How to get many more Twitter followers in just 5 minutes a day!

Want more Twitter followers? It’s actually pretty easy to do – and the good news is that you can do it in just a few minutes a day.

Follow these tips, and you’ll have a growing, solid base of followers very quickly.

Here’s how.

Let’s take a look at your Twitter account.

First – Are you following lots more people than are following you?

Oddly enough, it’s easier to get Twitter followers if you are following fewer accounts than are following you.

For some reason folks tend to think that people who are following many more people than they have followers are probably not putting out very interesting content. Or they may figure you’re primarily there to read others’ tweets – not to build your own following.

People with lots of Twitter followers and steadily increasing numbers tend to have either one of these following/follower profiles:

1) Keep it pretty even: follow about the same number of people who follow you (maybe about 80 percent ratio give or take maybe 10%, either way. For my 2 biggest accounts I have about 10-15% more followers than I’m following.)

2) Have MANY more followers than followed – basically not following anyone back. (This is NOT recommended at all – mostly celebrities and big companies do this – 100,000 followers and only following 25 back. Ugh. It doesn’t work for the rest of us.)

If you do the first way, people not only think that you often follow back, but also that your account is popular with other people on Twitter. It will give them a favorable impression of you.

What you want is for people to be motivated to follow YOU. And then, to read your tweets, follow your links, interact with you and best of all, RT your tweets.

Here’s the secret to getting more lots more followers.

I have 25000+ followers on my various accounts – and this is the method I used. Others have found it successful as well. It takes a little time but is very effective.

1. Do you need to pare down your “following” list?

If you’re currently following many more people than are following you, you’re going to want to reduce how many people you’re following. Unfollow as many as needed until you’re following about the same number of people who are following you.

Who to consider unfollowing:
– People who don’t follow you back.
– Those who are no longer active on Twitter.
– Those who tweet the same thing over and over again.
– People who never interact with anyone, or who never RT.

Use your judgment. Think twice though about unfollowing those who follow you – it may result in their unfollowing you as well.

Add some of the unfollowed people to lists.
Still want to keep track of some of those folks? Don’t worry – you don’t have to cut them completely loose!

The best-kept Twitter secret is LISTS.

Are there some people who don’t follow you back but who are important to you? Just put them on a list and you can still see all their tweets, just like you were following them!

When you’re following a lot of people, this is the best way to keep paying attention to the ones you care most about. Otherwise their tweets may get lost in the crowd.

(Lists can be visible only to you, or to everyone. You can even make multiple lists. I have several topical ones: poets & writers; Beat Generation; tech; music; local, etc.)

Another benefit is that people will get a notification if you add them to a public list, and sometimes that will spur them to follow you back.

For full details on how to manage who you follow and and use lists, very easily, see my article, How to use lists and get around the Twitter following limit.

2. Follow, follow, follow.

Now that you’ve gotten who you’re following under control, on a regular basis – every day, or every few days, follow some more people. Maybe 20-30 or even 50. (Keep it to a reasonable number – if you follow & unfollow hundreds at a time Twitter may flag your account and penalize you.)

Look for people who are similar to you – not just big movers & shakers, but, people who have things in common with you.

For instance, do you read young adult (YA) books? Follow YA book bloggers, self-published YA authors, YA readers, bookshops, reviewers, accounts that talk about books. And of course you can follow some big guys as well! – for instance, well-known YA authors & publishers.

Find your competition and follow them too (and follow some of their followers!).

All of these are the people who are most likely to interact with you, RT and reply to your tweets. They are gold.

3. What if they don’t follow back?

Many people will follow you back. Some won’t. That’s OK, that’s just the way it works. Wait a week or so. Then, unfollow the ones – or most of the ones – who haven’t followed you back.

(If it’s someone you’re hesitant to unfollow at this point, either put them on a list as described above – or give them another week. Most people who are going to follow back do it within about week, two at most, though.)

