For journalists and marketers, Twitter is an uncertain phenomenon that can’ t be avoided. It’s one of those social marketing tools that give your message or in my case, ramblings, a wider audience.
So the name of the Twitter game is to build a following. The more followers, the better. I write a post and then I tweet about it, hoping some percentage of my followers follow the link and read it. My following at 850 is modest so I stand in amazement of people largely without celeb status who have tens of thousands of followers.
Stephanie Quilao, aka @skinnyjeans
One of those is Stephanie Quilao, aka @skinnyjeans in Twitter parlance. I read her tweets early on in my 500 days on Twitter and do not know her. She’s someone Twitter recommends that newbie Twitterers follow.
She posted an excellent “10 habits of a savvy twitterer” about how to get followers. With more than 45,000, she should know. As I read her “habits,”, I thought this is an empathetic person who has her head screwed on right (no doubt in my mind she voted for Obama).
Her thinking is crisp, deep and intelligent. She is the epitome of a blogger and Twitterer with something valuable to say. Her advice is as much about being a smart and good person as it is a prescription on how to get people to follow you. Here’s an abbreviated sampling:
Be yourself: People are attracted to genuineness and that can only come through if you are yourself. It’s so much easier and rewarding to just be you than to pretend to be or act like someone else.
Stand for something: A really good salesperson once taught me that people are all ears when around confidence and passion, alluring qualities because we’d like to be that way ourselves.
Be a class act: This is the best piece of advice my mom has ever given me, and I pass that advice to everyone.
Mix up the tweets: I have a formula for my tweet stream. It’s 33/33/33 and no more than 10/day (that’s a third retweets, a third replies and a third original content…journalists think original content is the end all-be all and I defer in that direction. Her formula is onto something).
I’ll urge you to read the rest for yourself at her blog, The Everyday Blogger. Something really grabbed me about this post.
The irony is that I almost un-followed her as someone with whom I have little in common. She’s a nutrition and health enthusiast into “mind, body and spirit”and who is always reminding people to drink water. “What the hell is this?” I thought as downed my fifth diet Coke of day. I could never figure out what skinny jeans meant, either. You can visit her blog to find out and it has nothing to do with tight jeans.
The short of it is that we are different except she’s a Silicon Valley marketing and PR type whose travels in the same world as me, the grizzled Boston-based tech and business journalist.
She’s an insightful writer who clearly follows her own advice. I can identify with many of her tips, but there’s others I could work on to beef up my Twitter following. Maybe her habits could help you, too.
The main message I wanted to get across in my post was that what we do on Twitter is really no different than what we do in our everyday lives. 
