• Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Linkedin
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • YouTube

Cindy Ratzlaff

Bestselling author, award winning brand marketing and social media pro, Cindy Ratzlaff, creates sales driving campaigns for authors, books and publishers.

  • Speaking
  • About
  • Clients
  • Blog
  • Contact

Use Facebook Interest Lists to Grow Your Page and Social Influence

By Cindy Ratzlaff November 15, 2012

A consulting client recently confessed to me that his Facebook news stream is overwhelming him and he’s ready to give up on the brand visibility strategy we’ve outlined for building his personal brand through social media. I asked him to make a list of the top 25 people he’d most like to do business with, be on stage with or have as a strategic partner.  He was able to make that list in just minutes, of course, because when he focused on his business goal, it was easy to identify those people most likely to be a part of that goal. This social media strategy technique saves him time daily.

Strategic Influence Building

I showed him how to put each of those top 25 influencers into a Facebook Interest List, which we called A-List Influencers.  Now he can filter his news stream each morning and quickly scan the posts of the people he most wants to connect with and add to their conversations, comment, compliment, create value and in general develop a relationship with these highly desirable contacts. Facebook will always revert back to the standard news feed view but any time he wants to check in on his A-List Influencers, he can do so with just a click.

Read More

Twitter Redesign Surprise

By Cindy Ratzlaff September 18, 2012

Take a deep breath.  On NBC-TV’s The Today Show, Twitter CEO Dick Costolo announced sweeping redesign to the Twitter platform with a focus on the look of Profile pages and a significant update to the mobile and iPad apps.

What Changes?

The Profile Look:  Profile’s will feature a large Header Photo on the right hand side that might remind some users of the look and feel of Facebook.

Read More

4 Great Marketing Ideas Your Business Can Use Now

By Cindy Ratzlaff July 31, 2012

Every day thousands of fantastic articles and marketing ideas for entrepreneurs and small business owners come streaming onto the web, and throughout social media. What’s a busy entrepreneur to do.  You can’t read everything.  You can email yourself great links to articles you want to read later or save the links to a private circle on G+ or even bookmark them for handy reference. I use the G+ strategy most of the time and add sites that regularly deliver to my Google Reader account.

For those who haven’t yet figured out how to scan the headlines and save the best for later, here are a few ideas are so creative and useful that I want to make sure you don’t miss them.  I’ve added short introductory paragraph to tell you why they’re worth your time to click through and read and possibly save. But all of these have ideas that you can use, right now, to amp up the action on your marketing.

Read More

5 Cool Social Tools Worth Your Time | Twitter Tool Kit

By Cindy Ratzlaff September 8, 2011

Twitter is the amplifier of a social media marketing campaign—shouting out provocative sound bites and abbreviated teasers.

When used strategically and in synergy with a well-rounded marketing campaign, Twitter is the social whipped cream.

Here are five nifty Twitter tools to add to your entrepreneurial arsenal. Each one brings something special to the table and could add just the sparkle you need for your next campaign.

TWEETDOC

Create a document bringing together all the tweets from a particular event or search term. A tweetdoc allows you to keep a record of what happens on Twitter. You can set parameters such as date and time ranges, number of tweets to capture, hashtags and search terms and capture the Twitter conversation. Great for brand monitoring reports, competitor analysis, real time news stories such as the recent Hurricane Irene reports on Twitter, conference chatter to find and follow influencer’s and other attendees or simply to keep your finger on the pulse of an industry or technology.

TWYLAH

Twylah aggregates your tweets and highlights your brand areas of expertise, based on what you tweet about. It serves them back to you in a beautiful SEO optimized webpage that gives readers a clear visual impression of who you are and what you talk about. When you send a “power tweet” from your Twylah page, your Tweets are captured, organized visually and by keywords and your Twitter followers are directed back to you optimized landing page, which is populated with relevant tweets on the same topic. Twylah gives you yet another piece of high style social real estate to reinforce your brand identity. Seeing all your Tweets in one spot, visually and topically aggregated is an eye-opener too and can serve as a brand audit to help you quickly see if you’re hitting your target messaging or going off topic too often.

