Are you using Twitter to draw traffic to your blog?

I love twitter.

There. I’ve said it.

It’s my choice of poison to network with my fellow bloggers and promote my blog. Yes I use Facebook and Linkedin too, but Twitter? I think it’s the most wicked cool way to find great posts to read, share what I’ve read with my fellow tweeps and pick their brains for help.

When I’ve built a relationship with a tweep (trust me it’s an endearment) or find that they have cool thoughts or tantalizing posts to share, I head on over to their blog. I’ve noticed that my tweeps do the same for me.

And there’s where some of my traffic comes from.

Ah twitter, how I love thee.

But my traffic doesn’t only come from twitter, it comes from Google and Bing search engines too because I use twitter. Read on my friend, read on. My love for twitter is everlasting and abundant.

Basic Technique for Blog Traffic via Twitter

Do I always have time to tweet? Ha! Hell no. There’s bottoms to clean, uniform shirts to iron, job hunting to do, etc, etc, etc.

But it’s important to my traffic. Again, how else will my tweeps know I’ve got awesomeness for them?

So I try to use my twitter time productively. Two things I’ve recently started doing:

• 1. Schedule tweets of my posts.
  Some say it’s tacky to tweet your own blog posts. Some say you should wait for others to read your posts and tweet it. I say, screw that, how will “others’ know I’ve got a wicked post up if I don’t tweet it myself?

• 2. Schedule RTs of posts I’ve read (in the wee hours of the morning).
  Face it, what’s the point of ReTweeting a post if no one’s around to see it? When you sign on to twitter, do you backtrack through your timeline to 3am? Schedule those RTs for during the day when your tweeps would benefit from it. Those tweeps that haven’t been to your blog, may stop by, cause you know, you have good taste in blog posts. Traffic.
  Retweeting a post from a blog that’s new to me, has gained me new followers, and some of that blogger’s followers have followed me too.They all see the scheduled tweets of my awesome post and some RT. See? Traffic. However, I will ask that you tweet with integrity. Don’t RT posts to your timeline just to get the blogger to follow you. Not cool. If I’m on your timeline and you’re recommending really badly written articles to me cause you think it will help you get a blogger with 20k followers to follow you, you just lost me for good.
  

HootSuite, Tweetdeck and Seesmic are great options and have free versions.

Intermediate Technique for Blog Traffic via Twitter, Google and Bing

Did you know that Google and Bing index your tweets (depending on your twitter privacy setting)? What does this mean for you? Depending on how many post tweets you have containing the keyword someone is searching for, your blog post could be bumped up in the ranking for that keyword. So if you write a post about Google Friend Connect and input that keyword phrase and your link into a tweet, you’re link is being indexed by Google and Bing for that keyword. The more you have for that keyword, the better your chances are for ranking for that keyword in the search engine.

Keywords people! In each tweet for a post, use keywords. Stop the “New Post” and “From the Archives” tweets. It’s just taking up valuable space.

Advanced Technique for Blog Traffic via Twitter Using Backlinks

So how do you get a backlink from Twitter? Well, first let’s look at our Twitter application, mobile, web and desktop versions. Majority of those apps are free or have free versions. Why give away great apps like Tweetcaster, Hootsuite, Tweetdeck, etc, etc, etc for free? I don’t know the exact answer. But, I can tell you what I’ve observed.

Notice when you’re using Twitter, the web app, there are “promoted” links in your sidebar? Advertisers are paying for their links to follow a person, a company or a trend. When you’re using free versions of twitter clients on your phone, there are paid ads on the bottom. With so many applications out there, how do these advertisers decide who to go with? I’m guessing it’s the client with the most users and the highest page ranking.

Highest page ranking?

I’m sure all you twitter users have noticed that you can mostly tell what app a person is tweeting from by the url under the tweet. Did you know those URLs are backlinks? Backlinks to the twitter client developer’s site from one of the highest ranking sites on the web? Here’s a few examples:

We’ve got via web, which is twitter.com, TweetDeck, Tweetcaster (from my Android), and After Bedtime Blog.

Four Backlinks.

Did you notice the last backlink? The one which is a backlink for After Bedtime Blog from twitter.

Did I develop my own app? I probably could take the time to learn, you know I’m a bloody genius, but no, bottoms to clean, remember?

What I did was send my girl @WaningWoman over to Twitter and had her kick ass.

Ok, ok I’ll stop stalling.

You know I love to share and help my fellow bloggers out, right?

So this —> MarketMeSuite <— is NOT an affiliate link.

MarketMeSuite is similar to HootSuite and Tweetdeck by being a twitter client. MarketMeSuite is a downloadable desktop Twitter client. It’s no where as cool as HootSuite and Tweetdeck, cause it only manages Twitter and Facebook, but it’s unique where it allows you to Brand Your Tweets.

Yes my Blog to Business bloggers and my fellow bloggers who like traffic, who crave traffic . . . Brand Your Tweets. Backlinks from twitter. Need I say more? Ok, maybe I should. It’s costing me a Starbucks Grande Mocha Frap per month. $5.99 per month. There is a yearly plan, but frankly, the monthly is cancel anytime and that works for me.

Update: And I should have said this earlier. Don’t use MarketMeSuite as your only twitter client. It’s great for scheduling and branding but sucks in general.

There you have it my fellow bloggers and tweeps. I’ve bared my soul to you. I Love Twitter.

If you’ve found this post helpful, I’d appreciate you sharing it on Twitter and Facebook and Wherever your Water Cooler is.

By The Way, Have you noticed the awesome images I’ve been using lately on my posts? I have Fotolia.com to thank for that. My next post is a sponsored post from Fotolia.com. They gave me a month to try out their service and 10 promo codes to give away to 10 of my readers. Ten promo codes for 14 days of free image downloads from their site. Three Images Per Day. There’s lots of ways in my sidebar to connect, so please do and be on the look out for my review of Fotolia.com and the rules of the contest. I promise, it won’t be crazy, you won’t be doing a bazillion things to enter or leaving 60 million comments on my site.

And don’t forget to Tweet, Like, Stumble or whatever is your poison!

PhotoCredit:

(Traffic1) FridayviaPhotoXpress

(Traffic)Bryan Busovicki – Fotolia.com

(Lovebbirds)Lorelyn Medina – Fotolia.com

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