How to Catch a Whale on Twitter

On 09.15.09, In Web 2point0, by Brenton

Throw enough Tweets and you'll catch a whale?

I have read numerous articles on how to use Twitter, how to gain followers and how to pick a stunning Twitter icon and a couple months later I am at 309 followers and 275 tweets deep. Ya I know, not too impressive, if Guy Kawasaki didn’t seem like such a nice guy he would probably be laughing in my face. But like most other facets of life I like to think it’s quality over quantity. With that being said I have tried to absorb the most helpful blog posts regarding Twitter and disregard the others. This is when I stumbled upon a simple post by Janet Fouts titled “6 Ways to Attract Twitter Followers“. I believe this post was less about how to attract Twitter followers and more about how to make meaningful connections on Twitter. She focuses on engaging people in meaningful conversation and therefore gaining their trust in the Twitter world…that is why I believe her strategy is more about forging relationships in the virtual social space rather than exploding your follower count (I think that’s what she meant all along). This is exactly how I use Twitter, I have had some incredible conversations with some incredible people just by reaching out and trying to be helpful or supportive anyway I can. Here are some of my methods:

1. I scan my home page Twitter Feed for any interesting tweets in my areas of interest or expertise.

2. If a person is asking a question I have some insight about I will @tweet them a unique answer and leave it open ended pretty much asking them what they thought.

3. If the person is linking their blog post to the tweet I will retweet it and add a something I liked about the article in my RT.

4. @tweet anyone with links specific to what they are interested in.

5. Always @tweet with a purpose. Meaning, you should attempt to bring the conversation to email or a phone call that will better acquaint you and the other person.

Here are some example of how I put these methods to use:

1. Jason Peck- Jason is a authority in the sports social media niche. I have followed Jason’s blog for about a year now and since I am pushing out BlackTop Hoops, I wanted to get a better feel for his take on how athletes can use social web tools.

One day on twitter Jason had a questions about how to reach a certain amount of users on a social platform he is working with. I took this as an opportunity to @tweet him about an area in which I am strong in…Facebook. I stated a possible solution to his problem and I offered to help. I moved the conversation to direct messaging on Twitter and later set up a time to talk over the phone. We had a very interesting conversation about social media, sports and entrepreneurship. I hope to help him with promoting though Facebook and I hope he helps me with what he thinks is the right approach with BTH. In this case a couple tweets became very valuable.

2. Yu-Kai Chou- I have followed Jun Loayza’s blog for sometime and ended up stumbling across his business partners blog. One of his blog posts/videos (sorry, I forget which one…here’s his blog) was so valuable to me that I wanted to RT it with a very unique message. I made sure everyone knew that this was a post you couldn’t pass up if you have the same interests as me (which most of my followers do). Yu-Kai kindly enough sent me a thank you @tweet. After I added a few more value added @tweets I moved the conversation over to the direct message inbox and pushed along the conversation.

Conclusion:

Contrary to the title of the post, this was not about catching the biggest fish in the sea (I just liked the photo). Instead it’s about leveraging Twitter to create relationships with burgeoning superstars in your industry. It’s easier than you think and believe me it’s fun.