TWEETGURU

A quirky series of Twitter tools, auto tweeting bots and services that allows you to, among other things, direct message multiple Twitter accounts at once. You might want to use this feature if you’re reaching out to your personal list of press people on Twitter about a launch party or a big brand announcement. The free version has a limit of 12 accounts at one time for your direct message but this can save you time and that’s the point.

HOOTSUITE

Hootsuite’s free tweet scheduling feature is easy to use and with a modestly priced pro account agencies can manage multiple accounts at once, assign individual tweet action items to team members and keep track of which team member answered the Twitter query and their new analytic tools generate custom reports for clients and play nicely with Google analytics. Hootsuite is a timesaving tool, a team tool, a monitoring tool and a scheduling tool all in one.

TWUBS.COM

Twubs are groups built around content aggregated from hashtags. Twubs gives you a live tweet feed of an event, conference or Twitter Chat based on a specific #hashtag and offers tools such as a Tweetup and Events scheduler. You can register your event hashtag at Twubs, embed a Twub widget on your website, and the Twub offers a complete Conference suite of tools like live moderation, conference displays, live event audio and presentation streaming, RSS feeds and more to engage participants who attend in person or those watching remotely. These features could be used by speakers and can even include photos and videos. A moderator can view the stream in a time delay mode and control which tweets are shown to the audience and which should not be.

What other Twitter tools would you add to the list? Let’s share our favorites here.

8 Free or Low-Cost Twitter Timesaving Tools | *Twitter Toolkit*

By Cindy Ratzlaff June 7, 2011

UPDATE: Since the writing of this blog, Twitter has changed it’s policy on third party auto-follow apps. So Tool #3 below is no longer recommended for auto-following.

 

Twitter continues to help entrepreneurs and Fortune 500 companies alike increase their brand awareness, exponentially expand their marketing message reach and create more a sense of relationship between customer or client and brand or product.

Many still fear that Twitter is a time rabbit hole and that building a large following on Twitter will unleash a time commitment they can’t accommodate.

Here are eight timesaving tools to help any sized business or individual entrepreneur find, follow, engage or manage their time on Twitter for productive results.

  1. Twellow: This site is the Yellow Pages of Twitter.  This free site allows you to register your Twitter account under three different keywords such as marketing, branding, social media or whatever keywords a potential client might enter to find your business.  Listing your Twitter account here will help others to find you when searching for the service or product you provide. Therefore, leads or followers coming from Twellow are more likely than average to be seeking what you have to offer. It’s fast and easy to register and worth your time.  Additionally, if you use Twellow while logged into your Twitter account and Twellow, you can search, find and follow others directly from the platform.
  2. Twitter App for Facebook: The Twitter stream is a fast moving conversation and therefore, your tweets once out of sight are out of mind.  Making any content you create do double duty is a good timesaving strategy.  Using this app to cause Facebook to auto-post from Facebook to your Twitter account makes your daily Facebook post work harder by also speaking to your Twitter followers. And, the added benefit is the way this app creates a truncated link to bring people back to your Facebook page to read a post that is longer.  This is a subtle invitation for Twitter followers interested enough to click the link to continue reading to “like” your Facebook page.  Again, always ask your content to work in multiple ways.
  3. SocialToo: Auto follow everyone who follows you. I’m a believer in auto following everyone who follows me on Twitter. It’s an easy way to build your following and allows people who find you to DM or Direct Message you on Twitter. I’ve been interviewed by national newspapers and contacted by future clients this way and had I not employed a policy of auto following, they would not have been able to reach me as easily and quickly.  I upgraded from a free account at SocialToo to a one-time $10 fee to use their set it and forget it auto follow tool. I love this feature and cannot recommend it enough.
  4. Hootsuite: In my opinion, Hootsuite is one of the best social media dashboards for managing Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin accounts at a glance and pre-scheduling tweets. I use it regularly manage 10 or more Twitter accounts alone, using Hootsuite and their newly enhanced metrics are terrific for creating client reports and for insight into which marketing messages are working and which are falling on deaf ears and may need tweaking.
  5. Tweetbeep: Google for Twitter. Set alerts for your keywords, your business name and your competitors to keep yourself in the loop and to find good information to tweet to your followers.
  6. Tweepi: This handy site allows you to weed out the accounts that don’t follow you back, to reciprocate those that follow you first and to clean out inactive accounts from your Twitter tribe.  A free version is suitable for smaller accounts and a paid version adds significantly more functionality for larger accounts or agencies.
  7. Tweetchat: Follow hashtag conversations in real time without distractions.  By doing so, you can quickly and easily find people talking about keywords and topics that interest you or your potential customer. Use hashtag conversations to bring yourself and your brand to the attention of others by participating in interesting, on-point twitter conversations.
  8. Timely: Analyze your Twitter patterns and get recommendations on times of day when your followers are most likely see, read and respond to your posts.