Of course it’s OK to keep following people who don’t follow you back, but it’s not good to have too many of those as they don’t have much benefit and actually can hold you back.

It’s important to keep up on this step so you don’t wind up following way more people who are following you.

More tips for maintaining and growing a following.

1. When someone follows you, follow them back.

Many people will unfollow you (within a few days or a week) if you don’t follow them back. So, if you want to keep them as followers, follow them back. If they quit following you, you can unfollow them too if you want.

Exceptions: Don’t follow back spammers, people who have private accounts (that little lock), porn, those advertising “get more followers” or questionable services, and obvious junk accounts. Also companies which have nothing to do with what you’re interested in; they’re unlikely to ever RT you or interact. These accounts are pointless to follow, and probably going to unfollow you soon anyway.

2. Express appreciation.

Be good to those who are good to you.

If someone thanks you for following them in a tweet or retweets your tweet, reply to them.

If someone retweets (RTs) your tweet, try to thank them as well, within a day.

And if there’s someone who followed you that you’re particularly excited about, thank them for following. Maybe include a nice comment about their website, or their work.

If a whole lot of new people are following, retweeting, or mentioning you, you may not be able to thank them all in a tweet. But you may be able to mention some of them on “Follow Friday” (see below), RT or reply to them, add them to a list, or otherwise interact. It’s OK to miss one now and again. The idea is to be mindful of who’s helping you and try to help them out, too.

3. Mention multiple people in your tweets.

All the mentioning and thanking can get tiresome – for both you and your followers!

So, mention or thank several people in one tweet. Doing so is a good idea – otherwise all those “thank yous” (or whatever) can get repetitive and boring to others. And you don’t have to thank everyone individually either. Here’s an example:

Thanks to all our new followers including @typoera @miss_woody @thestoryplant @manoflabook @joannaroserose (wish we could mention everyone!)
— Empty Mirror (@EmptyMirror) April 18, 2013

 

4. Tweet something every day.

What to tweet:
– A tweet – or a few – of your own stuff: a new product, a new blog post, a page on your website, a little news, a photo. Mix it up!

– Perhaps a RT or two, a reply or two or a comment on other people’s work, tweet a link to a great webpage you found.

– Try to tweet things that your followers will find interesting and want to retweet.

Some people will unfollow you if you don’t tweet every day, so in order to keep them, and attract others, keep those tweets comin’!

(But by the same token, do space out your tweets timewise – more people will see them that way – and don’t do more than maybe a maximum of about 10 a day. People may also unfollow if they feel or if you tweet the same thing over and over.)

A note on automatic and pre-formatted tweets: Have you click a “share this” button that generated a pre-written tweet? Before sending that tweet, edit it. Keep the link but add your own words and possibly a hashtag. People can tell when you didn’t take time to write your own tweet, and are less likely to retweet those.

4. Use hashtags.

Some people track certain hashtags that make it easy for them to find information on certain topics. Find out which hashtags are relevant to your content, and which ones are commonly used in your topic area.

For instance, people who tweet about kids’ books use the #kidlit hashtag. To find tweets about children’s books, all they have to do is search for “#kidlit”.

Use a maximum of 2 hashtags per tweet. (One is even better!) Studies have repeatedly shown that tweets with more are much less likely to be retweeted. You can always tweet again at a later time with a different hashtag.

Don’t use hashtags on every tweet! Just do it where it’s important in getting your message out.

Here are some good hashtag resources:
Twitter’s page on hashtags
Wikihow hashtag tutorial

5. Follow Friday.

The “Follow Friday” hashtag is #FF. On Fridays, this is a way to suggest to your followers other accounts that they might be interested in following. People love to be mentioned in #FF tweets!

Try to mention some new folks each Friday (maybe do one #FF tweet of your favorites, and another #FF tweet or two for new followers, or those who’ve been good to you or interacted with you, or mentioned you during the week).

In conclusion

If you do these things, your Twitter follower count will increase and more people will interact with your tweets.

What techniques have you used to get more Twitter followers?