Six Secrets About Whether Twitter Censors Trending Topics

Twitter recruitment video goes crazy with more than 500K views already

I have just been reading Sharon Chan’s blog and I came across this new recruitment video that Twitter has done. I think its a great example of how you don’t need to take everything so seriously to get a good message across. It’s cheesy but it’s also low budget and people like cheesy stuff.

I think the fact that it has gone viral probably has something to do with the fact that it’s Twitter which is a cool company that most of us would love to work for. The clip has been viewed by more than 500K people.

Let me know what you think.

Fact: Twitter has Changed

I’ve been using Twitter for more than five years. It is amazing how much has changed… both in perception of thEdite service as well as usage of service. And while the fail whale is still a dreaded sight it has become ingrained into our vocabulary. Twitter has done an amazing job of not only changing the way we communicate, but also changed the way we relate to one another. Lets step back in time and take a look at what Twitter used to be to the few early adopters and what it has become today to the masses.

First, its not a stretch to say that in the early days of Twitter it was viewed as some “nerd/geek” thing that was pointless. The only people who spent time on Twitter probably had no friends of their own. Plus, the biggest statement about twitter users was that they were “over-sharers”. People who were so narcissistic that they believed other people actually wanted to know when they were brushing their teeth or what they were having for dinner or the fact that they “just woke up”.

Fast forward to today and we see that Twitter has morphed into an amazing avenue of content sharing. But the truly amazing thing is that its not just for content sharing but also for content consumption. People from all different demographics are sharing content, conversation, and consumption. These are people that users probably would have no way to connect with or discover without Twitter.

I remember when talking to people about Twitter and its usefulness, most people simply laughed and made some reference to the fact that Twitter was simply a tool to keep you from doing any work. It was a procrastination enhancer. This probably correlated to the first issue where people just thought others were “over-sharers” and that anyone who spent time on Twitter was just wasting their time following people’s daily tasks… watching paint dry.

Now when any major news or event happens around the world Twitter is one of the most reliable and fastest sources of information. People tune into news and individual twitter accounts to get the latest and even real-time reporting of events. When was the last time we heard about a plane crash, earthquake, tsunami, sports victory, or election debate where we didn’t hear something about Twitter saying this or that?

Even when Twitter was getting started back in 2006, Jack Dorsey (founder/creator) tweeted the first tweet, “just setting up my twttr”. It was setup to share short bursts of inconsequential bits of information. It was built around the 140 character limit in order to encourage a more condensed form of chit-chat.

That original limiting 140 characters has become the creative building block to shape headlines and even help popularize the shortening of URLs so that linking of content would take the least amount of space because space was so valued. The 140 characters enabled users voices to get right to the point and not deal with idle chit-chat.

In the early days of Twitter, there were times it would seem like a massive black hole sucking all content and thoughts. The impression was left not only on critics but even many users felt that when they tweeted on twitter it was like talking to the wall. Even though there were lots of people, at times it could seem like nobody was listening.

I can’t tell you how many people I meet today who say they first made a connection with a friend or business associate first on Twitter because of a discussion revolving around a topic both participants were engaged and spun the conversation out into real life. Twitter has because a resource for creating connections and facilitating conversations.

Twitter was viewed as an mob scene with everyone shouting at the same time. There were only individuals. There were no brands, there were no products, there were no organizations. Even Twitter itself spent countless hours (and years) trying to find its own brand and financial stability.

But now, Twitter has an ongoing engagement between companies and brands and their valued customer base. Twitter gave a voice to brands. Twitter because useful for driving traffic… because now people were listening. It isn’t just a shouting black hole. And those companies and brands who take customer service seriously, Twitter has been an amazing gift for them as they are able to connect with and assist their customer base.

How have you seen twitter change? Do you think Twitter has gone in a positive direction? Where do you want Twitter to go from here? Oh, and if you want…. you can follow me at @benjaminbradley

This was a guest post kindly written and shared by Benjamin Bradley if you wish to see the original post you can do so here. If you think you have an interesting Twitter post that you would like to share with the world drop us an email.

Allowing Twitter into British courtrooms could be a mistake

In this country cameras and any other form of recording equipment are banned from our courtrooms to stop the media interfering with live trials, but this week the British Chief Justice actually ruled that there is to be no ban on using the social network Twitter in the courtroom.

