With so many people on Twitter now having over 1,000 followers and truckloads with many more than that, I’m wondering if the Twitter timeline is now verging on extinction. How can you possibly pick out the tweets from the people you are most interested in when you’re picking up messages from all those thousands out there in one long, unfiltered string?
Don’t get me wrong – I love the randomness of it all and I love diving into my timeline to see what’s up with the world and who I can have an off-the-cuff chat with. That’s so much of the fun of twitter for me.
But I also know that a lot of users out there won’t have the same approach. For example, businesses using Twitter will have targeted people for conversations, so will probably have them in a list and will concentrate their efforts around engaging with them. Also, having tweeps in a list means that you can pick them out and have conversations with them without having to actually follow them and use up what can be valuable ‘follow slots’ (in terms of Twitter ratios).
In addition, many will use the strategic approach of focusing on saved keyword searches. In this instance, tweeps would be picked out for engagement based on the content of their tweets or bio. This gives you a slightly less targeted approach but is a great way of picking up new potential leads and clients. Advanced search in Twitter now has sophisticated search operators allowing for very focussed results.
How about you? How do you use Twitter? Do you have any great tips to share? Please add them below!