What other tools are in your Twitter toolkit?  If you have tools and strategies for maximizing your time on Twitter, I’d love to hear about them.  Let’s share with one another.

5 Twitter Tips for Authors and Publishers | Maximum Visibility Playbook Tips

By Cindy Ratzlaff March 12, 2011

The book is written and ready to publish. So how do you and your publisher spread the word, create excitement and ultimately drive people to take the action of purchasing and reading the book? These days a well-rounded social media strategy must include Twitter. Twitter is a nimble, real-time megaphone ready to create both ambient awareness (“Oh, yeah, I heard about that book…) and advertorial awareness (I read a great review of that book).

Twitter is to a social media campaign what PR is to a book marketing campaign.

Twitter, however, is not a marketing campaign.  Twitter is part of a full strategic campaign and acts as a megaphone to blast your message to millions of people and invites them to your website, Facebook page or other venue for a deeper conversation. A book marketing campaign needs distribution, point of purchase display, publicity, an advertising concept and a highly motivated author. With those things in place, Twitter can:

  • Share the author’s excitement with followers in real time.
  • Direct people to a link to buy the book.
  • Blast out late breaking news such as media appearances & live events.
  • Share excerpts from the book either in short snippets or via a link to a longer passage.
  • Encourage others to spread the word.

Here are 5 quick tips and techniques that any author or publisher can use right now to enhance a book marketing campaign.

1. Move content. Use Twitter to move content from your Blog and your Facebook posts to your Twitter fan base by installing the Twitter app on your Facebook fan page. This will auto-tweet everything you post on Facebook, with a link back to your Facebook fan page to read any post longer than 140 characters. If you are auto-importing your blog to your Facebook fan page, it will also be tweeted out to your followers automatically, again with a link to continue reading. This serves a couple of purposes. First, it shares content on three different sites, increasing the number of potential readers for every post. Second, it invites Twitter users back to Facebook to become fans whenever they click on the shorten Twitter link. Third, Facebook will have a live link to the post on your blog through Networked blogs. So one post introduces your Twitter fans to two additional points of interaction with you.

2. Increase SEO. Each Tweet is a unique URL and is viewed by Google as fresh, unique content. This Google juice makes it more likely that potential readers and fans will find you and information about your book. Google now serves up Twitter mentions and references on page one for most searches. Strategically include the name of the book, the name of the author, the genre or topic of the book in your tweets. These are your keywords for search engine optimization. Think about it this way. What would someone enter into a Google search to find you or your book? Those are your keywords. Use them strategically in your tweets to help readers find you.

3. The Big Ask. Bestselling authors such as Seth Godin, Gary Vaynerchuk, Jeffrey Hayzlett and Guy Kawasaki all give their fans an emotional shareholders stake in their book projects. They talk about them for months before publication. They ask followers opinions on titles, book jacket design and topics. They share nuggets of what’s to come. They thank followers for helping them through the process of creating a book. Then, when the book comes out they simply and honestly ask their fans to help them spread the word about the new book, and people do, by the thousands. Creating a community that is emotionally invested in you and your work is a powerful marketing strategy but can’t be faked. Authors must be engaged and genuinely enjoy conversing with their followers about their area of expertise. They must have, and display passion. And, this kind of loyalty and relationship building cannot be done overnight. Authors, especially authors with multiple book projects, should consider Twitter engagement to be a regular, daily practice.