Twitter finally became a courtroom tool last week when a court judge allowed mediamen to tweet from a bail hearing for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. However, two days after this ground breaking moment another judge barred it, so it’s clearly still a contentious issue.

I have to admit I am slightly worried what a micro-blogging service like Twitter could do to a live trial and I think they need to treat this area with real caution. I have been a big advocate of Twitter since it started way back in 2006 when there were only a handful of us using it in the UK but even I think a move like this needs to managed very carefully.

I am not a huge fan of the US system that allows cameras into a courtroom as I think it trivialises the cases and create a bit of a media circus around something which is usually extremely serious and often distressing.

One good point to make here is it is only journalists that are allowed to tweet from the courtrooms and this is a positive thing as they have to abide by a professional code of conduct. At least that means that a normal member of the public can’t start sharing their opinions about the case live on social media.

To write a tweet you often need to paraphrase a sentence or paragraph, and in doing that sometimes you can miss key elements of a story. This is usually fine with trivial matters but with court case I fear this could cause problems and lead to some form of misinterpretation. I also wonder if people, namely witnesses or worse still criminals themselves, will be able to follow a trial by logging onto the relevant twitter stream.

There is no doubt Twitter is brilliant for feeding us all with the latest tit bits of information but I think courtrooms are no place for this social network. What do you think – is it a good or bad thing?

You can follow me on Twitter here.

Merry Xmas – Vote for your favourite alternative Christmas track

Hi all, I posted a while back on my personal blog about a social media campaign we (my digital PR Company) have been running for the global music manufacturer Audio-Technica.

About four months ago we ran a strategic social media audit and workshop for them and created an online strategy which included launching the alternative Christmas track competition, which has been a lot of fun to run and organise albeit very busy.

In the last few months we have received a huge number of musical entries from all across the world varying in quality and genre. The original aim of the campaign was to seek out fun and vibrant alternatives to Christmas carols and songs and help people to get creative. We launched it using the brand’s Facebook and Twitter channels and a social media news release. Entrants each had to submit their video entries via YouTube but for doing so they received a free pair of headphones for their user generated content.

If you want to see all of the entries you can see them here on this playlist.

The music competition wasn’t restricted to any particular type of music so bands, DJs or music producers from any genre had the opportunity to show off their talent. The entries have been judged by Grammy & Brit award-winning record producer Steve Levine.

My personal favourite is the third one down James Bullen’s entry which samples Jingle Bells nicely. I would really appreciate it if you could have a listen and then vote for your favourite. You vote by clicking on the online poll I have created below. The winner will be announced on Thursday 23rd December.

The lucky winner receives £500 worth of Audio-Technica equipment and the five runners-up will scoop prizes of £100 worth of equipment each.

Why Auto-following on Twitter is Bad?

This guest post is from Illiya Vjestica, who is the founder of Smardog Digital, an online marketing consultancy firm based in Leeds. You can read more posts on his excellent online marketing blog.

There are  various tools out there that help you find Twitter accounts automatically which are likely to follow you back, you should avoid them and be careful to use only professional tools.

Let me help you understand why Auto-following is a bad idea, here’s some reasons why:

1. It’s about Quality not Quantity

This isn’t a popularity contest people, sure you’ve heard people say ‘I’ve got more followers than you!” and to that I say, so what? It doesn’t help you if the quality of your followers is 10,000 spammy or auto follow accounts that don’t add any value to your network or conversation.

Let’s look at some of celebrities on Twitter. Mr. Ashton Kutcher has 6,000,209 followers and only follows 609 people back. How do you think Ashton Kutcher would be able to keep up with 6,000,209 people’s Twitter updates! The answer is, he wouldn’t.

Lady Gaga’s Twitter account is different she has slightly more followers at 6,971,865, but has chosen to follow 146,798. Please tell me how you can possibly keep up with that many peoples individual Twitter updates!

To put that into perspective, if each person tweets on average 2-3 times a day that’s 440,394 Twitter updates a day she’d have to read. How do you stand out in a sea of nearly half million tweets? Starting to get the picture now? Read on.

Quality is good, aiming for just quantity is really bad!

2. Don’t Reciprocal Follow Everyone

If someone follows you don’t automatically follow them back, ask yourself what value do they add to my network and are their topics of conversations relevant to what you talk about. If the answer is yes to both of those question then by all means follow them back. There are lots of automated tools out there which you’ll find people will use to try and get a quick follow from you. If you follow them back they will automatically un-follow in hope you’ll forget to un-follow them from your account.

