More Twitter Tips for Content Creators

Doesn't matter if you're a serious content creator or just a hobby haiku author, the following tips will help you make the most of your experience on Twitter without having to rewrite the same content all the time.

Before I get started, I should tell you that my main interfaces to Twitter are the Chrome web browser, and (depending on the device I'm using), the official Android app (I've used Apple's, too). Nothing fancier. It should go without saying that other apps or computer programs may have their own little ways and/or tricks for doing similar.

The Pinned Tweet

Nothing shocks me more than seeing a self-professed author or content creator without one. If you are unfamiliar with it, it's the first tweet every single Twitter user who clicks on your profile will see. I find it essential, it's like a business card (or an extension of your Bio) so to speak -- but, can be as business-orientated or creative as you like -- with far more characters than the limited Bio offers.

Think of it this way: If readers and other authors see you have content there, they are more likely to share it than to go digging through your timeline for something. Moreover, if you have nothing there, that's exactly what they will retweet for you... nothing. So get something up there as soon as possible. The sooner you can catch the eye of potential readers, and let other content creators know who you are, the sooner and more often you'll both share and network.

So set yourself up; it's really easy. Click the DOWN ARROW in the RIGHT-HAND CORNER of the tweet you'd like at the very top just under your profile. This action will bring up a menu. Within that menu, click PIN TO YOUR PROFILE, and you're all done. To remove, click the same arrow and then click UNPIN FROM PROFILE. You can do this as many times as you like to the same tweet. You can also change the Pinned Tweet simply by pinning a new tweet. You do not need to unpin the current Pinned Tweet, Twitter will replace (but not erase) your current.

The Portfolio

Not only is the Pinned Tweet a great place to showcase some of your work. You can actually build a portfolio under it! That's right, you can use the Thread (multiple-part tweet) function of Twitter to use your Pinned Tweet as an anchor for all the other creative works you'd like to share. This creates a linked thread of tweets other users can read and share easily -- all in one place!

Just like pinning a tweet, threading tweets is easy. Go to your Pinned Tweet and immediately below it, you will see the option to ADD ANOTHER TWEET. Once you have entered all the relevant information and any hashtags you might be interested in, click TWEET, and it will be posted, in line, with all the others, creating a daisy chain of content. (Be careful though, you cannot connect tweets after, you must use the ADD function to the Pinned Tweet.)

Now, here comes the really cool part. Once you have threaded a bunch of tweets together, all those tweets come up in-line on readers' screens when they click any one of them in the thread. This allows them to use mouse wheel to see the rest of your content, because they aren't clicking just the one tweet, they are clicking the thread. Bingo... instant portfolio! And if that weren't the best part, you can now feature any of these tweets as the Pinned Tweet and everything remains in-line!

Do be careful though, if you make a mistake and delete a tweet mid-thread, all the tweets after the deleted one will no longer be part of the chain, and you can only reconstruct the chain by re-adding all those via the ADD function once more. A serious waste of time I do not recommend.

That's it. If you found this post helpful, I wrote a similar post outlining another Two Twitter Tricks that will help you get the most out of your experience with the popular social networking platform.