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12 Comments

3 Major Twitter Mistakes & How To Avoid Them

Thank you Indie Hackers participating in the profiles thread. Going through 54 Twitter profiles in the past week gave me a good look at the many mistakes people are doing. Some of them are repeated again and again. The following are 3 biggest offenders that let down your profile.

Avoid hastags:
Twitter may have started them but it’s no longer a mainstream part of Twitter culture. Using them make you look super spammy and it doesn’t help with search discovery at all for normal topics. Don’t use them unless it’s a popular and supported campaign like #100daysofcode.

Hashtags

To prove my point about hashtags being very unpopular just compare these links. Not having hashtag is much more active and popular.

Retweet with Comments:

Retweet with Comments

Retweet with comments let you put out your thoughts on what you find notable in this tweet. It shares your personality and perspectives. A lot of people miss out on this opportunity by using the default retweet. It’s also no more meaningful than a bot. What value would people find in following you instead of just directly following the source? Instead in all cases it’s better to retweet with comments.

Here are some prompts:

  • What do I like about this post?
  • Here’s what I find helpful
  • This is how I feel about this
  • These are who should benefit from this

Stay active:
Unfortunately, being seen on Twitter is at the mercy of algorithm AND people’s attention. I’m missing many tweets everyday even with low followings and checking a lot. Chances are my followers won’t see my tweets often if at all. So to fight against that you need volume, which Twitter algorithm favours. Don’t neglect quality too! This improves your chance of being seen at all.

Sahil

Unless you already have thousands of followers on tap. Your smart original tweets won’t be seen, you can check the reach in your analytics. Tweet it and they won’t come. Or at least you cannot count on it. What you need to do is to get on other people’s tweets and reply to them. And you’ll need to do a lot of this everyday if you want a real chance at growing fast. Think of it as outbound marketing for personal brand awareness. It guarantees that you’re being seen by people you’ve selected. Want to be discovered by people interested in marketing? Then do a lot of replies on marketing influencers you like. Chances are they’re followed by people with similar taste in marketing as you.

I feel like launching a premium Twitter service soon.
Follow me on Twitter: @WitSuma
This post is from my blog: Builders' Sun

  1. 2

    Good advice with the Reply Guy method. I actually just talked about that as well in my first newsletter on culturecrave.substack.com.

    I don't agree with the algorithm aspect though, it's not IG. I have accounts that I didn't tweet on for weeks and they still received around the same engagement. Might've even trended higher on someone's 'in case you missed this' since it had been so long.

    1. 1

      The daily workload of any method is not small. And 50+ tweets per day seems to be the ones that show great result.

      Algo indeed can work for can against you. But since the workings are unpredictable we cannot rely well on it like the "reply guy" method. Plus the reply guy method you can hone down followers of influencers. Most viral tweets don't seem to have long term benefits as people not in your niche are not following you anyways.

  2. 2

    Super interesting, Wit. I've only been using Twitter for a few weeks (only reading, no tweeting), but as I want to slowly grow my audience (currently sits as 3, probably bots), your tips really hit home. Thanks!

    1. 2

      Today's my first month on Twitter. I've learned a lot, and there's still much to learn. It's a work in process. But for sure I now learn the best for many to get started faster. It better be 95% replies. I'm also soft launching my Twitter Profile Review service.

  3. 2

    Hey Wit, thanks for everything you've been doing. Nice post.

    One question on replying people: do you think it's too spammy to reply people with my thoughts and include a link to my tweet related to the discussion?

    1. 1

      Gracefully, link to tweet is ok. Link to external sites would give people red flags.

  4. 2

    This is good advice, especially the section about retweeting with comments. Seeing plain retweets from the same accounts in your timeline starts to look a bit lazy after a while.

    1. 1

      It is even more disheartening when you check their profile and it's 100% plain retweets without their own tweet at all. Many bots have more personality these days. Remember: be interesting!

  5. 1

    Sage advice. I am just getting into Twitter despite having had a profile for over a decade! These are simple and sensible suggestions. Thank you.

    1. 1

      Hi there! Turns out my account is also 10 years old. It's much easier to take care of preventable mistakes than trying to be perfect from the get go. All about learning from doing it everyday. I've just started a month ago really!

  6. 1

    Great advice! Thanks 👍

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