a feeling of not being connected, by feeding the fear of not being in the loop. By elevating the importance of being “constantly updated,” it amplifies the feeling of missing something if you’re not checking Twitter (or Twittering) with enough frequency." -- headrush.typepad.com

The issue here is that effective Twitter usage necessarily involves an investment in time and attention. One needs to be plugged in to a certain extent to reap the benefits that come from using Twitter. Even listening takes an effort.