This week’s chat continued our Building Community series and focused on Twitter.  It’s always good to brush up on the basics for you seasoned pros, and great to hear some new ideas from all those using twitter in their various fields.

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Q1 Is your goal always to increase followers? What other goals/priorities do you have on Twitter?

mhandy1 My goal is always to add value first and formost

mhandy1 Great content and caring will drive engagement… engagement will drive network growth.

Jmodio Quality over quantity

rhogroupee # of followers is good to see trend uptick, but bot/nonbot ratio is more important

rodicka User count is overrated. Main goal is to share useful information and have authentic interactions.

jasonarican For example, our No. 1 priority for @meltwaterbuzz is helping our customers. But our No. 1 goal is developing leads

boco_consulting The ultimate goal is to grow the relationship past twitter to your website, tweetups, etc.

Fisherish: Increase followers should never be any1 goal: My goal is to educate our audience with relevant content and engagement

SteveCassady Engagement, Education, Sharing, Building Brand.

SunnyinSyracuse Reminds me of the @Wegmans model…”Numbers are good, smiles are better.” #lovethem

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Q2) What are the key data points you focus on with Twitter? What do you measure?

sarahkayhoffman Mentions, reach, impressions, growth, sentiment, top keywords used

SocialMedBtrfly Key data: clicks on links, @ replies, sentiment, RTs, reach, Klout (though this can be manipulated)

KellyLux What types of information are being acted on (RTs, mentions) is important to us

Fisherish Twitter in its core is a REACH mechanism. no. of followers is not reliable.Think avg & % e.g. avg followers of your followers

rodicka: I like to capture specific tweets and edited RTs for reporting (qualitative to enrich data points)

ProductDrew Among other things, I track Klout score. I really don’t feel that it is “goal”, but more of an “indicator”

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Q3. What ‘extras’ do you pump into twitter? Contests, trivia, etc?

SocialMedBtrfly When I was promoting my book, I did “Twinterviews” with other writers.

amgorder I started using @SproutSocial and i love them! super responsive and really making moves

KellyLux: We like to create hashtags around conversations we want to ignite. Weve really seen some of them take off.

LovelyLu I have better luck with open ended questions, not great with contests

EliseMarieTrent Yes, I would include trivia, contests, tweet & seeks, etc. into twitter. Way to gain followers & can then build relationships

sarahkayhoffman Contests, sweeps and chats – a good mixture to see what works/doesn’t work.

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Q4. How do you cultivate community on twitter? What are best practices?

evanhamilton Introducing people to each other, singing the praises of awesome people, and sharing cool stuff.

LovelyLu Offer quality, not necessarily quantity and engage with your followers

EliIngraham Geeky but I pulled twitter followers into Google Reader to get day-part metrics, then google-mapped to give geo-timed shoutouts.

rhogroupee Be there, be real, be helpful

pushingvision Spark conversations among followers — connect those you’re connected to…

JPedde Be yourself. Be the brand, but be yourself. Share awesomeness, talk to all, build relationships over time

Jmodio Be real, authentic, honest, transparent, story tell

sarahkayhoffman My current community is #fitness so it’s important to be present, with information & encouragement.

pushingvision Take responsibility if you #fail. If you’re being human, ppl will treat you that way.

KellyLux Twitter chats would be a key example of building community. You are building connections around shared interests!

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Thanks to all who participated!  Make sure to come back to #cmgrchat every Wednesday from 2-3pm EST for more chats!

If you have any ideas or suggestions for future topics, leave comments or get in touch with myself or Kelly!