There are 5 types of tweets that you can create on Twitter. Knowing what each type does and when to use each type can make a big difference for your business reach and your social media visibility. I will be teaching these to my Halifax social media business workshop.

5-types-of-tweets

The five types of tweets are:

  1. Plain text tweet
  2. Reply tweet
  3. Mention tweet
  4. Retweet
  5. Direct message

Plain text tweet:

  • Contains only text, spaces and characters (no @usernames included)
  • Seen by all the followers of the Twitter account and by those who use search for keywords.
  • The example below demonstrates a plain text tweet

Reply tweet:

  • @ sign and user name hard to left of tweet. Text follows after @username
  • Seen by sender, by the receiver – person who has the @username, and by anyone that is following both accounts at the same time. It is also seen by those who search for keywords.
  • The example below shows a @Reply tweet to my friend Vala Afshar

Mention tweet:

  • Text in front of the @ sign and user name
  • Seen by sender, by person who was mentioned – person who has the @username in the tweet, and by all the senders followers. It is also seen by those who search for keywords.
  • The example below shows a @Mention tweet to my friend Rob Cairns

Retweet:

  • RT in front of message (Traditional) or quotes around tweet with via @username included.
  • Seen by all the senders followers and the @username account that was retweeted. It is also seen by those who search for keywords.
  • The example below shows a retweet:

Direct Message:

  • d in front of text (Private message) – message goes into receiver’s email Inbox.
  • Seen only by receiver. Sender sees message in own Direct Message section.

Knowing when to use each type is important for creating visibility for your business. For a new account, I would recommend using more “@” Mentions than “@” Replies. We will be discussing this and more strategy tips for using Twitter during my next social media class in Halifax.

Any questions? Please feel free to ask below.