Alysson Fergison, a respected SEO consultant wrote an awesome blog post on Reciprocal and Auto-Following on Twitter = Bad Idea in her post she said:

“Auto-following is absolutely ludicrous, pointless and I can’t imagine a better way to render Twitter absolutely useless. I can’t fathom what my Twitterstream would look like with much more than 300 people in it. I probably miss out on a lot of useful tweets that pertain to search marketing or my other interests as it is. Why would I want to follow someone who sells soap just because they’ve followed me?”

My thoughts exactly Alysson!

3. Watch for the Warning Signs

I didn’t want to embarrass the people who’s Twitter accounts these figures belong to but shame on you and your auto follow generation tactics!

86, 989 Tweets, that’s a heck of a lot of tweets, this person is going to be popping up in your Twitter stream every minute of the day, too much noise it certainly will be!

Following 34,580, followers 33,536 notice how the figures are very closely linked. An auto-follow or reciprocal follow tactic has been employed here. The other image shows 16,336 following, 16,963 followers again closely linked figures.

These types of account are the accounts to avoid following back automatically why you ask? I’ll tell you…

• It is unlikely they will ever see a single tweet you put out in the sea of thousands of others.
• They will most likely have a poor engagement with their audience and not a lot of influence.
• Your unlikely to get re-tweeted and if you do your tweet probably won’t reach very far.

Your best off looking to get re-tweeted by influential figures in your industry or niche who have a very strong engagement with their Twitter followers.

That’s it for today, I hope my insights have helped you build a more engaged Twitter following and you know the benefits as to why you should always focus on quality and not quanity  Good job people lets make Twitter a better place!

You might also like to read my blog on post on 5 great tips to Build a Successful Twitter network.

Five ways to use personal and company accounts on Twitter

In business, people buy people. Being transparent is key on Twitter. Here are 5 situations where using personal and company accounts can bring in more quality followers. In business, people buy people. Not companies.

Of the dozens of people who want to follow you, the ones whose profile is open & transparent, supported by a photo, will resonate most.

You are less inclined to follow a company – there’s more chance they’ll want to sell to you than converse with you. Though a corporate Twitter account, used in the right way, can build credibility for the company.

For someone you know, you’ll feel more inclined to converse with a Twitter account under their own name with their photo than one under a made up name with a weird picture.

Here are 5 situations which call for the different use of personal & company Twitter accounts. Using a tool like Tweasier makes it easy to manage multiple Twitter accounts at once.

1. Owner Managed Business – Professional Service
   With a business founded on your knowledge & skill, it’s better to have a Twitter account under your name, with your photo. You company and brand is, frankly, secondary to everyone apart from yourself.
   I wrote a blog recently about accountancy firms whose natural tendency is to hide behind their company name.
2. Owner Managed Business Selling Products
   Where a product requires no explanation, the customer is primarily interested in the price and quality e.g. with a confectionery company selling wine gums is a known product & knowing who the owner is has little relevance. A company Twitter account would work best here to send out all the tweets then using a personal Twitter account to Retweet to friends.
3. Larger Branded Service Companies
   If we take the accountants from #1 and project them 3 years into the future, their brand may have become established. However, all clients personally know their contracting partner and he remains their first point of contact. So it remains important for the partner to tweet from his personal Twitter account. However he can supplement it with Retweets of company news from the company Twitter account.
4. Larger Branded Product Companies
   Brand ambassadors come into their own in this scenario. By that I mean employees of a company who are passionate about their company and tweet news and updates through the company account.
5. Groups and Communities
   This is similar to #4 but comprises a looser connection of people. A good example is business networking groups. The group leader can send tweets for the next event through the group Twitter account e.g. @4NDenton then get all the group members to Retweet through their personal accounts.

So consider your company and what your audience expect. Then choose the right Twitter account for maximum impact.

This was a guest post written by Martyn Hodgson an Internet Marketer from Get Above The Fold based in Yorkshire. We would like to thank Martyn for taking the time to write this.

Likemytweets.com – Get the Like Button for Twitter

Hey all, how is everyone doing? Nice to be back on the Tweasier blog.