4. Google’s Real Time search: Google now allows you to search something called Real Time. So Google your name or the name of your book and in the left hand navigation bar, choose Real Time. There you’ll see if any Twitter conversations include your name or the name of your book. Next authors and publishers can click on each Twitter account mentioning the book or author, follow them and thank them for their comments. A savvy author will then engage that Twitter account in a deeper conversation, turning the casual chat into a fan building opportunity. All of this is, of course, done on a very public platform. The advantages of this are that other Twitter users see you, the author or publisher, engaged in fun and interesting discussions about your book, your passions, your travels and your life. This becomes an opportunity to attract new fans and new readers. Followers are surprised and delighted when authors notice and thank them for their support. This strategy can create a life long fan who will help you spread the message about your work.

5. Tweet Ups: Whenever an author is speaking, doing media or making a bookstore appearance, there is an opportunity to create a Twitter event or a Tweet Up. Plan ahead, just as you would for any event and use an event organizer like Eventbrite or MeetUp to manage your guest list, RSVP’s and invitations. Create a real call to action for the event such as making a special announcement or having a desirable guest speaker or even a high end sponsor offered door prize. Giving followers an early heads-up about a special event with the author is like a VIP pass. Followers want, and need to feel they have a special relationship with the author.  Now, here’s the most important thing. When you create opportunities for followers to meet authors in person, the author must be willing and able to engage in conversation, thank the followers for their support, and spend some time with them. These are mixers and they are social. Authors who cannot or who are not willing to be social should avoid this strategy.

You’ve no doubt noticed a theme in this post. Twitter is a cocktail party and the author can be the guest of honor. But, it’s better if the author is the host and treats his or her followers as the honored guests.

If you found this post useful, please leave a comment. It’s important to me to know what you think so that I can create articles that are useful to you. For more Twitter tips, techniques and strategies, click here. And, thank you for finding me and reading this. I appreciate the time it takes to follow a link and read a blog.

11 Ways to Use *Twitter Lists* to Increase Brand Visibility | Maximum Visibility Playbook

By Cindy Ratzlaff January 29, 2011

One of the most often repeated objections to the social media platform Twitter is that it’s a loud, noisy and crowded platform and it’s difficult to find, follow and gather followers who are actually interested in your brand or product offering.  You can increase your chances of finding these pre-qualified followers, those most likely to want what you offer, through a strategic use of Twitter lists.

Twitter lists are an underused secret weapon in social media marketing.

Use Twitter lists to find people to follow and to group influential people together on Twitter so you can quickly and easily see what they’re tweeting every day. Twitter lists can also be used to demonstrate leadership in your area of expertise and provide something of value to your followers by offering them a convenient way to follow others.  And, for those with locally based businesses, Twitter lists can be a powerful tool for alerting  people to your area of influence, location and specific interest.

Here are 11 ways you can immediately implement the power of Twitter lists in your business.

1. Connect with Industry Leaders. Create your first Twitter list and call it (Your Industry Here) Superstars. Go to your Twitter account and enter the name of one of the most admired leaders in your industry in the search bar at the top of your screen. Click on the “Follow” button under the picture or avatar of @industryleader. Next click on the downward arrow  just to the right of the “Follow” button and a drop down menu will say “Create a List.” Click on “Create a List” and a pop-up box will appear. Here you can name your list “@MyIndustry Superstars.” Underneath you’ll have the option to describe your list. Enter: “People and organizations in My Industry that are helpful, show leadership and really know their business.” Then click “Save List” in the lower right hand corner. Now @industryleader is on your list. Your new list will appear on their Twitter profile page, at the top right hand side of the page under “recently listed in.”  People added to your list will  know that you consider them to be a superstar or whatever attribute you’ve ascribed to your new list, giving you visibility with top industry leaders.  Contintue to add to your new list as you find and follow other inspirational or educational leaders in your field. As you add new followers, put them into lists such as “My Industry Resources.” Keep your most important keywords in mind when creating lists and incorporate them whenever possible. Your lists will each have a unique URL and are, therefore, indexed by search engines.

