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5 Tools for Twitter Power Users

Recommendations from a celebrity tweeter who actually writes all of his own tweets.

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One of my clients (sorry, can’t say who) has over 700,000 Twitter followers, tweets constantly, admits he responds to more DMs than he should, and does it all on his own without the help of a ghost-tweeter. His following is huge mostly because he’s famous, but his Twitter popularity is also due to how effectively he manages the process.

These are his favorite Twitter tools and apps (the comments in quotes are his):

1. Twilert: Twilert works a lot like a Google Alert except it monitors tweets instead of websites and blogs. Set up keywords or terms and get email alerts whenever those are mentioned on Twitter. It’s an easy way to keep up with conversations and developments regarding your business, competitors, industry, etc.

“I love to rip on other athletes but the last thing I want to do is monitor their Twitter feeds. Problem is when I hit them late because then it just looks like I’m piling on. Twilert lets me know what dumb stuff people are up to without having to read every boring thing they say.”

2. Buffer: Buffer lets you schedule tweets and send them when you choose. It works well for tweets that aren’t time-sensitive, lets you broadcast a tweet at just the right time (like a tweet for a contest or a limited time offer), and keeps you from overwhelming followers by joining the tweet-a-minute club. Buffer also lets you send tweets when your followers are most likely to notice. And you get results for each tweet showing the number of clicks and retweets so you can refine your tweet schedule based on what works beste for your audience.

“8 a.m. to noon EST is like a dead zone for me. No matter what I tweet almost none of my followers pay attention. Except the media. 10 p.m. to around 3 a.m. is like my prime time. I schedule press-release type stuff for the morning and at night I give everybody what they want. The only problem I’ve had with Buffer is explaining to team management I really don’t stay up that late the night before a game.”

3. Tweriod: Tweriod takes the analytics in Buffer a step farther, not only analyzing your tweet performance but also analyzing your followers’ tweets to provide reports showing the best days and times to tweet.

“I get a lot of followers through retweets. Having people read my tweets is cool but I also want them to pass them on so I send my best stuff when my followers are most likely to do that. Catch your audience when they’re active and they do your work for you.”

4. TweetCaster: TweetCaster (for Androids) organizes multiple Twitter accounts, hides tweets without unfollowing, saves links, filters tweets, and supports longer tweets.

“I follow a few people. I don’t want to be ugly but I don’t want to read everything they tweet. Right now TweetCaster is the best app I’ve found for weeding out the junk on my phone, but it could always be better. You listening, developers?”

5. Twylah: Twylah creates what it calls a Brand Page to store tweets and other content. (Check out one of their sample pages; it looks a lot like a blog page.) You can also create a Power Tweet that generates a custom landing page for that tweet. The life of a tweet is incredibly short and Twylah helps extends it.

“Sponsors dig deeper when their message gets heard by more people. Twylah helps important tweets last longer, and any tweet that makes my sponsors happy is an important tweet. Power Tweets are nice when we do a contest or giveaway. My followers have somewhere to go to check it out and see the other content we want them to see and we get it done without having to add pages to my personal website.”

 

Jeff Haden learned much of what he knows about business and technology as he worked his way up in the manufacturing industry. Everything else he picks up from ghostwriting books for some of the smartest leaders he knows in business. @jeff_haden