Brainstorm Design Blog

If you want more followers on Twitter, remember this golden rule: 

"People are attracted to people who have a great sense of humour"

Humour makes you look human, especially if you can laugh at yourself. So here are a few pointers to help you be more humorous on social media. 

1. Share a humorous quote.
2. Share humorous videos. It doesn't have to be related to your work: e.g.  Just for Laughs gags.
3. Humorous observations from your work. E.g. I posted a blog article about illiterate SEO consultants, by publishing some sample comments I found on my blog.
4. Describe humorous things that have happened to you.
5. Most importantly, never make a joke at someone else's expense. It's not funny, it makes you look unprofessional, and it will probably backfire.

If you run a business, you presumably have a business plan that sets out your aims and objectives for the next six to twelve months. But do you have a marketing plan? 

If you want to attract more business, you need to plan what you’re going to say to your target customers, when you’re going to say it, and how you’re going to say it. And it’s the “how” that I’m going to talk about. You can get your message across through your website, your pay per click campaign, your emails, and even through SEO. But social media has become such a major force for attracting new business, it needs a plan all of its own. 

Ever accepted a LinkedIn invitation by mistake? Or discovered that one of your connections are not as legitimate as you thought they were?  If that’s the case, then it’s time to remove them. 

Go to the top menu and click on “contacts”. On the next page you’re taken to, there is an option on the top right of the page called “remove connections”. You will then see a long list of your connections. Just select the people you want to remove and click the “remove” button. 

Would you like more business through LinkedIn but not sure how to make it work for you?

Today, Friday 1st July, I will be holding an online question and answer session on Twitter. Tweet any question you like about LinkedIn to @brainstormdsgn and I will give you my opinion. 

I will be taking questions between 2-4PM UK time. I look forward to hearing from you!

So, you've launched your new Facebook business page. All your friends, relatives and even a couple of strangers have 'liked' it. What now? How do you continue drawing new fans to your page, giving it enough exposure to turn it into a useful business tool?

One way is to use other social media sites in order to promote it and drive traffic to your page. Of course, any time you post an item to your Facebook page - be it news item, poll, special offer or information -- you should post a link on Twitter. Hopefully, some of the visitors will decide to follow your Facebook page permanently.

One reason Twitter can be intimidating to new users is that they worry they won't have any interesting content to post, and that finding useful content will take up large amounts of their time.

Of course, the best tweeters post original content - perhaps links to their own blog or published material - and interact with other Twitter users spontaneously. But if you are going to rely on material published elsewhere, such as news stories and blog posts written by others - as many people do - there are some 'tricks of the trade' that will help you use your time efficiently.

One secret of Twitter that many new users take too long to work out is that putting together a good, solid list of accounts to follow is just as important as who, or how many people, you get to follow you. You don't want your Twitter feed clogged up with useless rubbish - you want links, information and discussions that can benefit your business.

So, you should avoid the temptation to follow everyone who follows you. There are a few obvious warning signs that your new Twitter follower is a spammer or time-waster:

• They are following hundreds of people and have very few followers themselves. 
• Their user name is complete gibberish, usually a weird and random collection of letters and numbers.
• Their profile picture is a young girl (usually blonde), typically showing a generous amount of cleavage.

When you suffer from chronic pain, it can be difficult to find people who really understand what you are going through, and who can offer you support and advice. Groups like the Fibromyalgia Association offer invaluable benefits, for which there is no substitute. But in recent years, many thousands have also found help through the internet – and specifically, through what is known as "social media", that is, sites like Facebook and Twitter that help you connect to others.

 There are endless books and articles being published that deal the subject of gaining followers on Twitter. Less is written about unfollowers. It’s important to understand why people stop following you on Twitter as this can alert you to things you might be doing wrong. You can be unfollowed for a number of reasons:

1. You tweet to often: Your followers feel that they’re being spammed by you with constant updates.
2. Your content of your tweets may not be relevant to your followers.
3. You tweet too infrequently: Your followers may not feel you have much to say.
4. Your tweets are just links to articles, you don’t actually say anything.
5. Your tweets are full of conversations with other tweeters that mean nothing to the people who follow you.