A true story guide to using Twitter, in 2 steps!

It’s Saturday, a day that many social media experts (The Onion understands social media “experts” perfectly) will tell you, that owing to extremely high online traffic, is a GREAT day to update your blog, tweet, put some content on Facebook and sell,goddammit SELL, I mean, change the conversation. Some people are surprised that so many people are online on Saturdays–the first day of the weekend–but I’m surprised that they’re surprised. I suspect they’re just being disingenuous. After all, Saturday is a day that people are stuck at home with their families. If it’s a choice between tweeting and having true emotional engagement with their loving families, most people will be on Twitter as if their very lives depended on it.

But I’m sure that you, Dear Reader, are online for entirely different reasons. (I’m online because I own my small business, so since I enjoy eating every day, my livelihood depends on non-stop creation of clients and satisfying their demands. I’m also getting my work out of the way, so I can go out and have fun tonight. Here I am, justifying myself to strangers; it’s like 7th grade allll over again.)

Anyhoo, let’s say you’re thinking about using The Twitter that all the kids are talking about, but you have no idea how to get started. Don’t worry; I personally know people who have been on Twitter for years and still have no idea what they’re doing. (Oy.) But, if you commit to using your brain and learning, you might actually become pretty decent at Twitter, and allow yourself to have some fun. Maybe meet some cool people.  I don’t have thousands of followers, and I’m okay with that because I actually have many real friends in real life. (meow…!) Not to mention, despite not having thousands of followers, I’ve gotten tons of clients throughout the US and the UK with the followers I do have. Content is always more important than numbers.

Thus, if you want to get started on Twitter, awesome. Here’s two true story tips:

1. Conversations are more interesting than monologues.

If you’re on Twitter, just basically nattering on about you, you, you all the time…meh. That gets kinda extremely masturbatory, and boring. Conversations, on the other hand, can be fascinating. Yes, there are people on Twitter having conversations about what to cook for dinner and you want to smack them and remind them that text messaging is a thing, but I’ve had conversations with people about books to read, plays to see, restaurants to try and, Yahweh forgive me, even met some great men. (That sigh you hear is my father reading this blog, and shaking his head.)

Crucially, as an entrepreneur, I’ve demonstrated, through real-time conversations, the benefits of my nagging coaching to people across the country, thus securing clients who otherwise would never have heard of little ole me. Have I also tweeted a lot of weird, boring sh*t? Sure. So what? Perfection is boring. Life is messy. And wonderful.

A good way to get started having conversations, is to follow the people, websites, radio shows, WHATEVER, that you’re genuinely interested in, and when they tweet out something significant, re-tweet them and respond. Respond in a polite, intelligent manner. (How sad that I actually have to type these words.) Not everyone will respond, but some people will and if you say something thought-provoking, and the other party re-tweets you…presto! Now a lot of new people will come check you out. If you boast a solid, intelligent profile, with a good picture, some of those people will stick around. I advise clients to aim for three smart conversations a day. Yes, at first, it’ll seem crazy awkward…and then someone will respond, you’ll make each other laugh, they might tell other people to follow you and you’ll think, “Whoa, this is kind of fun.” (PS: You’re welcome.)

2. It’s your responsibility to give people a reason to pay attention.

When you’re rich and famous, when your name has become short-hand for cry-for-help behavior, cocaine, over-sharing and plastic tits, then you’ll be able to literally post a photo of the remains of a bagel you had for breakfast, and that tweet will get oh, 50K re-tweets and another 25K favorites. Many (lonely) people will tweet, “OMG, I SO love bagels too! So cool!! We’re soul-mates, I want your baby!” Check out any celebrity’s Twitter feed to see this happening in real-time. A celebrity can tweet out about their damn dry cleaning, and get 10 thousand re-tweets. If a celebrity does it, Americans are f**king fascinated.

Meanwhile, there are some brilliant people on Twitter, talking, very intelligently, about the fate of our planet, or the meaning of life, or violence against women (bad) and you can hear the collective yawning. (These are some of the things I think about whenever I see those posters for the remake of Planet of the Apes. I find myself brooding, “If the damn, dirty apes want the planet, let ’em have it and good luck to them!” In the late 1990s, I was a producer on Capitol Hill; I can only imagine that the apes would be better read and more truthful than most politicians. Yes, Eric Cantor, I’m looking at you: buh-bye!)

But you, right now, are probably not a celebrity. (Oh simma down, I said “probably.”) That in no way means you don’t have many interesting things to say, but it does mean YOU have to give the hoi polloi a reason to pay attention. If you’re cute, people will pay attention for a while…but since there are quite a few cute, smart people on Twitter, doing interesting things, eventually, like the rest of us who survived high school without going on a killing rampage, you’re going to have to develop a personality.

So: who’s your audience? What’s your message? Why are you on Twitter? What’s your brand? What do you want me to think of when I think of you? It’s your responsibility to demonstrate: don’t just tell me you’re super cool, SHOW me.

Therefore, let me see the full force of your personality, of your interests, of your likes and dislikes, of your cats, kids, spouse, friends, your travels, your causes, your passions. What gets you out of bed in the morning? Make me care. Once I’m interested, I’m far likelier to buy what you’re selling. I don’t have to agree with you constantly, since I’m a rational adult and I know that’s impossible, but I should be more interested than not. I should agree with you more than I don’t. (Unless of course, you’re incredibly smart and you can package your unpopular opinions in such a way that I’m fascinated. Repelled, but fascinated.)

Your message and your brand, are going to evolve over time, so don’t wait. Don’t wait till you know yourself perfectly, since I can only presume that’ll happen the 4th of Never. Just get started TODAY: create a Twitter handle that is both professional and evocative–no, nowadays, I probably wouldn’t choose @kittenmagix, but hey, it was good enough for US News & World Report!–and start following people who interest you. Then,  think before you tweet. If you’re furious or outraged or horny, maybe put that smartphone down and take a walk. Your career will thank you. In the long run, those Twitter feuds make everyone involved look stupid.  Try to help others, learn from your mistakes and allow yourself to start evolving.

Otherwise, while you’re waiting for your brand to be perfect, one day you’ll see someone else on Twitter, actually doing what you just talked about. That person will be reaping some amazing opportunities. You’ll be cranky. Get started. No, you won’t be fascinating out of the gate but, besides sociopaths and serial killers, who really is?

Want to get started on Twitter? Good. Get. Started. Now.