How To Use Twitter Lists
One often forgotten feature on Twitter that
should be remembered is the ability to make lists. The list feature on Twitter
is essentially a way to sort the people you follow into groups, and you can
then view only the tweets from the people you’ve added to that list. This can
be useful in a number of ways, both for personal use and business uses. Keep in
mind that you cannot tweet to a list, only to all of your followers. The lists
simply sort whose tweets you are reading at a given time.
Family and friends
When you create a list
only for family and friends, it makes sense that you’ll use it to briefly see
what they’re up to, and maybe to see where they are hanging out in case you
want to meet up. You could also use the list to check in after an emergency.
Business contacts
Whether your work
involves social media, or you just want to keep up with others in your field,
having a list of business contacts makes sense. You can keep out the noise of
non-career related tweets while you’re in a work environment, without losing
your up to the moment edge on the information your colleagues and contacts are
tweeting about. In addition, you can have your colleagues all follow a list of
each other, which can be especially useful for working on a group project from
separate locations.
The competition
Luckily, you can even
create private lists, which no one but you can see. Use these to quietly keep
your eye on what rivals are up to, or to sort out your slightly embarrassing
need for celebrity news updates from all the best sources. Keep in mind, other
users can block you, which will prevent you from seeing their tweets. You can
stop others from adding you to their lists, but you’ll have to block them on an
individual basis. Blocking a person will not only keep you off of their lists,
but will keep them from following you.
Using lists will help you build more followers on Twitter and it
will help you keep track of the people you follow.
What is the difference between
public lists and private lists?
A public list is one
that anyone can see, and anyone can follow your public lists. They cannot,
however, add people to a list you created. You can also follow public
lists created by other people, allowing you to follow a large number of people
without actually following them on an individual basis.
A private list is one
that no one can see, period. You can’t even give permissions for certain people
to watch your private lists, and no one will be able to tell you’ve added them
to a private list. Just don’t use a private list for stalking your exes,
because that’s just not cool.
Although it may seem
like a lot of extra work to setup lists on Twitter, it can really streamline your feed. You can opt to
only see work related tweets while you’re on office hours, and only friends and
family tweets when you’re off the clock. Want to catch up on the news real
quick? Just pull up the list you made following your favorite news sites, and
you’ll catch the latest without having to hunt through the rest.
Author Bio:
Susie MacDowell is a
huge fan of Twitter and loves helping others learn from the site. She also
writes about other social media sites from time to time.
