Tried & True #Tweetchat Hosting Tips
Knikkolette | Jan 13, 2012 | Comments 20
What is a Tweetchat?
If you’ve been on Twitter for any length of time, you’ve probably seen people posting tweets or even having conversations with hashtags (#) at the end of each tweet. Many times, you will see an announcement encouraging people to attend these Tweetchats, which are scheduled events usually held on a regular basis and they can cover a variety of topics. If you want to host your own Tweetchat, here are some things you need to do and some helpful links that will make your Tweetchat more successful:
1. Pick a Topic – Know what you will be discussing and start working on your questions for your participants.
2. Choose a Date & Time – There are things to consider when choosing a date and time such as where are the majority of participants located? If you are on the east coast of the US, but the majority of your followers and participants are in China, plan accordingly. If you are a member of an online community, try to pick a date and time that is convenient for the majority of the community members.
3. Choosing the Right Hashtag – You want to make sure your hashtag is unique. To ensure your hashtag isn’t currently being used for another group go to a site like Tagdef. You can do a search for your hashtag and if it’s available, you can put in a description. Another advantage of researching a hashtag before your Tweetchat event, is ensuring you aren’t supporting a cause you don’t agree with.
4. Promote, Promote Promote – If you don’t tell them, they won’t attend. People have lives outside of your online world. (I know – it’s shocking, but it’s true.) Just because you are online almost 24/7 doesn’t mean everyone else is. Even if they ARE online, that doesn’t mean they are on the same social media platform so be sure to give everyone plenty of notice.
5. Prepare – You have your questions for your topic (see number 1). Do you have any associated links? Do you have videos or anything else you might need? How about a script? Just how much preparation do you need?
Things to Consider:
There are third party sites that make Tweetchats easier for the attendees to participate:
Tweetchat – an online site that connects with your Twitter account: PROS: automatically adds hashtag to every tweet, pause feature, as a host you can feature or block a user. CONS: there is a delay serious delay if you don’t have a really fast internet connection. My home connection is DSL, but not super high speed and it definitely shows. I hosted an event recently and no one could see me within the Tweetchat site so there are still some bugs that have to be worked out.
Twebevent – an online site that allows you to schedule your Tweetchat: PROS: you can create an event, and you get a unique url to share, you can post questions, media, date and time of your event as well as promote your event. CONS: there’s no feature for transcription of the Tweetchat.
Tweetreach – an online site that gives you analysis of all available tweets based upon a twitter name or hashtag: PROS: allows you to save, or print your Twitter activity, analyzes the data based upon your search. CONS: non fee version only shows up to 50 posts, if you want a full report you have to shell out $20
Hashtracking – an online site that gives an analysis of all available tweets based upon a twitter hashtag: PROS: allows you up to 1000 most recent tweets and the window is good up to 24 hours. CONS: pricy, the month-to-month price is $40 for a single report, didn’t see a feature from the free version how to save or print the report.
Don’t know what you want your Tweetchat to be about? Monitor existing chats and see what’s missing then give the people what they need!
Finally, once the chat is over, it’s not really over. Continue to monitor your hashtag and if the participants are using it, be sure to interact, communicate, engage. Be social. Who knows where it could lead!
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Great list! I’ve been participating in tweet chats for years, being a moderator, a hostess, an interviewer, interviewee, etc. and there are all sorts of ways to operate them. My favorite is to run a simultaneous radio or call in show at the same time where people can interact on and offline.
I have to admit, I do like hashtracking, although the only time I actually go back and read is if there are links I missed!
Good luck to you in your new tweet chat!
Martha Giffen recently posted..Powerful Ways To Promote Your Business For Free
Thanks so much Martha – sounds like you have more experience than I do. I learned A LOT coordinating the tweetchats for the kiwk group. Thanks again for commenting & hope you can host one of the KIWK tweetchats!
Great top Knikkolette! After hosting around 200 tweetchats have found that success is dependent on the quality of your ongong daily promotion, the topic and most importantly your questions. Have to engender an 100 character reply. Not too narrow to just get a yes or no but not too wide that people cannot express themselves in a tweet
Hey Michael – thanks so much for your feedback. If anyone knows about Tweetchats – you certainly do!
I appreciate you taking the time to post.
Great post. You’re a great writer: you made complex things simple. That’s because you know them deeply because you have experienced them. Thanks.
Thanks so much Fabrizio – I really appreciate your feedback.
Hello Knikkolette,
Thanks for writing this very informative article. I’ll have to check out every single one of those tools. I know I was having a bit of a challenge with Twebevent the other night. I couldn’t see you.
Jocelyn
PS: Love our TweetChats on #kiwk! See you Thursday!
Glad you liked it Jocelyn. I’m still researching for part 2.
Nice straightforward advice which I shall be using, I’ve never had the time to include tweet chats as part of my weekly routine but I will be endeavouring to do so this year.
Kittie Walker recently posted..Those Pesky Design Questionnaire Questions – What Do they Achieve
Glad you liked it Kitty – thanks so much for your input!
Twitter is by far one of the fastest ways to promote and tweet-chat is one targeted down to what you really need. I use Hootsuite for scheduled posting but pro program can be unpredictable at times.
love the article!
JanB recently posted..My Job Interview…
Thanks so much for your feedback! You are correct, just about any application can be unpredictable.
Knikkolette,
You covered points well.
I actually like Tweetchat.com – The speed and lag can be daunting at first, but once you figure it out, I like seeing people’s faces, getting that automatic hashtag, and my own customized little alcove it provides.
When we’re using free tools, nothing is going to give us every bell & whistle we want. But there are options out there that provide options — I like that!
One tweet chat organizer reminds me about the chat, and then makes a “Top 10″ report from the hashtracking and features it on the Google+ page. It is a good enthusiasm builder.
Good sum-up!
~Keri
Keri recently posted..The Pleasures Of Owning Your Online Real Estate
Great post. I just hosted a chat last night. Wish I saw this first.
I actually would like to highly recommend folks to use Storify to currate their chat. What a great tool.
You can currate content not just from Twitter but many other places. You then publish it and it’s live.
Got a Google Alert 5 minutes after I published.
Mike Brooks recently posted..Game Changer: Google Plus Changes Search And Social Media Marketing
Hey Mike, thanks so much for your feedback. I’ll definitely have to check out storify.
Knikkolette,
Great post. I’ve bookmarked it for re-read, as one of my big projects for 2012, along with blogging consistently, is to make much better and consistent use of Twitter.
I’ll also be checking out the apps and programs you listed, as well as those listed by your other commenters.
Mallie recently posted..Schedule A Pajamas Day!
Tweet chats are getting more and more popular.
Yes they are and participants can learn a lot from them.
You can also follow a hashtag in your Twitter client like Tweetdeck or Hootsuite. Just set up a search for the hashtag and all of the tweets with that hashtag should show up in the search window. These apps range in difficulty and also in update speed. I suggest you pick one of these options, drop in a hashtag for an upcoming event and see if it works for you.
Read more: http://janetfouts.com/how-to-participate-in-a-tweet-chat/#ixzz1rXLTQofp
Under Creative Commons License: Attribution
Keisha recently posted..WoW Gold Guide Review
You are right Keisha – thanks for sharing those tips!