Although people will try and sell you scammy auto following tools – by far the easiest way to build a targeted and valuable following is making the habit to @reply at least twice daily.

By using @replies you are directly connecting with other people.  Your username will appear in their stream and they will be encouraged to reply to you.

Of course, @replying with nothing to say is fairly useless.  I find you need to be following around 100 people to see enough tweets that interest you to reply.

So there you have it.  A simple and easy way to build Twitter followers.

It may have been an alright thing to do a few years ago, but these days there are just too many spammers and marketers promoting their crap for you to follow everyone.

Do you really want to follow an account that only promotes things?

Twitter isn’t like Facebook – their are no friends.  It doesn’t need to be a recprical relationship for two people to see each others tweets.  Therefore, if you’re not actually interested in what someone has to say, don’t both following them.

By far the best approach is to take a quick look at the profiles of your new followers and see what they’re tweeting.  This way you won’t risk following a bunch of people who only put out noise.  Remember the best Twitter experiences happen with people you can relate to and respect.

Following everyone will also potentially damage your brand.  You run the risk of looking like you’re only on Twitter for the sake of marketing.  And that’s a sure-fire way to get people to ignore you.

So is it a good idea to simply follow everybody who follows you.  No!  Be selective and and start enjoying twitter.

Photo By – joelaz

Posting quality items on your Twitter stream will dramatically improve the chances of a Retweet.  No one wants to retweet something you’re selling!  Instead, find quality links that you thing your followers may find interesting.

But the most important factor in getting more retweets is quality connections.  I have found by simply, interacting with my followers more, I have dramatically increased the number of retweets i’m getting.

Here are some tips on creating quality connections:

1. @reply to Followers – its important to not just post and push information out.  You also need to take the time to respond.  Make an effort to @reply to at least 5 people a day.
2. Promote Others Content – Promote your followers blog posts and their content.  Make sure you put (via @username) at the end so they can see that you’re promoting them
3. Say Thanks – When someone does retweet your content, take the time and effort to say thanks

So now you know how to get more retweets!  Its not hard.  Making some connections with just a few of your followers will dramatically increase the amount of retweets you get.

Chances are these users won’t pay much attention to you – and are only using Twitter for marketing purposes.  So it makes sense to unfollow these users.  There is no point in giving them credability by following them.

Do you send automatic DM’s?

The Easiest – Digg

Simply add “digg.com” (without the quotes lol) before any url in your browsers address bar to have it automatically shortened.  From there, posting to Twitter is just a button click away.

The “Stats” Option – Cli.gs

Grab yourself a free cli.gs account.  Cli.gs tracks all the clicks that someone makes on your links plus you will also get refferrer information and where in the world clicks are coming from.

The “Twitter” Option – TweetBurner

Built just for Twitter, Tweetburner will convert your links into a shortened Twurl as well as tracking how many clicks your shoretened link gets.  Pluds post your link to Twitter right from Tweetburner.

So there you have 3 different options to shorten urls.  as Twitter only allows 140 characters this is something that all tweeps need to master.  Choose the right URL shortener based on your needs.

How to Retweet

Here is the format of a Retweet – RT @feint “here is the tweet text

The RT obviously stands for “retweet” and lets your followers know that the following is someone elses content.  Next you put their username with the @ so that you link back to their profile and give proper credit.

The Advantages of Retweeting

Retweeting is not only a nice thing for you to do, it may also increase your follower count.  Retweeting puts your username in other peoples Twitter streams.  The more you retweet others the more likely someone will retweet your content.

Don’t Over Do it

Try and limit the number of retweets you put out.  Aim for 80% of your own content and no more than 20% retweets.   This way you won’t annoy followers. And besides your Twitter should be written by you not someone else!

Advert – Real Time Web Analytics – For Free!

Apart from being annoying, these automated DMs take the “personal” out of Twitter.  You’re not going to make someone feel special by sending them an automated message.  Instead they may feel like they are being simply used to have your marketing messages forced upon them.

Stay away from automating your Twitter account!

Make sure you update your Twitter account everyday.  This will keep your account fresh and active, and will ensure you are always in others streams.

Many of the top Twitterati, will automatically follow you back.  Plus, users are constantly looking at the Twityerati’s recent follows which ends up giving you quite a bit of reach.

Head on over to Alltops Twitterati page for a list of the top users.