2.  Attract a Local Based Following. Use Twitter Lists to find and follow quality leads in your local area. Go to the search bar on your Twitter Account and type in #yourcityname. Click on one of the Twitter accounts that comes up mentioning your city. First add this person to a new list called “MyCity Resources.” Next, look to see what types of other lists mention this person. Look for lists that fit your “resources” concept. When you find one, click on the list link. You’ll be taken to that list’s page. Across the top of this list, you’ll see the words tweets, following, followers. Click on Following. A screen will pop up with the Twitter names of everyone on this list. Go down the right hand side of this list and click “Follow” for those accounts you want to add to your “resources” list. Once you click follow, you’ll also need to click the downward arrow to the right and check the box that tells Twitter to add this person to your “resources” list.

3. Use Newly Created Lists for Visibility: Go to your homepage on Twitter. You’ll see these words across the top of your screen: Timeline, @Mentions, Retweets, Searches, Lists. Click on “Lists.” Choose one of your newly created lists and click on it. Now, the only tweets showing in your stream will be tweets from people on this particular list.  You can quickly scan their activity and choose someone to retweet, comment on, praise or ask a question. Simply mouse over the bottom of the tweet you’ve chosen and you’ll have the option to retweet or reply. Do this for at least one or two different people on your list every day to increase your visibility, to demonstrate a desired relationship or connection with this Twitter account, and to be seen engaging with resources and leaders in your area.  Make sure your tweets to these accounts add value, and not noise, to the stream.

4. Share Your Lists: Share your growing “Resources” or “City” list several times a week on Twitter to attract people in your local area and people interested in your business. Click on your list. Copy the URL of that list from your browser window. Paste the link into the “What’s happening?” window on your Twitter page and send this message: Check out this great list of fun places to visit in MyCity! If you need to shorten the URL to fit it into the tweet, go to bit.ly, shorten the link, then copy and paste the new shortened link into the tweet.

5. Add Yourself to Your Own Twitter Lists: Increase your visibility by adding yourself to your own Twitter lists. Just as we recommend going to the pages of other Twitter users to find lists to follow, they’ll be coming to you. When they click down the list and follow people, one at a time, we want them to find and follow you. To do this, enter your own @yourtwittername into the search bar at the top of your screen. When your twitter name shows in the stream, click on it. The right hand side of the screen will now show your profile. The words “Edit your profile” will be on the left and our familiar downward arrow on the right. Click on the downward arrow and check off the boxes for any and all lists to which you’d like to add your own Twitter name. It’s that easy.

7. Connect with Others and Make Yourself Known: Request to be added to appropriate lists of other leaders in your industry or city. When you find a list that you’d love to be on, send a @DM or @reply to the person and say “I’d love to be added to your New York City Businesses” list!  You can reciprocate by adding them to your lists to complete the connection.

8. Broadcast Your Lists to the Listed: Let others know when you add them to your lists. Whenever you add a particularly high profile or valuable networking contact to a list, Tweet to them and tell them. “@IndustryLeader, I just added you to my Industry Superstars list.” Then include the URL. You’ve engaged with them, added them to a list, promoted your list and increased your visibility all while building a relationship with them.

9. Follow Whole Lists at Once: At the top of every list, there will be a button that says “Follow This List.” This will copy the entire list and make it available to you on your page so that you can check it regularly. It does not, however, follow each individual user. Use this for very large lists from professional organizations you might want to check in on but don’t necessarily want to see individually in your stream every day. This will create a link from your page directly to the Twitter account that created the original list. A small icon of their avatar will appear next to the list on your page. Strategically, this is another great way to honor the original list builder and is a valuable way for you to connect with very large lists and high profile creators.

10. Increase Your Lists: Invite Twitter followers to be included on your lists. “Hey Philadelphia. Let me know if you want to be on my new “Philadelphia Resources” list.

11. Broadcast Accolades: If you’ve received awards or been praised in the press, let others know via lists.  Create a list that includes everyone who received accolades and name the list appropriately for that award.

