In the past week, I’ve incorporated some new tactics that have had me grow my following more in one week, then in previous week’s combined. Below I’ve listed some steps you can take to possibly produce similar results.

First, some disclaimers on my methods/motivations of using Twitter. There isn’t a one size fits all approach to using Twitter. I don’t claim that my way is the right way, or that it would work for everyone. But for me, it works.

I only tweet a couple times a day on average…
There are tons of users who tweet everything they see, find, experience, etc. That’s not me. I don’t have that kind of time, nor do I have any interest in spending that amount of time on Twitter. I keep my tweets to a minimum only sharing my 1-2 blog posts a week, very interesting/entertaining articles and retweets. I imagine this accomplishes two things. One, my followers appreciate I am not flooding their Twitter streams with endless tweets about everything I experience. Two, it makes the content I share more valuable, as those that follow me know that when I share something, it may actually be worth checking out.

A large (albeit, relevant) following is important to me…
I am working to gain credibility in social media marketing and community building while building out my business. I also have aspirations to write a book if I can every get my ass in gear. Imagine having a 10, 20 or even a 50,000 following of potential readers/customers. As long as you took the time to build a strong, relevant, spam free following, I would imagine that a large following might open some doors with publishers that would otherwise be closed. At the very least, some potential buyers/customers.  Chris Brogan touches on this nicely in his latest book, Trust Agents (must read).

The following strategies assume you have some Twitter history with your account..  First being that you already have a Twitter account and some degree of followers/following established.  If you’re just starting out, these tactics might not be as effective (but I imagine they will still produce good results).  Second, that you have some sort of tweeting history.  People won’t be as interested in following you if you don’t have some of this history.  Of course many won’t care at all.

Now that we’ve got that out of the way, here’s some steps you can take to possibly mimic some of the success I’ve had:

1. Use a 3rd party Twitter software solution. I have been using TweetAdder for the past few months, and it’s been a fantastic tool.  I am not a corporate shill for them in any way (yes, it’s an affiliate link, but c’mon, who wouldn’t?), I’m simply someone that tried out the demo, had early success, and since then, it’s been a no brainer tool that I use everyday.  I DO NOT recommend anything that I don’t stand behind.  It’s great software, works on Windows and Mac, and they recently updated with some great new features.  Don’t take my word for it.  Check them out and try the free demo yourself.  If you’re serious about wanting to grow your Twitter following, I promise you’ll find yourself a customer.

2. Follow the followers of those you respect. There are so many spam accounts, robots, etc. out there it can be hard to know who’s real or who’s not.  In addition to using TweetAdder to identify relevant users to follow, I’ve found that using the software to identify followers of those users I respect have produced tremendous results.  The idea here is simple.  If you choose to follow users of those you respect or are related to you in some way, there’s a high probability that the majority of those users are real people with similar interests.  The follow back rates tripled for me using this tactic.  TweetAdder has a great feature where you can simply add a user’s name and it will extract those who follow them and add them to your “follow list” that you can use within the software.

3. Add yourself to the wefollow directory. This one is a bit harder to measure, but the fact is this can be a great tool to find others to follow that are relevant to you (including their networks).  You simply add your account and choose categories that are relevant to you.  For example, I listed myself as Seattle, WA, community manager, and social media.  While I probably won’t be cracking the Top 10 for social media anytime soon, I’m currently #9 for Seattle, WA and #3 for community manager.  It’s kind of fun, but more importantly, it’s a great resource because you can simply enter the users in these lists into TweetAdder and add their networks into your queue to follow.

Those are the 3 key areas I’ve focused on in the past week and it’s produced significant results.  There are many users that think using automated software is evil, spammy, etc.  I couldn’t disagree more.  With anything in life, anything can be abused and used in the wrong way.  But utilized the right way, ethically, there’s no reason to not take advantage of tools that can help you be more successful and efficient with what you do.  It’s worked for me, and it can work for you.

I understand that it is impossible to manage a large following by personally welcoming each person that follows you, and it’s not my expectation that anyone would do this.  I rarely do unless there are unique circumstances such as someone I’ve stumbled across that has much in common with me.  But let’s be honest here, people and businesses are using Twitter auto DM to pimp something, which I get.  This sort of thing has been done for years on a variety of different mediums.  What makes it so frustrating, is that Twitter has not released features that allow it’s users to combat this.  Much like an email spam filter, there needs to be ways to block these auto DMs.  I know recently SocialToo has launched some options to help, but it’s certainly not as useful as a Twitter supported feature could be.

I’m certainly not the only advocate for seeing this trend go away.  Sites like StopAutoDM.com are springing up to help buck the trend.  There’s also some useful chatter on the subject on a recent TechCrunch article.