Today I bring you Likemytweets.com, is a website that provides you with a like button for Twitter.

How it works?

1. Post a tweet from any twitter client. Your tweets will be modified by likemytweets. See example
2. Your followers click on the link to like the tweet.
3. You will be notified when a user likes your tweet.

If you “like” many posts and updates on Facebook, you’ll probably enjoy this tool. I can see this being a really useful tool for some Twitter users, I’m not sure how much I’d use it personally, but it gives you extra indication on how interesting or relevant a Tweet is to your followers.

About this blog post

If you enjoyed reading this blog post, then you can read Illiya’s other posts about social media on his Online Marketing blog or follow him on Twitter.

Friendorfollow.com Who Doesn’t Follow you on Twitter

Today the Tweasier blog presents, one of my most favourite Twitter tools that I frequently used in the early months of my Twitter experience. Friendorfollow.com is a great Twitter cleansing and simple analysis tool allowing you to see the following:

• Who’s not following you back on Twitter?
• Who are you not following back?
• Who are your mutual friends? Find out!

These are the big questions every Twitter user wants to know straight answers to.

These people don’t follow me back

Following section

The great thing about FriendorFollow, is it allows you to quickly access the Twitter accounts who aren’t following you. Of course not every account is going to follow you back, some celebrities for example probably won’t give you the time or day. I wonder though, who are those individuals that you thought were following you back and actually aren’t. This is where FriendorFollow comes to the rescue!

Sort by feature

A cool feature on Friendorfollow.com is the drop down menu that allows you to sort Twitter accounts for the following

• By Username
• Name
• Location
• Followers
• Following
• Last Tweet
• Account age

It is a nice little feature that lets you analyse your Twitter following with more depth and certainly helps if your looking to clean up your profile.

Your fans

Your fans are Twitter accounts that are following your profile although you don’t follow them back. My personal account @kungfudigital has 435 people following me who I don’t follow back.

Your friends

These are the accounts who are following your profile and who you follow back. In this section, I have about 238 people who I follow and who follow me back.

Limitations

With all free apps there are certain limitations. In FriendorFollow’s case to remove a Twitter follower from your account you need to click on the invidual profile icon first. Having login into Twitter already, you can then remove the user manually by using Twitter’s unfollow functionality.

Conclusion

Overall though, Friendorfollow.com is a useful little tool for quickly analysing your Twitter following. If your looking for a Twitter tool that goes more in depth into the managment and analysis of your Twitter account, then stay tuned and watch this space…

About this blog post
If you enjoyed reading this blog post, then you can take a look at Illiya’s other posts on his blog or follow him on Twitter.

Tweetfeel.com Real-time Twitter Sentiment Search with added Feeling

Tweetfeel is a real-time Twitter search tool that allows you to see the sentiment and feeling around a specific keyword or search phrase. It’s a clever little tool that gives you fast insights into overall how negative or positive the sentiment is around your keyword or search phrase. I will admit, I’ve had a lot of fun with this tool by typing my most loved and most hated brands into Tweetfeel.

In Twitter’s advanced section of their search you can search for Tweets with a positive or negative attitude, however Tweetfeel allows you to delve in quickly to the data and build up an overall picture by the perctengage of negative or positive tweets.

(Twitter’s Advance search lets you search by Positive or Negative attitudes)

Think of a company you deal with that isn’t perhaps providing you good custom service? Check them out on Tweetfeel and see what others think. Thinking about choosing a companies product or service? Well, before you do….Check them out on Tweetfeel. In the search results there sometimes is some quite heated comments from fellow Tweeters, but then that is there feeling or opinion about that brand.

I find Tweetfeel very useful for gathering a opinion around a brand’s feeling on Twitter, it gives you the data quickly so you can build up a fairly accurate overview. It works by analysing the sentiment and opinions that are included in the Tweets, keywords are highlighted in green for a positive sentiment and red for a negative one.

Here’s one I did earlier….What do the Tweeple think of Nick Clegg?

Everyone’s favorite politician Mr. Nick Clegg. Well according to Tweetfeel, the sentiment around Nick Clegg on Twitter is very positive overall, he should be pleased with himself. By the way, I voted for David Cameron if anyone’s asking.

About this blog post
If you enjoyed reading this blog post, then you can take a look at Illiya’s other posts on his blog or follow him on Twitter.