Articles Tagged with Twitter

432 Mind-Blowing Article Titles You Won’t Believe Are By Cracked.com

Published on December 20, 2012January 31, 2013 by Steve

File this under: silly…

I’m a massive, massive fan of Cracked.com – I have been for years. As an online marketer, I’ve always been interested – with sites like these – about how they go about their digital strategy. Given the types of titles Cracked.com tend to use for their regular articles, it’s quite clear that for them it’s all about encouraging click-through rate (a.k.a. the clickbait), particularly from social media sites.

They’re a fan of lists, so they often start with a number. Over the last few years, I started to notice another trend… In just the last month alone we’ve seen:

…And…

Click to read more!

A Trick For Stopping Event Hashtag Spam

Published on October 1, 2012October 1, 2012 by Steve

Have you ever been following the hashtag of an event or conference on Twitter that has become popular – maybe even trended – for it to suddenly become inundated with irrelevant tweets like this?

This happened at BrightonSEO and its #BrightonSEO hashtag, which I attended a few weeks ago. According to a few attendees, the event’s hashtag trended, possibly even on a national scale (can anyone confirm?). Eventually, probably as a result of the trending and the hashtag’s popularity, the spam started trickling in, with the hashtag getting hit by spammers now and again throughout the day. At one point, I think there might’ve actually been more spam tweets than normal/genuine tweets. Obviously it was ruining the hashtag, making it harder to read and follow with so much useless noise jumping in and interfering.

The perfect solution

However I noticed a pattern with the tweets and therefore a fix. All of the spam tweets used the same URL shortener: 00ey. It’s certainly not a popular URL shortener – I’d personally never seen it before – and so I realised that there was a way to follow the hashtag without the spam but also without risking missing out on or eliminating anyone else’s tweets, i.e. those of the actual attendees.

Instead of doing a search/column for #BrightonSEO, I tried #BrightonSEO -00ey. The difference can be seen below:

(Click to enlarge)

Spam gone, proper tweets kept.

I presented it to the other conference-goers via the hashtag, getting a few mentions of thanks and a couple of RTs for my troubles, which is always nice!

The not-so-perfect solution

Sometimes you might not get so lucky, and the spammers might use a more common URL shortener. This happened with #OiConf and #smwb2b, which took place more recently. I didn’t attend the events, but I saw people complaining about the spam that the respective hashtags were receiving. Unfortunately, in both cases, the spammers were using bit.ly instead of 00.ey.

However, it was still possible to do a fix, this time with [#OiConf -bit.ly] and [#smwb2b -bit.ly] respectively, but this obviously would’ve meant that if anyone else used a bit.ly link then their tweets wouldn’t show up, either. That said, in my experience, most people tweeting at a conference aren’t necessarily always also tweeting links (they might just be tweeting things that the speakers have said), so you might only lose out on <10% of relevant, non-spam tweets.

Again, I presented them to the attendees via the hashtag, receiving thanks and RTs in doing so. You can see the difference between [#OiConf] and [#OiConf -bit.ly] here.

Help your fellow attendees

So the next time you’re at an event and the spam tweets start flooding in, look for a pattern. If they all contain the same URL shortener, including it in the search criteria with a minus in front of it will exclude any tweets containing it.

Try it out, and if it works, be sure to tell the other attendees! They’ll love you for it – seriously!

[# image credit: Tom Magliery]

Battle of the Birdies: HootSuite vs. Tweetbot

Published on July 24, 2012 by Steve

Once upon a time, I wouldn’t have let anyone say a bad word about HootSuite. As someone who needed to manage multiple Twitter accounts and didn’t want to keep signing in and out of Twitter.com, it was perfect. I’d tried TweetDeck but found that I preferred HootSuite (incidentally, it seems to be a bit of a Marmite thing: I know some people who are the opposite and who love TweetDeck and hate HootSuite – each to their own, I suppose)!

The best thing about HootSuite? It’s free! Sure, there’s a PRO version available, but the free version is plenty handy. I recommended it to quite a few people I know, who also seemed to find it very useful.

