Twitter Tips to Get More Retweets

You keep tirelessly posting on Twitter, but there are still no retweets? And your only new follower throughout the whole week is a bot? Not to mention, you can literally count on your fingers the amount of traffic sent from this social media to your blog? The time has come to change things up!

Every marketer would give anything to learn the skill of working with Twitter in a way that would bring a constant increase in followers, and for every post to get retweeted. Tens of thousands of users follow celebrities and popular brands on Twitter.  The followers immediately retweet or comment on the posts of famous fashion designers or any other well-known figures, increasing their popularity and authority. As well as increasing their traffic and SEO ranking.

This is the reason why many marketers use Twitter to promote new projects, trying to get on the same level of followers with famous brands and established celebrities. However, quite often start up entrepreneurs are only able to get a small fan base consisting mainly of friends, family and coworkers. As a result, another Twitter account with hopeless posts and endless links.

But this doesn’t have to be the case, with these tips you can now take your account under control. Read on, take notes, draw conclusions and don’t forget to implement the tips.

1. Use Simple but Powerful #Hashtags

Hashtags have become some sort of a trend all on its own. There is something so special about them. Many studies have shown that posts with hashtags get retweeted two times more than regular posts. It’s best not to go crazy on them though. One or two hashtags is the optimum number, any more than that and your chances of getting a retweet decrease.

When it comes to using hashtags, it’s always better to use something simple yet on point, than to use a more complex one that doesn’t have a direct connection. For instance, when the producers of X-Factor USA decided to come up with a hashtag that would be different from the British version, they created a short yet complex hashtag #xfusa. The amount of money spent on the promotion of this hashtag didn’t save the situation, because the fans were still using the classic #xfactor hashtag five times more, than they did #xfusa. So the moral of the story is, stay simple yet precise!

2. Pick the Right Time to Tweet

For many social media platforms afternoon has the highest activity and engagement levels. This is why it is important to tweet at the right time. Usually the best time to get some retweets is around 5pm when most people get off work. Always make sure you know your target audience. If your fan base is of high school age, then make sure you tweet around the time they get out of school. It’s generally always better to post when people are in between of action, not while someone is studying or working. Which is why late afternoon or evening are more preferable as opposed to the beginning of the day.

Another little tip is, try to be consistent with the time of your posts. Do not change it often and try to post at a regular time. This will give some sense of routine to your followers and they will know what to expect from your account on a regular basis.

3. Use Images in the Right Way

It’s important to use images when you’re tweeting. Surely, you don’t have to do it in every post, but it is necessary to do it from time to time. It attracts more attention and makes your account more active. Another small yet important tip is, if you use pictures upload them through Twitter.  Quite often people post pictures on Twitter through Instagram or Facebook. This is a big no-no! It’s been shown that uploading images through Twitter increases the chance of getting a retweet by 94%!

4. Shorten the URL

Some people still don’t use URL shorteners. As you probably imagine, that’s a mistake. No one wants to see never ending links, especially when your initial plan is to actually get some traffic through that link. That is why it’s crucial to shorten the URLs. This way the post looks more attractive and people are much more likely to click on it.

In addition, posts that contain links actually get a higher number of retweets. Two of the most retweeted topics are instructional posts and news updates. If you embed a link in your post on those topics chances are you’ll get a pretty good number of retweets.

5. Optimize Space for Retweets

Have you ever found a post you wanted to retweet, but because it was so long and you had to edit it to add your comment you canceled it in the end? I’m quite sure that happens more often than not!

The trick to optimizing your tweets is to write somewhere from 80 to 110 characters. Really do your best not to use up the full 140 characters limit. Otherwise, you leave no room for your followers to retweet without any hassle. No one has time to edit someone’s post to just retweet it.

6. Use the Right Words

That’s right, you heard it correctly! There are words that actually get more retweets and attention. By using those words you increase the chances of your post being noticed and reposted by your followers. The top three words that get retweeted the most in the descending order are ‘You’ ‘Twitter’ and ‘Please’. So Please use Twitter words right and Youwill be happy. Check out the picture below for more words to use.

7. Quote Others in Your Tweets

To interact with your followers even more, what you can do is add quotes to your tweets. Everyone loves quotes and by using them you increase your chances of being retweeted by 30%. You can quote either random famous people or simply other famous Twitter users. Make sure the content is engaging and you’re good to go!

8. Be Polite if You Need a Retweet

Not all content falls under this category, but there are times when you actually need your tweet to be seen by as many people as possible. For these situations you have an option of asking people to retweet your post. However, there are a few rules to be successful in it. You have to make sure you are polite to your followers. Just like in real life, on Twitter you have to have manners and understand that no one is obliged to do anything for you.

So when you need a retweet use phrases that increase your chances of getting one. Phrases such as;   ‘please help’and ‘please retweet’ increase your chances by 100%. There are also other options that would help you get your message out. Words as simple as ‘please’ or ‘pls’ would do the trick and ‘please RT’ is quite an effective one as well.

If you’re in a hurry and you’re ready to sacrifice the effectiveness of your post you can always use ‘retweet’ or ‘spread’. This slightly affects the quality of your tweet but it gets the word out.

9. Let it Be Short, but Not Too Short

As you may have guessed there is an ideal length for your post. Experts from Hubspot have looked at 1,4 mil of tweets, published on 1,2 mil Twitter accounts to find what’s the most optimal length of a post that would get the most retweets. According to their study they found out that the average use of characters has to be around 120. The longer the post the more people will retweet it. However, do not go beyond 120 characters. Otherwise it will strongly affect the level of your retweets. Don’t go lower than 80 either. It decreases the chances of your post attracting attention.

10. Do NOT Use the Least ReTweetable Words

Yes, there was a list about words here already. This one is the opposite of the previous one, but just as important. Do you know what people don’t want to hear about? They don’t want to hear about how busy or tired you’re, how pissed off or irritated you’re, or how you’re going to bed, to play games, to eat and so on. No one cares about these details of your life. Everyone wants to know something that will actually be beneficial for them or at least entertaining.

This is why it’s important to pay attention to the words you use on Twitter. Try hard to avoid the least retweetable words such as ‘game’ ‘going’ and ‘haha’ and check out the list below for more words to stay away from.

If you follow this list of tips, you’d be on your way to growing a successful Twitter account. Never rush if you want to get far. Slow and steady is always the key and make sure to check out our other blog posts for more interesting tips and advice to use on other social media platforms!