Twitter lists can be the most powerful tool to use on Twitter and yet it seems under-utilised or over-used
I’ve been using them from day one and it helps me keep my interests, hobbies and work organised in separate lists so I can find and join the conversations my fellow twitterers are having.
You’re allowed 20 lists with 500 people in each list (as of May 30, 2013, you may have 1,000 lists with 5,000 people in each list), which helps you connect to an extra 10,000 (now, 5 million) twitterers which you don’t need to follow directly, more on that later.
For this to work, I’m presuming you already know how to create a list and if you don’t please follow this link.
Tip #1
First of all, you need to decide what you’re using twitter for, business, personal or both and decide how you can separate your interests, hobbies and work.
I have striped back some of my lists and incorporated them together. For example, I had a Celeb and Sports Stars List but decided to put them together as there wasn’t that many in the list and I needed space for another list which was more important.
Decide what lists you want the public to see and be able to subscribe to and what ones you want to keep private. I have a competitors list which is private and I can see what they are tweeting and what they are doing within their business.
Tip #2
Did you know you can follow users tweets without actually following them?
How? Start adding twitter users to your lists and don’t follow them just yet and it will display their tweets with any other users you have added to the list making this easier to manage and browse through when you have a need or desire to see what’s going on within that niche.
Some will see you have added them to a list and be flattered you have done so and will follow you in return. Once they do this, follow them back and start tweeting with that user.
The other users which haven’t followed you are your opportunity to start a conversation with the users on your list and join any conversations they may be having because it will be easily displayed in the list for you.
Keep adding to the list even if you don’t have time to start a conversation at that moment as you can come back at a later date and continue growing your network.
Tip #3
Subscribe to other lists that are of interest to you. If you find a list exactly with the type of users you are looking to gain start adding them to your list or subscribe to that user list. Subscribing to other lists leaves you with extra space to create unique lists.
Watch and see the knock on effect from this, once you start adding users to your lists and you subscribe to lists you will start to see yourself being added to lists. Once this happens it will have a knock-on effect and your tweets will be going out to a bigger audience than just your followers.
Add your lists here to gain more subscribers ~ Listorious
To manage your lists the tool I have found best for this is HootSuite. You manage all your lists and profile on the one dashboard and manage your social profiles more efficiently.
Do you have any other tips or programs for using twitter lists?
