5 Effective Ways To Use Lists On Twitter
Oct 01 2009 
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With the imminent launch of lists, or groups, on Twitter, you’re probably wondering how the hell you’re going to use this feature. Why is Twitter adding lists long after several clients have already integrated Groups? Groups are a popular feature in Twitter clients such as Tweetdeck, Mixero, and Hootsuite. They offer many advantages and flexibility options for Twitter power users and those that follow thousands of people. However for the average Twitter users, this just seems like another chore right? WRONG!
Advantages of Grouping Twitter Followers
Those who take advantage of groups have many advantages over others including:
- Being the first to know about new announcements
- Building new relationships relatively quickly
- Strengthening current relationships over a shorter period of time
So what and who do you group? Well there are many ways that you can group your followers. Here are 5 of the most effective ways I’ve discovered as a blogger to group my followers:
Track clients
If you’re managing a ton of clients or maybe just a few, but with numerous employers to keep track of, grouping them is an easier way to keep track of what everyone’s tweets.
Track Brands
Got favorite brands that you want to keep updated on what new products or services they’re using? Group their twitter accounts!
Track Your Favorite Blogs
More blogs are starting to push their updates to Twitter. Some use a separate account and single author blogs like SheGeeks, use personal accounts to mix things up. If you hate using RSS readers, grouping your favorite blogs on Twitter is a great way to get new updates in near real-time. No more mark as all read or unread items count
Track Your Favorite Bloggers
Sometimes you enjoy the personality of bloggers as much as you like their content. So why not group your favorite bloggers to help strengthen your relationship as a reader. Bloggers are more than willing to listen to your ideas and thoughts on how they can improve their blog for you (including me).
Family and Friends
When followers start to build up, it gets hard to maintain current and prospective relationships simultaneously. Start grouping your Twitter followers that you already have a good relationship with and group growing relationships in another category. This way you can keep track of everyone within all the noise.
How Can Twitter Lists Better Your Experience?
- What other ways are you using group features in Twitter clients?
- What advantages have you found to grouping your followers?
- Has it effectively helped you to manage your growing follower count on Twitter?
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This list will be put in full effect by average uses too.. now that twitter announced groups!
Great list- also you can track by subject experts I do already in a number of different apps- wish I could sync all of them between apps (someone will do that soon I hope. I track #branding #blogging #scrm( social CRM) #cem (Customer Experience management, #analytics (social montioring) #consulting #speaking #presentations #hyperlocal and then move them thru my other groups- interesting, experts, network, inner group, core insider. So I have most folks in 2 or more groups this help me streamline the content and also helps me target key folks in projects, or know who to reach out to for help on questions or resources. Nice post.
Do you use Twitter list for doing any sort of outreach or networking?
Oh Doctah have your twitter lists been activated yet?
Not yet and hope I do not need to.But more than likely will have to.. I was hoping that Tweetdeck might take the API and work with twitter to be able to take my existing groups and sync them we shall see. My list function has not been turned on as of today. I have 2 apps that I use People Browser and Tweetdeck to create my groups. I highly filter these groups and create them around Customers, Vendors, key people in the different areas of my business. I then use search thru these groups to research what I am interested in knowing from those groups. It has made it easier to get Real Time info faster than shared Google Reader where I follow your shares for instance. I filter all my blogs in reader also with keyword search both my shared and also the 600+ blogs in Reader. Answer to your question is yes.. that is the power of filtering correctly. Follow only key people and drop everyone else or follow a lot and filter and tune the info big time…
Imho one important group is forgotten in this list: the business competition.
Why spare a group that has exactly the same intentions and goals as I have? I might benefit from their know-how and get delivered links to my door that will be useful to me ;-)
Imho one important group is forgotten in this list: the business competition.
Why spare a group that has exactly the same intentions and goals as I have? I might benefit from their know-how and get delivered links to my door that will be useful to me ;-)
One of the best article that is seen regarding twitter lists.
Nice one