Some of you might say, “Just unfollow those that auto DM, you have the power to filter it out”.  Yes, this is true, but just because someone is utilizing auto DM, doesn’t necessarily mean that person or or organization has nothing valuable to offer.  Often times people just don’t realize that some of the tactics they use are not an ideal way of communicating.  While I disapprove of the tactic, I don’t automatically categorize the user as spam.  In some cases, yes, in many, not necessarily.

I’m not implying that auto DM tactics should  not be available to those who wish to use it.  I’m all for businesses, organizations, and people having the freedom and ability to evangelize their products and services in ways that make sense for their business.  What I’m saying is that as an end user, I should have access to tools that allow me to control whether I see those messages or not.  Yes, Twitter is a free service, but it’s not like they are making money through these tactics to keep the service afloat.  I can tolerate some small, targeted advertising in exchange for using a tremendous tool like Twitter, but we’ve certainly reached a point where we need some tools to better manage Twitter.

I can’t imagine that the click through rates to links in Twitter auto DMs are that high, let alone conversion rates, but it would certainly be interesting to see.  I haven’t found any studies on the subject, but Mashable posted some interesting finds on overall click through rates for Tweeting as a whole here.  If the CTR on tweet links is roughly around 1.5% or so, it’s got to be much lower on auto DMs.

So, if you utilize Twitter auto DMs, I’d be interested to hear your take.  Why do you use it, and what are the results?  And if you knew that your audience hated them, would you stop?

Let’s preface this discussion with a few omissions.  Spammers, robots and automated accounts do not count. Most users aren’t interested in those connections unless they are providing some sort of value.  Also, celebrities, sports stars and industry superstars don’t count either.  You can’t expect them to really care too much about following every fan when they don’t have to.  It’s not realistic nor necessary for them to do so.  I’m talking about everyday, normal Twitter users with real human beings behind the accounts; those that choose to follow you for whatever reason.  Do they deserve or warrant your follow in return?

I come from the school of thought that they do.  I believe that by not following someone back I am in essence saying that I have more important things to say than they do.  That’s not the vibe I want to give out. Don’t get me wrong, certainly there are instances where I don’t follow someone because they are simply not relevant at all, so not everyone applies here.  However I work hard to ensure that I follow users that are relevant to me either socially or professionally so that the chances are better that they would in fact have useful information to share. Does this mean that I pile up quite a bit of follows that share information that isn’t relevant to me? Of course, but I don’t use Twitter to browse. When I need information, I use targeted searches that allow me to pull up the relevant information I need.  What’s more important to me, is building up a large, relevant network of individuals that are interested in what I have to say.  Since using Twitter more strategically, traffic to my blog from Twitter has increased to 14% (up 10%), and continues to grow.  So this method works for me.

Some individuals use Twitter differently.  They count on a clean, relevant stream of Twitter updates that don’t require searching through, which means not following all those that follow them.  These users then either have to grow their followers through frequent, useful tweets and re-tweets, or they simply do not care very much about the size of their following.

So what do you think?  Is it more valuable to return the favor for all that follow you, or to be more selective in who you follow?

FROST is a new gourmet donut shop that has opened up in the Mill Creek Town Center in Mill Creek, WA.  For those of you not local, it’s a hip/trendy outdoor shopping center that is quite popular with the locals.  They have already made quite a name for themselves with their savvy marketing/community approach, and more importantly, their amazing doughnuts.  These aren’t your average, run of the mill, doughnuts.  These are high quality, always fresh, gourmet doughnuts that fly off the shelves.  Unique flavors such as Southern Red Velvet, Banana Split Fritter, or their highly sought after Maple Bacon Bars, have people flocking to see what the latest and greatest creation is.  I’ve tasted them; they’re the real deal.

But it’s not just the product that has FROST on everyone’s mind.  It’s the unique approach they’ve taken to building their business that has caught this blogger’s eye.  Daniel Sterling is the Creative/Brand Technology expert and Managing Partner and the brains behind the social networking behind FROST and in just a few short months, Daniel has been able to build an incredibly strong community of customers by using social networking incredibly well.  And it’s not just the numbers that are staggering, but the community of highly passionate customers and two-way communication that has FROST driving crazy business.  One visit to their Facebook page and you’ll see comment after comment of already loyal customers gushing about this flavor and that flavor and sharing their feedback about how to do better.  So how do they do it?

Pre-Buzz – Rather then wait for the store to open, Daniel jumped on the opportunity to build buzz and awareness using Facebook, Twitter and their website to collect emails.  As the store was being built, they placed paper over the windows with their URL, but no information of what they would sell.  Daniel used Facebook and Twitter to slowly leak out hints as to who they were and the community ate it up and offered prizes for those hot on the trail.  Fan after fan joined and contributed to the “mystery” of what FROST could possibly be.   And when the doors opened, they drove so much business; they had to close on Monday to regroup.

