How To Get Retweets? 9 Strategies to Maximize Your Online Influence

Getting retweets is a sign that you captured the attention of your audience online, and that followers find your tweets interesting. Retweets are posts by your followers based on the original tweet posted by you or someone else. They usually start with “RT” which means retweet followed by the twitter name of the person it originated from.

Your influence increases exponentially when someone retweets your post because your original tweet will be shown on the feed of the person who retweets you, and all those that follow that person will also see your tweet. If your content is something of interest to them, the chances of them following you are very high. And as such, the ripple effect begins…

So how do you get retweets? In today’s 6 min episode I will discuss several findings from the research conducted by Dan Zarella that will highlight some important aspects of your tweets to help increase your chances to be retweeted.

Here is a script for your convenience:

#1 Eye movement research shows that readers pay attention to the first 11 characters in a title online, and only then decide whether they want to proceed with reading further.  Tweets are mini titles, so be sure to include the most important information into the 11 first characters in the twitter.

#2.Dan Zarella found that there are several words that get retweeted more than others. Here is the list of the top 20 retweetable words:

#3 Dan Zarella discovered that posts containing links were retweeted much more than those that did not have links. He also found that using link shrinkers like bit.ly and ow.ly increases your chances of being retweeted

#4 The frequency of your tweets is also important. Contrary to the widespread belief, “the more the better”, when it comes to tweeting, moderation is the key. Tweeting more than once per hour decreases your chances of getting retweets! The readers just do not have time to absorb your information, and might even view you as a spammer. Thus, you should post ideally no more than every hour for higher exposure.

#5 Retweets also appear to have more syllables per word than ordinary Tweets – tweets have an average of 1.58 syllables per word, versus retweets at 1.62 syllables per word

#6 Dan Zarella found that retweets require a “higher level of education to understand”.  In other words, don’t dumb it down for the crowd in order to get retweeted

#7 Add some new information and use words related to “novelty” in order to maximize your chance of being retweeted.

#8 Retweets tend to be less self-referential, despite the fact that most tweets are about one’s self. Therefore, do not tweet as a celebrity reflecting any movement you make. Choose a niche and tweet within this niche.

#9 The topic of the tweet is also important. People do not tend to retweet posts that are about politics, religion or contain swear words

What To Do Now:

In the comments below share what makes YOU retweet other people’s posts.

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If you liked this post you might also enjoy the following:

http://effectiveonlineteaching.org/2012/10/23/7-twitter-tools-to-increase-manage-and-measure-your-online-influence/

http://effectiveonlineteaching.org/2012/09/19/how-to-stand-out-from-the-crowd-online/

http://effectiveonlineteaching.org/2012/09/05/3-strategies-for-building-connections-through-linkedin/

http://effectiveonlineteaching.org/2012/08/29/how-to-increase-your-visibility-through-linkedin-recommendations/