How are you using your Twitter fingers in 2016? Here is the Twitter strategy that I’ve used this month to triple the amount of followers for the account I manage and shoot engagement through the roof.

Set up a schedule

It’s important for your brand to create a frequent and consistent stream of content in order to build a community of engaged followers. But Twitter requires a high frequency of posts to accomplish this goal.

“If you want to wring the most value out of your Twitter presence as a whole, tweet up to 30 times per day.” -- Kevan Lee, buffersocial 

WOW! 30 times per day? If you are telling yourself that 30 posts seems a bit much, don’t worry… Kevan at buffersocial -- as well as many content marketers -- agree that between 10-15 per day hits the sweet spot for engagement.

Here is a chart that shows buffersocial’s Twitter content schedule…

But how could you ever possibly find the time to post so much content?

Enter, Hootsuite

Hootsuite is a great tool that allows you to schedule massive amounts of content on an easy-to-use platform. You are able to link up to three social media accounts for free.

Oh, you have a Facebook business page and an Instagram too? Boom, Hootsuite is the tool to schedule posts for all three accounts. Simply insert your content and select the account that you want to publish to.  

Check out Kevan’s complete Social Media Frequency Guide to create a strategy for your other social media accounts.

Upgrading to Hootsuite Pro for $9.99 a month gives you access to suggested content. Hootsuite monitors keywords of your choosing and auto-populates content for you to post. This definitely comes in handy if you are struggling for time and can’t produce content to share.

But CJ, I have no marketing budget!

Never fear, feedly is here!

Not only am I a marketing strategist for Near Me, but I’m also the marketing coordinator for a really awesome outdoor adventure startup called StokeShare. I use feedly every day to find content to post on StokeShare’s Twitter account.

It’s a free way to follow categories of blogs, podcasts and videos that are relevant to our social media voice. You can easily see which blogs are getting the most attention, copy their links, and paste directly into Hootsuite. Take a look at the comprehensive guide to curating engaging content With feedly.

Here’s a view from StokeShare’s feedly account… don’t even think about copying our feeds!

As you can see, the content is kept in orderly groups on the left and you can browse by category or what’s hot today.

Mind your #’s and @’s

If you are posting direct content from another source, be sure to give them credit by including their @account handle. Not only will it peeve off the people who worked hard on the article, your followers will also take notice and might choose to unfollow you. Don’t be an internet plagiariser! Your 8th grade English teacher will be very disappointed.

Using #hashtags are also essential in a Twitter post. By including #hashtags, your content will become available for people to search. This is a great way for users to discover your content, engage with it and follow you. Be sure the content is great and your #hashtags are relevant.

It goes down in the DM

Having a prewritten direct message automatically sent to a new follower is a great way to promote engagement and loyalty. Be friendly, ask a question, encourage them to tweet you, or share some content with them directly in the message.

There are a few free tools out there to use. SocialOomph sends auto direct messages and allows you to schedule Tweets, unfollow non-followers, gain new followers and track key words.

We use Crowdfire, which is essentially the same tool but with a much sleeker interface. And for $20 a month, you can remove the - @crowdfire branding. But, this is not what is essential here. What we are going for is early engagement with new followers that makes them feel special. Everyone likes to feel special!

DON’T BE SPAMMY! There was one instance where a gentleman got very perturbed that he received a DM from StokeShare. So perturbed that he tweeted some not so nice things about us. I’m not sure how many unfollowers resulted from that tweet, but I sure as hack never want it to happen again.

This is the direct message that receives the most new-follower engagement for StokeShare. Thanks for the photo Charles G. - @speedyak

Reach out to influencers and partners

Influencers are the people or companies that are big players in your space. They will usually have a large amount of engaged followers and should be a high priority to connect with. Creating partnerships with complementary brands in your space can also be a great way to put your content in front of tons of potential followers.

Make Twitter lists to isolate and follow specific accounts you want to partner with who will share your content and open their follower list to you.  

Engage, engage, engage! No ring needed!

At the end of the day, Twitter is by far the most social of social media platforms. To really ensure that you are building a great community, engage with people that you want to engage with you.

Take part in Twitter Chats, comment, like and retweet, ask questions and always be warm and inviting. Sure controversial and hot-topic discussions generate buzz, but you want people engaged with you for the right reasons.

Bottom line, find your brand identity on social media and stick with it. A great Twitter content marketing strategy is nothing without the brand that’s delivering it. If you can be genuine when engaging with your community, the rest is sure to follow. Keep those Twitter fingers strong!

What does your Twitter strategy look like? Do you use some of these tactics already? Leave me a comment! I’d love to speak with you about what’s working and how we can further maximize your efforts.