I invite you to take a look at examples of these Twitter strategies on my Twitter account, and please let me know if you’d like to be added to one of my lists.  If you use Twitter lists in a unique and powerful way, please share your strategies here so we can all employ them.  If you found this article helpful, please leave a comment.

How to Increase Your Twitter Following

By Cindy Ratzlaff December 14, 2010

The question I’m asked most often is, “How did you grow your Twitter account to more than 47,000 followers?”  So here’s my list of what I do every day to create a follow-worthy Twitter account.

Consistency, frequency, specificity, likability and careful monitoring will help you build a powerful Twitter presence.

Consistency and Frequency:  Because the Twitter news stream is fast moving, getting your brand message noticed requires that you be present with new messages every single day and several times per day for best results.  I try to post at least five times per day during peak user times.  When I do this, my account increases by 50-75 users per day without any additional efforts on my part.  I use a site called Hootsuite to schedule my posts so that even if I’m otherwise engaged during the day, my posts will still be present.

Specificity:  I want to attract clients and customers who are interested in learning how to use social media to promote their brands. Some of those clients will hire me as a speaker and others will hire me as a consultant.  Therefore, I focus the majority of my Twitter activity on education based marketing.  In other words, I share what I know freely to demonstrate my knowledge and attract people who want to know what I know.  I tweet about classes I’m teaching, speaking engagements I’ve done,  social media tools I find useful, social media marketing strategies and digital gifts.  I use the Twitter yellow pages, Twellow, to find new Twitter accounts to follow.  I follow about 100-200 new accounts daily, carefully selecting accounts that use the same keywords that are of interest to me.  In this way, I’m building a following of people interested in my area of expertise.

Monitor and respond:  You’ll learn what your followers want to hear from you by monitoring your account for feedback.  When you get no feedback at all, that’s a message.  Change your output regularly until you hit upon that portion of your brand message that resonates with your followers.  Check out the link called “Lists” on your Twitter profile.  This will tell you a lot about who your followers think you are.  After all, your brand is not what you think it is.  Your brand is what your followers think it is. Every day I check the @replies on my Twitter account and respond to anyone who reaches out to me.  I check DM’s as well. I follow anyone who follows me and I unfollow anyone who does not follow me back within a one month timeframe.  I want my Twitter account to be actively engaged people, interested in conversing and sharing ideas, so I’m not afraid to trim the account and delete those who are not interested in a two-way conversation.

Likability:  People do business with brands that they know, like and trust.  So personality is very important in your social media outreach.  I try to intersperse tweets that show who I am as a person, my sense of humor, my inquisitive nature, my pleasure in chatting with and helping others along with those education based tweets.  The kind of client I am trying to attract will want to work with someone who is smart, fun and nice.  I regularly mention people by name in my stream. If someone reaches out to me, I’ll reply with both their Twitter handle and their real name to let them know I’ve noticed them and appreciate their conversation.

Thought leader status is afforded to a brand who shares new information, links to sites that will be useful to followers, gives advice, discusses breakthroughs in their industry and provides information about live events that might be interesting or educational. If you do these things daily, your Twitter following will grow rapidly.  How do you grow your Twitter account?  Let’s share our ideas and tips with one another here.

Twitter power | Forbes List

By Cindy Ratzlaff August 5, 2010

I was delighted to open my e-mails this morning and discover that I’d been named to the Forbes list 20 Best Branded Women on Twitter.  It was fun to be included in a list with Maria Shriver, Kimora Lee, Ivanka Trump, Ann Curry, Kathy Ireland and Alyssa Milano to name just a few.

Alyssa Milano, Maria Shriver, Ivanka Trump, Ann Curry and Cindy Ratzlaff

We’re all so different that it’s hard to image another list where we’d all be named together.  But it just goes to show you the power of Twitter to extend your brand message and personality to an enormous audience.  If you’re not already representing your brand on Twitter, what are you waiting for?