(I also adore HootSuite’s branding. I LOVE that owl, and the fact that they have so many different versions of it, which they even use for Twitter. In doing a bit of research for this article, I discovered that there are even Plush Owly’s, which are OMGsoawesome, but I digress…)

However, recently their iOS updates (for the iPhone and iPad) have had a few issues: updates intended to fix various bugs would themselves have a few bugs in them. I have also come across an error message (I think it’s called the “NSURE” error or something?) that won’t allow you to send a tweet. It used to give you the option to retry, which would allow you to at least copy and paste the content of the tweet to repost elsewhere, but recently it won’t even let you do that, meaning that you risk losing the tweet’s content altogether and have to retype it again elsewhere!

Frustrated, my buddy @Nonentity of yourleft.net recommended Tweetbot. Given my frugal ways, my immediate scepticism kicked it: it’s a paid app. When I hear that something’s paid (when it has free alternatives), I react pretty much the same way Napoleon does in Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure (watch from the 1:05 mark).

“PAY?!”

However, I decided to give it a try for the iPhone (£1.99 or $2.99 as I type this) and do you know what? Worth. Every. Penny.

Here are my favourite things about Tweetbot:

(Note: I imagine most people reading this might be HootSuite users who are considering Tweetbot, so I’ll assume that you know how HootSuite works and therefore mostly focus on Tweetbot’s features.)

Layout changes for other people’s tweets vs. your tweets

(Click to see a larger version)

As you can see from the screenshot, when viewing your main Home Feed, your tweets are presented differently, with your image on the right instead of the left. I thought this was a nice touch, making it easier to differentiate between people’s tweets, especially when you’re trying to catch up and you have been a bit busy with the tweets and/or @mentions yourself.

HootSuite users will know that HS does something similar, by changing the tweet background colours (yellow for your tweets; green for @mentions), but I personally feel that Tweetbot’s solution looks neater while still making it obvious to the user whose tweets are whose.

Thumbnail previews for pictures and videos

I also like the fact that pictures and videos show thumbnails alongside the tweets, so that you can glance at their content without having to see the tweets’ details. In HootSuite, one would have to click onto the tweet to see a preview and then the link again to see it fully, adding an additional click (or tap) for the user.

Note: So far I have noticed that HootSuite doesn’t necessarily preview pic.twitter.com images (Twitter.com’s uploaded images – probably a conspiracy)! However, unfortunately Tweetbot isn’t exactly perfect, as it doesn’t preview ow.ly images (HootSuite’s uploaded images – probably also a conspiracy)!

Receive notifications of new @mentions or DMs

Although HootSuite is meant to do this (showing a number corresponding to the number of unread tweets next to each row on the main Streams page), it never seems to work for me.

Tweetbot highlights the bottom buttons blue if there are new tweets, which also applies if you’ve received new @mentions and DMs. Very handy, particularly if you’ve disabled email notifications and do not receive any other type of alert or notification when someone tweets you directly.

Customise the bottom buttons

I also like the fact that some of the buttons at the bottom can be customised. The last 2 (out of 5) can be changed if tapped and held, and then another feature can be shown instead.

For example, instead of my profile…

…I could change it to my Favourites instead…

Admittedly, you can do this in HootSuite as well, but you either have to navigate back to the Streams page or flick left or right, which I find to be a bit more clunky, if that makes sense.

Downsides?

Tweetbot’s downsides are few and far between. The only potential issue I’ve come across so far – which is probably a case of me being silly than anything wrong with the app – is that when I tried to upload an image, it didn’t then show the shortened URL for the image (like it does in HootSuite), so I was concerned that it might send the tweet without the image link. A bit confusing, but I’m sure it’s fine – I’ll have to give it a go sometimes and see what happens.

So I guess this post was more of a review of Tweetbot than a full-on comparison between the two, but as a long-time user and advocate HootSuite, I was pleasantly surprised with Tweetbot. So much so, that I recently purchased it for the iPad.

Now if you don’t mind, I have an iPad version of Tweetbot to play with…

[Image credits: HootSuite and Tweetbot logos courtesy of their respective Twitter profiles: @hootsuite and @tweetbot]

#SMsceptic: A Quick, Simple Guide to Twitter @Mentions

Published on June 13, 2012 by Steve

As a heavy Twitter user, I often come across people improperly using @mentions. If you’re a long-term reader, you might’ve seen me briefly cover this before (see 1-3 in the list).

Often, those guilty are brand new users. That’s ok. I made some horrendous mistakes when I first started using Twitter. I’m sure most of us did. Twitter takes some getting used to.

