Today most people have heard of Twitter , at least in passing, in comments on the radio or on TV, in gatherings and in various conversations … Twitter, since it was created 8 years ago, has been little by little making a place for itself in the panorama of social networks in Spain and today it is the second with the most users, behind the almighty Facebook.
Twitter was born on March 21, 2006 when co-founder Jack Dorsey automatically sent the first message. Since then, and to place ourselves before its magnitude and influence, according to data from the company itself, more than 350 billion tweets have been sent by 232 million active users, 77% outside the United States. Spectacular figures for the bird’s net.
For many people Twitter has become an essential tool in their day to day. Its usefulness can vary according to each one: there are people who use Twitter to be informed of current events at the moment, since one of the main characteristics of this social network is its immediacy ; There are other people who are looking for an approach more related to leisure and humor , through the humorous profiles that can be found or the enormous number of celebrities who are on Twitter; and there are also people who use it in a more professional way, whether it is to meet other people, to contact potential clients, enhance their personal brand, start relationships that can benefit them for their work, etc.
In this first article we will try to explain what it is, what functions it has and what we must do to register. In the second part, we will detail what are the main concepts and keywords that must be mastered if you want to manage effectively, because if something has this social network is that it is not easy to understand it at the first change, or colloquially speaking, it costs a little “get the hang of it.”
We will start with the most essential. According to Wikipedia , Twitter is a microblogging website that allows its users to send and read very short text messages , with a maximum length of 140 characters, called tweets . The main purpose of the network is to follow users who may be interested in what they say and share your messages with those who follow you.
These messages can be sent from the Twitter website, from a mobile phone or from a tablet (through its applications for iOS and Android ), and are public (everyone can see them), despite that there is also the possibility of sending private messages between users.
To register on Twitter we will have to create a personal account on your website . As with any record, we will be asked to fill in several fields. The most relevant is to choose the username, because it will be our identification on the network. With this name, other users will be able to locate and mention us. Once finished (remember to enter a robust password, which is difficult to decipher), we will have to press ” Create my account “.
Then, following the steps that Twitter recommends in the tutorial at the beginning, before writing the first tweet, it is convenient to personalize the profile. This customization will help others find us and start following us. Within the profile, the Biography section is important , where we will have to describe who we are or what identifies us. We can also indicate where we live, upload an image (also known as an avatar ) that identifies us or change the design of the page (colors, background, etc.).
At the beginning, in the timeline , that is, in the timeline of the main page, only our publications will appear. We will have to follow some users so that their contents also appear on the page. The best way to start is to search for friends who are also online.
To do this, we will have to use the Twitter search engine, entering their user names. When we find them, it is helpful to keep an eye on the people who follow (in the following section ) and who follow them ( followers ), to see if we know someone else. Another alternative to find people is the option that Twitter gives us to import email contacts (email contacts that already use Twitter will be added to our network).
When we have the contact located, we will only have to click on the “ Follow ” tab (we will have the ability to stop following people whenever we want, by clicking on the same tab again). We can see the list of people we follow, and also the people who follow us, on the main page, under our avatar and username.
Once we have a group of contacts to read and share messages with, we can start interacting. In the next article we will talk about how to do it, how to respond to a tweet , how to send a direct message … and we will also learn about new key concepts, such as Retweet , Hashtag, Favorite or Trending Topic , among others.
