Blogging like a pro. Easy with these two tweaks.
Friend and editor Alison Williams shared some twitter tips which I’m re-posting for the benefit of our new readers.
The mistake I made when I set up my Twitter account was my choice of twitter username/handle. I wanted to use my actual name. I have a really common name, so Alison Williams wasn’t available, and neither were any variations using numbers that weren’t far too complicated to use. So I decided to use a capital ‘i’ in place of one of the ‘L’s in Williams. Sorted.
Problems arose when I was tagged in a tweet. People assumed that my twitter username was @AlisonWilliams (with two lls). It wasn’t. So I didn’t see a tweet and therefore couldn’t retweet it. This meant I lost out on sharing that tweet with people. An editing client tweeted how pleased she was with the work I did for her – she asked me a few days later why I hadn’t retweeted. I lost out on some free advertising there.
I realised that I needed to change my username to something that, first of all, people could spell correctly, and secondly that would lead people to me on Twitter. So I decided to change my username to @AlisonW_Editor
My name is now spelt correctly. It also means that anyone looking for an editor on Twitter is more likely to find me.
Changing your username is really simple to do. Just go to your Twitter profile, use the drop down menu to select ‘settings’, and change the username listed in the username field. Click ‘save changes’ and you’re done. It doesn’t affect anything on your account; you keep all your followers, and all your past tweets, favourites and lists are still there. Or click on your picture icon, select ‘profile’, then edit ‘profile’ and you should see a box to change below the option to change your picture.
If you use WordPress. Make sure Twitter is correctly connected to your WordPress account. This way, when followers use the Twitter share button on your post, you will get notified on Twitter.
Here’s what you need to do:
- Go to WP Admin
- On the left hand side under ‘Settings’ you’ll see ‘sharing’ – click this
- Scroll down until you see: ‘Twitter username to include in tweets when people share using the Twitter button’
- In the box alongside this enter your new Twitter username. (No need to add the @)
- Save changes
And you’re ready to go.
Extra Tip: Make your Twitter Handle is as close to your “Author” name (or Business Name) as possible so fans can easily follow you.
For more blogging and Twitter tips see here
Mine is @bakeandwrite so not linked to my name at all. I don’t know if that was a good idea but it seems okay. My other is @robertaeaton, not many Roberta’s out there.
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Thanks Robbie, some of it will depend on where you want to grow your social media. I like to hang out on Twitter, so good user names which are easy to find are important to me.
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When I joined Twitter (all those years ago!) I opted for my name and year of birth ShelleyWilson72 – it’s easy to remember but certainly doesn’t tell followers what I do. I wonder if I should drop the number and add ‘author’? Interesting post, ladies. I didn’t realise this was even a possibility. Thank you for sharing.
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It’s certainly worth thinking about Shelley.
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I’m very fortunate in having an unusual name. It can still be spelled incorrectly, but I’m generally easy to find.
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Thank you April, I think I’ve spelt your name incorrectly on occasions – oops!
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It’s easily done.
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I fortunately was able to use my blogsite name for my Twitter handle. The problem I have is how to use more than one twitter handle because I have a completely different interest (genealogy) and it would be confusing to use the same one for both topics. Any suggestions?
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Just found this for you…Twitter does not restrict you to a single account. If you need multiple accounts, such as accounts for each product type your company offers, you can create a new account exactly as you did your first. However, each account must use a different email address.
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Thanks Rosie, it was very kind of you to dig around for the information.
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Reblogged this on anita dawes and jaye marie.
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Thank you ladies.
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I have two accounts.
One is my original, linked to my blog etc. @PhantomGiggler.
Then my teacher one, so I can follow all things education based, and not flood it with writeeky/blog based things.
As mine has been that for a long time, and is used on other social media platforms, I’m not sure whether to change it, or set a third one as my name and author…
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Perhaps if you are going to use your blog to help market your writing, then you might consider changing the original one. It really would depend on how much of your traffic comes via Twitter.
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It’s definitely something I need to think about!
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Good tip, although if you’be published a lot of books and shared your Twitter handle all around, changing it everywhere might take a while, but worth thinking about. Thanks, Rosie and Alison.
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Yes,not worth it if you already have a large reader fan base for your books. I think I would look at the data, does the current twitter following buy your books? Or do they follow for another reason?
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As you can imagine Mary Smith is not an uncommon name! I was very happy to find MarySmithWriter had not been taken when I joined Twitter.
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That one works well for you Mary.
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This is one I really need to think about, Rosie – I’ve been contemplating changing my Twitter ID to my blog name for a while, because my activity’s almost entirely book related…
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Sounds like a great idea Anne.
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Great idea, Rosie and Alison. My Twitter feed is so cluttered with all kinds of things; I think I need to think about changing it.
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The feed will be from tweets by people you follow. You can always unfollow or mute people so that you don’t get so many tweets that aren’t of interest to you.
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Thanks Rosie.
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Reblogged this on Morgen 'with an e' Bailey and commented:
Some handy Twitter tips from Rosie and Alison Williams… Back in the day (2009), @morgenbailey had already been taken so I went with @morgenwriteruk because it does what it says on the ‘tin’. 🙂
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For some strange reason, I don’t have settings on my “edit profile”. April kindly directed me to your blog post in the hope I could use your clear instructions.
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Try this, when you go to profile from your picture icon, next click edit profile, then you should get a couple of boxes below the option to change your prfile picture? The first box should have your current handle name, change what you need, then hit ‘save changes’. hope this helps.
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Thanks Rosie I’ll try that option.
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Let me know how you get on.
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It worked, thanks very much for your help Rosie.
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