Sometimes, however, they are people who have “social media” in their job title. I’ve seen social media professionals – including a variety of consultants, trainers, executives and in-house staff – who can’t @mention properly. In my opinion, this is not cool. While it could be argued that someone doesn’t necessarily need to know how to use a platform inside-out to be able to consult strategy on it, a) it’s not exactly a hard concept to grasp properly, and b) they might be giving people incorrect advice, particularly if they’re a trainer.

Besides, if someone gave you all the details on how to build your house, but forgot to include any doors when they built their own, what would you think? It hardly inspires confidence.

Tempted to scream, tweet various swear words, or tweet something like “if I had a pound everytime someone did this…” each time I witness such errors, I thought instead that I’d vent my frustrations in a more practical and helpful way…

So here it is: a really quick and simple guide on how to use @mentions on Twitter.

@mentions at the start of a tweet:

@joebloggs has a new website. Check it out: [link]

The above is intended as an announcement. However, not all of your followers will see it.

An @mention at the start of a tweet will only be seen by you, the person you’re tweeting and anyone who follows both of you. The only other exception is if someone happens to check your profile manually, but in my experience, people may only do this when they first come across a profile (e.g. they’re wondering whether or not to follow you) or if they just want to check something (e.g. to look up your profile bio or URL).

So if you want to make an announcement, make sure the @mention isn’t at the start of the tweet! Either re-word it so that the @mention appears later on, or put a full-stop before the @ sign, e.g. “.@joebloggs has a…”

@mentions mid-tweet:

Hey @joebloggs, what’s your email address? Thanks!

An @mention mid-tweet will be seen by everyone in your timeline. This is fine as an announcement, but if it’s only intended as a brief, bland, personal message that really isn’t intended for anyone else, then you risk irritating your followers and clogging up their feed. Especially if you’re @mentioning a lot of people with the same message.

So if you’re posting a personal tweet, intended only for the individual, then be considerate to your followers: consider keeping the @mention at the start of the tweet.

How they should be:

Sticking with the above two examples, you should do something like this instead:

.@joebloggs has a new website. Check it out: [link] or
My good friend @joebloggs has a new website. Check it out: [link]

@joebloggs Hey, what’s your email address? Thanks!

That way, your intended announcement is actually an annoucement, and your personal tweet is more personal. Easy, no?

I also recommend Jessica Hische’s more amusing guide on how to use Twitter, which also covers @mentions (I swear I haven’t simply ripped it off!) as well as things like #hashtags and retweets.

It may seem like I’m making a big fuss, but if you’re a business that’s trying to make a big effort on Twitter, you don’t want your announcements to go unseen and/or risk bothering your followers with tweets that don’t concern them!

And… breathe.

[@ sign image credit: Steve Snodgrass]

SEOno News & GB Posts: Part 1

Published on May 8, 2012 by Steve

In a few previous posts, I’ve talked SEOno news as well as guest blog posts I’ve written for other sites. Rather than having them as random, standalone posts, like some of the previous few, I thought I’d start a series of them, as-and-when I have anything to share.

News

SEOno is in dire need of a proper custom design, but with my third and final instalment of my CAM Diploma course coming up over the next few months, it may be a couple of months off just yet. Besides, I prefer writing, so if I have to choose between the two, I’d much rather write a new post than go overboard with the blog’s design. Still, it’s something I have in mind (it’s just a matter of ‘when’)!

Guest Blog Posts

I’ve been quite busy the last few months, mainly writing stuff on behalf of Liberty Marketing:

I’ve had two posts published by the wonderful Ann Smarty (@seosmarty):

8 Ways to Get Links from Events and Conferences (Without Being a Sponsor or a Speaker) for Daily SEO Tip
5 Guest Blogging Considerations (Beyond Link Building) for MyBlogGuest

Local networking connection Rob Warlow (@bizloanservices) kindly posted Leveraging (Offline) Networking for SEO and Online Marketing on Small Business Success, his business advice website.

I published a guest blog post on social media, called Social Media’s Chicken & Egg: Should You Put Content or Followers First? for Opportunities Planet.

Last but not least, a recent post on behalf of both Liberty and Computer Recruiter is one I’m particularly proud of: How to Find Jobs Using Twitter Search for the GO Wales blog. This is a sort of follow-up to a similar post I wrote a while back for the Liberty blog on finding jobs using Google, however I think this one about Twitter Search is better explained and laid out. If anyone gives it a go then I’d love their feedback on it.

I have a few more exciting guest blog posts planned, which I’ll share in Part 2…