Active Engagement – FROST does not rest on its laurels.  They proactively engage with their customers on Facebook and Twitter regularly offering discounts, responding to feedback, and even taking flavor requests.  Their Facebook and Twitter pages are a flurry of activity.

Two-Way Communication – It’s not must about posting today’s flavors or buy one get one free.  FROST is about customer enablement through two-way communication.  Not only are they enabling their customers to feel like part of the business through flavor, pricing and logistical recommendations, they are able to move swiftly to customer demand and make changes on the fly.  Never in the history of business has their been the ability to respond in this way, and FROST is all over it.  They’ve built trust with their customers right out of the gate to ensure business will boom even beyond the honeymoon phase.

What’s even more amazing about FROST’s success is not only their impressive use of social networking to promote themselves, but how they’ve truly created a community of customers.  They are not only sharing feedback directly to FROST, but also conversing with each other about their experiences.  That’s true community, and incredibly powerful stuff.  They’ve got the masses talking about their business to each other and that’s the dream of any business.

I was so impressed with FROST’s success, that I thought it would be useful to hear from Daniel what his top 3 recommendations for business owners would be regarding using social media effectively.

“Number one is getting over the fear of doing it and just go for it.  It’s not going to consume you, nor is the tech overwhelming.  You don’t have to be an expert.  Second is making sure you are ready and willing to communicate with your customers and respond quickly.  And the third is knowing how to communicate with your customers and be prepared for negative feedback.  Know how to respond accordingly.”

For most savvy social networkers, much of this is not news, but it’s still amazing how so few businesses (especially small to mid) have not embraced and taken advantage of the social media and community building opportunities.  FROST has been able to drive significant buzz, awareness and business using tools that cost nothing but time thus far.  They have saved thousands of dollars just by incorporating the use of Facebook and Twitter as part of their normal routines, and combined with their commitment to being a part of the conversation, they’ve found a recipe for success in more ways then one.

If you are a business owner that has yet to capitalize, FROST is a great model to learn from.

Oh, and Daniel’s favorite flavor?

“Our Classic Raised Glaze.  Nothing beats an original.”

FROST website: http://www.frostology.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Mill-Creek-WA/frost/57383368725?ref=ts
Twitter: http://twitter.com/frostology

However that does not mean that Twitter cannot be a useful tool. In fact, it can be a tremendous asset to those in business, or looking to promote anything whether it be themselves, a project, a good cause. Twitter’s main asset is it’s ability to track and direct. For businesses that means another channel to connect current and new customers to your product or brand. For websites it means another traffic building resource.

I originally was one of the 60% when I signed up for Twitter, but after attending some interesting lectures on the service, I gave it another shot and since then have found some use for it. I’ve been able to increase my blog traffic roughly 25% simply by employing some basic Twitter usage in to my blogging routine.

Here’s how you can take advantage of Twitter depending on your situation:

1. Traffic Generation. An immediate benefit of Twitter usage is the ability to drive traffic to your website(s). By simply using Twitter to spread information about your website, you’ll instantly see a spike in your site’s traffic. Obviously the larger and more relevant your following is, the stronger results you will see.
2. Find Customers. Twitter can be a great tool for finding new customers. By simply using Twitter Search you can find relevant users that will find value in your offerings.
3. Branding. Whether personally or for a business, Twitter can be a powerful tool to extend your brand. By developing a casual persona in the Twitterverse, you can establish yourself as a connected social personality.
4. Hire People. Traditional methods are a dying breed. Like Craigslist, Twitter can be a valuable source for hiring. And it costs you nothing to post.
5. Increase Your Network. Sometimes you just want to extend your social or professional network. Use Twitter Search to find relevant individuals to connect with. Use tools such as Social Too to auto follow those that follow you.
6. Feedback. Whether it be an online survey, or you simply want some feedback on your product line, use Twitter to get the word out and increase your results.
7. Event Coverage. If you’re hosting any type of event, Twitter can be a great tool to give real time updates to those either in attendance or those unable to attend. It also makes your company or organization look with the times.
8. Cross Promotion. Most users of Twitter use Facebook and vice versa. If you have a blog or company website, your best bet is to integrate all 3 with each other by visibly having your Twitter and Facebook identities on your site, and utilizing Twitter and Facebook’s cross posting features. That way no matter where you post information, it aggregates everywhere saving you time, and ensuring your message gets maximum exposure.
9. Learn. Despite popular belief that the only thing people post are meaningless daily activities, there are plenty of users that share interesting articles. In fact, in many cases late breaking news hits Twitter before any of the major sites or networks.

I’ll be writing more about my Twitter experiences and sharing best tips and practices in the coming weeks. Feel free to get started by following me.