6 Steps For A More Effective Non-Profit Twitter Account

6 Steps For A More Effective Non-Profit Twitter Account

I love Twitter (especially for non-profits!) for a variety of reasons, but to the uninitiated user, Twitter can feel very overwhelming. These six steps help break down how your non-profit can use Twitter more effectively.  

6. Use these free resources to tweet smarter

First, I'd be remiss not to mention that there are a large number of free resources available online that you can use to tweet more effectively. Here's a quick list of a few I personally use with the purpose for each:

• Hootsuite: Hootsuite is an amazing free tool that will help you automatically schedule tweets for the times when they get the most engagement.
• Klout: This tool measures your Twitter profile performance, but more importantly, it also curates relevant content that you can share by category to populate your Twitter feed (e.g. MANY's Klout profile follows the Non-Profit category.)
• Followerwonk: Pictured above, this free tool gives you reams of actionable data that can help you to make more informed decisions on how to tweet more effectively.

5. Post and curate relevant content, even if it's not yours

Because of the limited amount of time in the day, it can be very difficult to keep a steady stream of content coming from your own website to post onto Twitter. You can, however, post content from other organizations in your niche to keep your followers engaged. To keep up to date on what's going on in the nonprofit world, I browse Klout and I'm also subscribed to a number of nonprofit newsletters (like Nonprofit with Balls and Upworthy) that provide me with a steady stream of content to post on social media. A huge plus to this approach is being able to build relationships on social media with other organizations by sharing and engaging with their content, which can lead to all sorts of fun things, like new followers, guest posts, collaborative events, and more.  

4. Switch up your writing style according to the content

More than likely, your Twitter feed has two types of content: 1) articles related to your non-profit (created by you and others), and 2) information/events that need to be promoted. As a general rule, I’ve personally found it effective to put articles in title case and events in copy case (e.g. Title Case: “6 Ways To Tweet More Effectively” vs. Copy: “Six ways to tweet more effectively”). On this point, HubSpot found that, on average, tweets in title case get more clicks than tweets that are "copy," also known as tweets that are more similar to a full sentence. Obviously, not all of your Tweets Can Be Titles, but utilizing this technique where it makes sense can help you get more click-throughs on your links.

3. Pay attention to trending hashtags

As I stated above, scheduling your tweets with an app like Hootsuite can be a good way to make sure you have a steady stream of content. Having said that, being both in the moment and relevant are also highly important on social media, and especially on an app as ephemeral as Twitter. The easiest way to stay current and up-to-date is to check out what's trending and tweet content that's relevant to your perspective on the topic. For example, here's an article that we tweeted for May 4th, a.k.a. Star Wars "#MayTheFourthBeWithYou" Day.

From @starwars.com + @CoffeeWthKenobi -- Mentors In The Star Wars Films: https://t.co/p6OJWWTEuG #MayTheFourthBeWithYou

— MANY Network (@MANYnetwork) May 4, 2016

I included the Star Wars tweet to show that, if you really think about it, there's always an angle for you to contribute to the conversation, no matter what it is.

2. Tweet on the weekends

Interestingly enough, click through rates (CTR) are actually higher on the weekends than any other time of the week. If you want your content to get more exposure, it's not a bad idea to schedule it to be tweeted out on a Saturday or Sunday. I personally like to schedule the tweets containing links to longer articles on Sunday, primarily because I see the highest CTR on Sundays for our content on @MANYnetwork. However, every account and follower base is a little different, so pay attention to your analytics.  

1. Follow the right people and engage with their content

 First, following the right people is important. To have engaged followers, it's important to find influencers and others in your niche who can help amplify your own content. There are a couple of ways to do this (tools like Followerwonk, as suggested above, can help). I personally recommend finding Twitter lists related to your niche and following those accounts. Click here to search for your niche and find lists of accounts that tweet about that subject. Being a good member of a social network requires engaging with others. I always retweet, like, or comment on especially great content related to our niche. Engaging with others makes your account a great member of the community, and in turn, people will engage with your content as well. P.S. Got a question you’d like to see me answer? Feel free to shoot me an email here or comment below.