Using Twitter As a Broadcasting Medium Either As a Service, Or As a Politician Or Celebrity

West Mersea Bowls Club

@WMBowls

Written by Carol Everett

May 2020

Getting Started to Twitter in 8 steps

About this booklet

This booklet assumes no prior knowledge of Twitter – you just need an interest to try out something new! Take one Step at a time – perhaps during a coffee break – and after a few days you will soon be immersed in the Twitter world!

This booklet is for Android or IOS smart phones or tablets, not for Windows PCs.

Step What?

• Get Safe Online 1 • Setting up a Twitter account • Changing your Twitter handle • Twitter Screen 2 • Searching and Following • Unfollowing • Using the Timeline 3 • Tweeting • Tagging • Protecting your Tweet 4 • Revising your profile • Following local groups • Privacy settings 5 • Retweeting • Direct messages 6 • Using Hashtags 7 • Pictures amd website links 8 • Multiple Tweets and Polls

Acknowledgements

Getting Started to Twitter in 8 steps was based on previous work undertaken by the author for Anglia Ruskin University.

Step 1: Setting up a Twitter account

➢ Being Safe Online

Using social media means sharing information on a public platform. As with doing anything online, it is prudent to be aware of the risks of using social media. Many such risks can be avoided by applying a bit of common sense – if it sounds too good to be true then it probably is!

If this is the first time that you have used social media (such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram) then you will find it helpful to spend some time on reading about being safe online. A good website for this is https://www.getsafeonline.org/ which caters for both personal use and for business use.

➢ Do you have the Twitter app on your device?

Look for on your device. If you do not have it then go to Playstore/App Store and install it.

➢ What information do I need to set up a personal Twitter account?

Your name This is your display name. This name is how other people will recognise you. It can be your real name (so people will know who you are) or it can be anonymous. This can be easily changed at a later stage. Email address or You may wish to use a separate email address specifically for phone number social media – there are many websites around for a free email address. Once your Twitter account is set up, you don’t use this email address again unless you forget your Twitter password! Password 6 characters or more Profile picture A picture helps people to identify your tweets. You can either use the Camera option on your tablet/phone and take a picture when prompted, or upload an existing picture. It does NOT have to be a photo of you! It can be a flower or a picture of an object that represents you. Remember this can be changed anytime!

Tip: A picture is better than the blue default Twitter icon. Bio A few words to describe you. This can be changed anytime. Only 160 characters!

Tip: You can skip this step and do it later if you wish. Twitter handle This is the name which will be used within Twitterworld. Make it (@username) easy to remember both for you and for other people. Do not have it too long! Location Where you are

Step 1: Setting up a Twitter account

Example

➢ Set up your Twitter account

1. Click on the Twitter app, and choose Create Account 2. Enter your name 3. Enter a phone number or email address (see bottom of screen) – this is to ensure that you are a real person. I use an email address but the choice is yours. 4. It will ask to customise your experiences – skip this step. 5. You may get a verification code to check the email address (or phone number) is valid. 6. Choose a Twitter password. 7. You will be asked for your PROFILE picture – take picture or upload photo 8. Enter your bio (if you wish)

➢ Customising your account

Twitter will ask you a number of options to customise your account – ignore these at this stage: • It may ask you to connect your address book – click Not Now • It may ask for your interests – choose Skip for now • It may give you suggestions for you to follow – ignore these and click Next • It may ask about notifications – choose Don’t allow • It may ask you to use your device’s location – click on not now

➢ Customising your Twitter handle

Twitter may have allocated you a handle (@username) which will include your name and several numbers – something difficult to remember! You can change this if you wish. 1. Click on your picture for your profile 2. Click on Settings and Privacy 3. Click on Account 4. Click on @Username 5. Choose a new username – it has to be unique within the Twitterworld so you may need to try more than one name.

Step 2: Searching and Following

➢ The Twitter screen

Depending on your device (Android or IOS) you will see either one of these screens.

The empty screen is your TIMELINE

Click on your picture (avatar) for your profile

See the Blue Pen Quill – we will use this later so remember it!

There are 4 icons – see left hand side or bottom of the screen. These are:

HOME SEARCH NOTIFICATIONS MESSAGES

➢ Try these steps:  Click on your avatar – this will display your profile  Return to your Timeline  Where is the SEARCH icon? (Hint: look for magnifying glass)  Which is the HOME icon? (Hint: picture of a house)

➢ Follow an organisation’s Twitter feed

There are 2 ways of finding out an organisation’s Twitter handle which starts with the character @.