How To Add a Twitter Button to Your Facebook Fan Page

By Cindy Ratzlaff July 11, 2010

NOTE: Since the writing of this blog post, Facebook has discontinued Static FBML. Adding a Twitter app to your Facebook page is now easier than ever before using free tools such as Woobox.com. Here’s how:

 

  1. When logged into Facebook as your personal profile.
  2. Open another window on your browser and log into your Twitter account.
  3. In a third window, go to http://Woobox.com.
  4. Log into Woobox using your Facebook account.
  5. On the top of the page, you’ll be able to choose which Facebook page you’d like to use to install this app. Choose your business page from the menu.
  6. Now look at the top of the page, choose “static tabs.”
  7. Then choose “Twitter,” and follow the directions on this page.

Woobox will install a Twitter app on the left hand side of your business page and pull your Twitter feed into the app for your visitors to see. The app view will also include a button for people to “follow” you on Twitter, directly from that Facebook app.

 

Brand awareness is directly connected to increased visibility.  Making it easy for people to find you, wherever you are, is just plain good business. Twitter, the micro-blogging social media platform is tracked by Google.  Every tweet you make is a unique URL and increases your visibility online, making it easier for people to discover you in a search.

Adding a Twitter Button on the wall of your Facebook Business Page–not your personal profile–allows people to easily find and follow you on Twitter.  You want people to be able to interact with you on any social platform they frequent, so adding a convenient way to connect with you on Twitter is a key visibility strategy.  I’ve blogged about this in the past, but since Facebook has changed it’s face so many times in the last year, I thought people might need these updated step-by-step instructions.  Please feel free to post a comment here if anything is fuzzy and I’ll clarify or illuminate any issues you are having.

The blue Facebook Bar contains the white search window

Step One: Install the Static FBML (Facebook Mark-up  Language) Application to your page. To find this application, enter the words “Static FBML” in the search window on the blue bar at the top of your page.

Step Two:  When you get to the Application page, click “Add to My Page” which you’ll find directly underneath the Avatar image on the upper left hand side of the page.

Step Three:  An overlay screen will pop up and list the names of any pages associated with your profile that do not already have Static FBML installed.  You’ll click the “Add to Page” button next to the page on which you wish to install this application.

Static FMBL App

Step Four:  Go back to your profile and click  “Ads and Pages” on the left hand side of the page.

Locate the newly installed FBML app

Step Five:  Click Edit under the FBML application in your list of applications on your page.

Step Six: A box will appear that can be customized.  You’ll title it “Follow Me On Twitter” or “Tweet with Me” or something that invites people to follow you there.

 

Step Seven:  Enter your HTML coding into the FBML box for your custom designed Twitter button or you can use google to find a variety of sites that offer free Twitter images.  I like  Twitter Buttons where you can enter your Twitter name into the automatic code generator and they provide you with the HTML code you need to create a button.

Once you’ve entered your desired code, press “Save Changes.”

Step Eight: Go back to your page and click the + sign on your tabs bar. Locate your new “Follow Me On Twitter” FBML app and click on it.

You’ll see that the phrase “Follow Me on Twitter” has now become a custom tab on your screen.

Your image  is now a live link, under this custom tab.

Make sure you post about your new tab to alert your followers.

More Posts

Get Your Free Copy!

Free Author Branding Tips Download your free copy of HOW TO CREATE AN AUTHOR BRAND, from Cindy Ratzlaff’s Maximum Visibility Playbook™ for Authors, a 23-page workbook & step-by-step action plan.

Send my copy now!

Book Cindy to Speak

“Cindy is consistently one of the highest ranked speakers at our conference, which is why bring her back year after year.”

— Sally Dedecker, UPublishU

Learn More

Blog Categories

  • Book Marketing
  • Books
  • Challenge
  • Facebook
  • Marketing
  • News & Events
  • Personal Branding
  • Publicity
  • Publishing
  • Social Media
  • Social Media Strategy
  • Social Media Tools
  • Twitter
  • Video
  • Video Marketing
  • Videos

Get a free copy of "How To Create An Author Brand," a step-by-step guide for developing your brand message.

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Linkedin
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • YouTube

Copyright © 2023 Cindy Ratzlaff. All Rights Reserved. Privacy | Disclaimer | Contact