Twitter, the little blue bird that keeps us up at night–Â recently turned 11. Since its launch in 2006, it has maintained a pretty good rep with the younger generations and has reached 328 million users who send out about 500 million tweets a day!
But what a lot of younglings don’t realize, is that Twitter can be used for more than just scouting funny new memes.
Yes, Twitter is a goldmine of many kinds and while passing along memes is definitely one of its most important features, you can also benefit from relevant content such as news, jobs, internships, and even contests. It’s also a great way to take part in conversations about things that matter to you! So, without further due, here are a few things you can do to make better use of your Twitter. But first things first…
MAKE A TWITTER
If you don’t already have a Twitter, get with the program and make one! This isn’t the usual kind of social media. This is the nerd table of social media and it’s time you come sit with us.
Unlike Instagram and Snapchat which are predominantly visual, Twitter has more text. And not only is it good because you’ll exercise your ability to read in a painless way, but it gives you a better sense of people’s personalities. You can go on Instagram, see a picture of your friends, and not learn anything new about them because you already know what they look like. But you can learn a lot from people, even those you think you already know, by reading their tweets, simply because it gives you a glimpse into how they think. It’s like the telepathy of social media.
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FOLLOW NEWS OUTLETS
Listen, I am the first one to admit that I barely keep up with the news. It’s hard! We’re college students, we live crazy lives trying to juggle school, work, involvements, and our social life. I get it. But that is no excuse to not know what the world is up to. So, if you don’t have time to sit and watch an hour-long news program, then keep up with the news through your Twitter. In this way, every time you open the app to do some mindless scrolling, you end up getting informed about the world.
I recommend that you follow at least three different news outlets in case any of them have any bias with certain stories. While most headlines will read the same, the way the articles are written will be different and the perspectives you are exposed to will be different too.
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FOLLOW COMPANIES YOU WOULD LIKE TO WORK FOR (& THEIR EMPLOYEES)
Disclaimer, if you go ahead and do this (which you really should), you need to be more mindful about what you tweet. You can still post funny memes, but definitely nothing with curse words or inappropriate photographs, etc.
I recommend that you do this for two main reasons:
1) If you would like to work for that company someday, then you have to stay updated on the going-ons of the company. Duh.
2) By following them, you will get on the company’s radar some way, somehow because once you follow them, then you’ll appear as a suggestion for other people who follow the same company. A lot of the times those people will follow you and you never know what kind of connections you can create.
Maybe your dream job is to be a comedian, some dude that also follows SNL starts to follow you, he thinks your memes are hilarious and BAM turns out he’s the writer for SNL, who would’ve thought?
Okay, realistically, it might not be that easy. But really, you never know.
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GET INVOLVED IN CONVERSATIONS THAT MATTER TO YOU
You know that “Search” bar where you usually type in your ex’s handle a trillion times a day? Use it for something more productive and type in a hashtag of something that interests you. For instance, #myexsucks or #womeninpolitics, you know, whatever floats your boat.
Maybe the hashtag isn’t active at the moment, meaning no one is currently conversing on the topic, but you’ll still be able to view all the conversations that have taken place with that hashtag and reply to people if you want to. Some great influencers and celebrities use this tactic to communicate with fans, but it’s not the only thing it can be used for, so definitely try to look up some topics that you want to voice your opinion on through hashtags.
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ADVANCED SEARCH…FOR ALL US FUTURE FBI AGENTS
If you go to twitter.com/search and then click on the option that says “advanced search” you will have turned your twitter into a legitimate investigative program… or at least I think so.
You can look up tweets by words included in the tweet, people tagged in the tweet, places by which tweets have been sent, and even narrow it down by date of the tweet.
So let’s say you want to know if Zac Efron tweeted about tacos near you any day in the year 2015, you would fill up the page as follows:
And voila, you get your answer (which was “no results” in this scenario).
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Last, but not least, CONTINUE TO USE YOUR TWITTER FOR MEMES
It’s not all its for, but it is what gives Twitter life. So keep those memes coming.
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