I wrote this for my local political blog, at the request of a reader, I realize many of you here on Active Rain are already active on social media ... but just in case there's still someone not using twitter.
I was asked yesterday if I had an outline or plan for a politically active person wanting to get involved in social media? Now, first let me say that the second I write this plan down it will of course get skewered by those that know a lot more than I. I'll try to source the really great socially actives in my posts. So, from today December 27th, 2008 till January 5th 2009 I will write one post per day.
Follow along if you like - The steps will be as easy as I can explain with links to places for lots more details if my method of "esplaining" isn't all that great.
Day One - Social Media for Conservatives (allow 20 minutes)
1. Join Twitter - Go to twitter homepage and sign up. My recommendation would be to use your own name or a nickname you use often. You may have to try a couple different names, if yours is common and already in use. I would not suggest doing the AOL thing and doing your name followed by a number. Too generic and impersonal. You'll need an email address, I think they limit each email to one twitter profile ... of course we all have multiple email addresses and yes some of us also have multiple twitter profiles.
2. Once you're signed up, and this really only takes a matter of minutes. Click my profile Daltonsbriefs and press "follow" ... it would be great if you would go to the bottom of this post and in the comments section tell me you followed and leave your profile name too. Frankly, I have over 2,600 followers and I don't always follow back right away. Sorry.
3. Go to Top Conservatives on Twitter and choose "Get Added" just enter your profile name, remember that profiles have no blanks (perhaps an underscore if you used but no blanks) and email and whether you desire to have a mentor assigned to you.
4. Go to Search.Twitter (#TCOT) this is the live stream of all posts on twitter that feature the hashtag #TCOT so that we can follow along. You'll see big names like Michelle Malkin, Drudge Report, Instapundit, and thousands of little bloggers and activists as well. The fun really starts when the elected officials, like Bill Frist and members of Congress, start posting and engaging.
Watch as long as you want, it will keep updating and you'll merely have to choose "refresh" to see the new ones as they flow in. When you see a tweet that you want to respond to ... now we're going to dive in.
Press "reply" under the tweet that you liked, disliked or want to comment on. Your twitter homepage will come up, you now have 140 character to say anything you want. Because you hit "reply" you'll see the original person's profile with an @ in front of it. That creates a reply to that person ... but everyone can still read it!
Hit "update" when done with your comment or reply. Now, you need to follow some people so they'll follow you. Go to Follow-TCOT and follow this person. It's a listing mechanism to make following easier. I think they have to follow you back to make it real easy, so we'll just follow today and come back in Stage Two tomorrow.
5. Lastly here are your first 15 people to follow: As you go to each link choose follow and then come back for the next link. Obviously multiple tabs in your internet explorer is going to help make this quick work. Follow all 15, anything they post will appear on your timeline on your profile, the rest of the #TCOT posts you'll have to watch on the search.twitter site. Anytime you see a post on search.twitter that engages you, follow that person too. You'll get followed back by most and the goal is to pick up 100 followers in the next week!
More tomorrow, check back in, leave comments below especially if what I said doesnt work or doesn't make sense. Thanks
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