Blazing Minds

Creative Ways To Increase Your Twitter Followers

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If you have a Twitter account, either personally or representing your brand, then it probably goes without saying that you want to get the maximum amount of followers that you can. This is particularly true if you’re concerned with SEO, as social media links have been proven to have some effect on your search engine rankings (especially in Google and Bing).

But how can you go about increasing your Twitter followers? Many people try the normal routes; adding social media links to your website, cross-linking social media platforms, increasing the number of people you’re following, submit to Twitter directories, etc. and whilst these are all viable options (and should be encouraged, particularly if your account is new), they don’t often result in a high, continued stream of new followers.

So let’s have a look at a couple of creative methods for adding new followers to your Twitter account:

Competitions

I work for a creative agency based in the Midlands, and we increased our Twitter following substantially by running an 0n-site competition; giving away some customised LEGO zombies we created for a blog post. To enter the competition, all people had to do was follow us on Twitter, and then we picked the winner at random from our followers. We then built a few decent links to the post announcing the competition, contacted a few competition sites and then left it. Within a week we saw our Twitter following more than double, which is exactly what we were aiming for.

PayWithATweet

A few months ago I came across a fantastic tool called PayWithATweet, and I’ve been surprised how how little I’ve seen it being used across major networks. The tool allows you to give away downloads, products or user benefits (like a downloadable ebook for example), and all the user has to do to download it is send out a Tweet telling their followers that they’re using your site. This ‘social payment’ system is an excellent way of gaining social media links and attracting new followers.

Discounts and Twitter-only promotions

If you run an e-commerce site, then you could consider rewarding the people who follow you on Twitter with a discount code to use on your site. Alternatively (or additionally), you could run Twitter-only promotions, whereby you offer discounted products or discounts that are promoted only to your Twitter followers, encouraging more people who visit your site to also follow you on Twitter.

Infographics

Infographics are a fantastic way to encourage natural inbound links to your site, increase traffic and gain traction on social media platforms. As infographics naturally encourage sharing via social media sites, they also have the added benefit of increasing followers on Twitter. I recently worked with Kaplan International on an infographic displaying how their students rated their different schools (in terms of recommendations), which are aimed at those looking to learn English abroad. The infographic not only presented interesting information in a much more appealing way, but saw a fantastic amount of sharing between students who had filled out the survey. This not only increased traffic to their blog, but had the added benefit of increasing both Twitter followers and ‘Likes’ on Facebook.

QR Codes

I wrote about how you can be creative with your QR codes in my last BlazingMinds post, and how they can be a fantastic tool for sending additional traffic to your website. These codes can also be easily linked to your Twitter account, allowing you to use them both online and in physical publications or adverts, encouraging mobile internet users to visit your Twitter profile (subsequently increasing followers).

Those are just a few simple ideas for pushing your Twitter account to a larger audience, but there are many more ways to increase your Twitter following. Think about what works for your brand and figure out exactly what you’re using your Twitter account for – is it a customer services channel? A news portal? A general brand communication outlet? A promotions channel? Once you have a defined goal for your Twitter account, you’ll find it much easier to incorporate it into your day-to-day business activities.

If you’ve come up with any great ways to increase followers on Twitter (or ‘Likes’ on Facebook for that matter), then let us know in the comments below.

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Related posts:

1. Twiends a Tool to Help Increase Twitter Followers [Twiends Review]
2. The Importance of using Social Media when you Guest Blog!
3. How To Write a Twitter Bio That Gains You More Followers
4. How To Vet Your Twitter Followers
5. The Blazing Minds Twitter Now Has Over 4,000 Followers

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 23rd, 2011 at 8:28 am and is filed under Guests Posts, Social Media, Twitter, Twitter Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Written by John (16) Published Articles

John is an SEO engineer and infographic designer working for Designbysoap Ltd; one of the leading creative agencies in the country. You can follow him on Twitter @john_pring and @designbysoap

Link up with John at @designbysoap