How To Tweet In Just 10 Minutes Per day

One of the most popular excuses I’ve heard lately about the lack of social media use is that it just takes too much time. People feel that once they commit to updating, engaging and creating content, they will be sucked into a vortex. They feel learning how to tweet will suck unnecessary time up. While effective social media strategies, content creation and brand engagement definitely take their share of time (that’s why most companies now have social media teams), keeping up with your personal brand on social media doesn’t have to be a full-time job. Here are some quick wins for you to apply in just 10 minutes a day that will be sure to give your social media a boost. Stop making excuses and start engaging!

1. Follow 20 People That Are Following One Of Your Favorite Handles

[inlinetwitter]One of the best ways to build a great audience on Twitter is to follow people that are following other handles that are similar to your own.[/inlinetwitter] For example, I am in healthcare social media, so I would follow people that are following other healthcare professionals and social media professionals. This way you are following people sharing content that you will most likely be interested in, and you are sharing content yourself that they would also be interested in.

2. Send Out One Original Tweet

Try to send out at least one original thought a day via twitter. This will keep your account relevant and fresh. The quickest way to do this is to set up a Google alert for your industry (in my case, social media), and tweet one of the relevant articles out that pops up in the Google alert.

3. “Quote” Retweet Three Relevant Tweets

In order to do this quickly everyday, it will take some initial groundwork. Think of hashtags that are relevant to your personal brand, and then search them on hashtagify.me to see what other hashtags are relevant to those. Once you have a list of about 10 hashtags, search 1-3 of these hashtags per day and retweet an article or thought that is relevant to you through the ‘quote retweet’ function on Twitter.

Using the ‘quote retweet’ will allow you to add your own personal opinion above the Tweet. This is important because it helps solidify your personal brand and build thought leadership in your industry. You might have to start with quoting one tweet per day until you get the hang of it and can start scanning twitter streams and retweeting more quickly.

4. Reply To One Tweet

Replies are a great way to get involved in a conversation. Using the same hashtag list you set up for step four, search for conversations that you can add value to. Respond to one of the tweets with your opinion on the subject. Make sure to put a period before the other person’s handle in order to get as much visibility for the tweet as possible.

5. Follow Relevant People Back That Are Following You

[inlinetweet]Take a quick look at the people following you and make sure you follow back anyone who is relevant to your industry or tweeting about something you are interested in.[/inlinetweet] This helps solidify your relationships on Twitter. In fact, your ‘one reply’ tweet for the day could be a welcome tweet to someone who just followed you!

Learning how to tweet can be daunting. You don’t have to have copious amounts of free time to engage on Twitter. Follow these five steps daily and watch your engagement grow on Twitter. It’s amazing what conversations can stem just from following new people and responding to a couple of tweets.

– Marji J. Sherman