17 Common Types of Tweets
Twitter, the ADHD brother of Facebook, takes a lot of heat. And unfairly I would say. The critics always dumb it down saying it’s 90% crap. But I disagree. I find it fascinating listening to the thought process that emerges in 140 characters. In many ways, it clarifies the thinking process requiring us to really think about what we’re going to say. I’ve documented my journey through Twitter and I’m going to continue to use it as long as it has value.
But I was also thinking about ways to make Twitter useful and enjoyable. So I came up with 17 different types of Tweets to consider and reasons to use them or not.
1. The Lunch Tweet: What you have for lunch is not interesting unless it’s something based in Soy Sauce and it fell on the woman next to you. We’ve all had Chipotle and we know it’s really, really good.
2. The Quote Tweet: If you quote someone, make sure it’s something people understand and not some sixth century nomadic who stood on a pole for 67 years.
3. The Pic Tweet: If you serve up a picture of your lovable dog, make sure its of him getting away with murder as he just digested your last copy of your first graphic novel. We all have dogs and we love them too.
4. The Endless Tweet: If you tweet a lot, realize that if your Tweets are connected to Facebook, your spamming the hell out of people. (I’ve done this while tweeting a conference and had hate mail for a week.)
5. The Opinion Tweet: If you have an opinion, make sure you don’t assume it’s the only one in existence. Nothing turns people off faster than a closed mind.
6. The Sales Tweet: If you’re selling something, consider the value of your readers and not just your pocketbook.
7. The PR Tweet: If you’re serving up articles about yourself or your new book (unless stuff is free), you’re treading a very fine line. If you’ve crossed it, it’s hard to come back over that line.
8. The Offer Tweet: This could be the single best reason to use Twitter. If you’re helping people find good stuff, especially free, it’s all good.
9. The Info Tweet: If you ask for help, people will generally give it to you. We’re like that.
10. The Link Tweet: If you link to humor, beauty, or tragedy, you’re pretty much golden.
11. The Blog Tweet: The twin brother of the Link tweet. If you have a blog and advertise it on Twitter, don’t tweet it over an over again. Multiple tweets suggest you don’t have confidence in what you have to say. We do know you write and we’ll get around to it. We think.
12. The Wallow Tweet: If you’re having a bad day, we’ll feel sorrow for you. If you’re having two bad days, we’ll feel extra sorrow for you. If you’re having a bad year, it’s pretty much time to reevaluate things.
13. The Play-By-Play Tweet: There’s a reason Twitter is 140 characters. We don’t need every last detail.
14. The Name Dropping Tweet: If you hang with really famous people, it’s cool. If you let us know about it all the time, we’re starting to wonder if you have self-esteem issues.
15. The Provocative Tweet: We love it when you tempt us with something like, “You don’t want to read this.” You know we’re going to go ahead and click that link.
16. The Thank You Tweet: I’m not good at this and I want to be. Thank people for RT and gracious comments. The little bit of recognition takes sixteen seconds and last a long time.
17. The Conversation Starter Tweet: If you have a really great question that gets lots of people Tweeting and ReTweeting, you’ve hit the jackpot.
What would you add?
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