The first way is to look at an organisation’s website or literature and look for their handle. The example below shows you how to search for @yourcolchester (which is Colchester Council) and follow it. . 1. Click on SEARCH 2. In Search Twitter box, enter the text yourcolchester (see left image on next page) 3. Click on Colchester’s twitter handle 4. Twitter will now display the Timeline of yourcolchester (see right image on next page) 5. Click on the FOLLOW button 6. Return to your timeline (left arrow on top left of screen) 7. On your timeline, click on HOME 8. You will now get their tweets on your timeline – but perhaps not immediately!

Step 2: Searching and Following

The second way is to type the name of the organisation in the SEARCH box. Try typing Bowls England or BBCNews.

Follow 3 or 4 large Twitter accounts. They may be using Twitter as a broadcasting medium either as a service, or as a politician or celebrity. Here are some ideas:

You do not need to type the “@” symbol

@getsafeonline @EnglishIndoor @EnvAgencyAnglia @BowlsEng @Essexpoliceuk @sports_england @Stephenfry

Note how many followers they have compared to the number of people they follow themselves.

➢ Unfollowing an organisation

If you find that a particular Twitter feed is too prolific, or it is not what you expected then you can Unfollow them. Click on their profile and then click on the Following button.

Step 3: Tweeting and Tagging

➢ RECAP: What is your Timeline looking like?

Make Twitter work for you and follow the right feeds!

➢ Doing your first Tweet!

On your Timeline, click on the Blue Pen Quill You have only 280 characters – that is all – so you need to be succinct!  Remember your tweet is PUBLIC

 Keep SAFE Online: Do not tweet personal information such as your address

 In the What’s happening box write your tweet – here are some ideas! Tell us about: - a Bowling event to advertise - a book that you have recently read - an event that has happened today  BEFORE clicking on TWEET, just look at the text that you have written and check that it reads OK. People may read your tweet differently to you!  Tweet it! It will now appear on your timeline. It will also appear on your followers’ timeline. (Your profile will show your followers).

➢ Tweeting and tagging another person

Post another tweet, but this time include @cmeverett21 in your text at the end of your tweet like this:

Thinking about going to the semifinals to watch our own club play? Anybody interested? @cmeverett21

As well as putting your tweet on your timeline, it will also put it on the timeline of @cmeverett21 – in other words – to include this person in your conversation. You can put as many @handles as you have room for (remember the limit of 280 characters!) When you receive a tweet whereby you have been tagged, click on the tweet itself and REPLY by writing your response in the box TWEET YOUR REPLY at the bottom of the screen. You may need to return to Twitter again during the day when other club members have tweeted you! Tweet again with a comment applicable for several members of the club but this time just include #wmbcnet at the end of your tweet – we will look at hashtags later.

(wmbcnet stands for West Mersea Bowls Club Network)

Step 3: Tweeting and Tagging

➢ Protecting your Tweets

Your tweets will be seen by your followers, and some people like to know who their followers are! This is a privacy setting which you can change at any time.  For Apple devices, click on More (circle with 3 dots) For Android devices, click on your avatar  Choose Settings and Privacy  Choose Privacy and Safety  Under Tweets, choose Protect your Tweets From now on, anybody who wishes to follow you has to get your approval. This does not apply if you already have followers.

Step 4: Following local clubs and people

➢ Revisiting your profile Up to now, you have been looking at large Twitter accounts. You may also wish to follow local community groups or shops, or your bowling club! Before following people who may be more ‘personal’ to you, you may wish to revisit your Twitter profile to see if there is sufficient information in your profile for people to ‘identify’ with you. This may be particularly relevant if you are using Twitter to promote your local club/group. They may wish to follow you back!

1. Click on your picture (avatar) 2. Click on profile 3. Click on Edit profile 4. Change your Bio if you wish. 5. Your profile has 2 photos a. the round one (avatar) which is on your Timeline and is what other people see – you have already uploaded a picture for this in Step 1. b. the rectangular picture which is displayed when you click on your profile – Twitter gives you a blue screen but you may wish to change this if you wish. 6. Location – this informs potential followers as to your context ie location of club 7. Click on SAVE 8. Return to your timeline by clicking on the left arrow at top left of screen.

➢ Find and follow people which follow your interests

A local club or individual will be notified by Twitter if you decide to follow them - it’s a compliment to the club/individual! Likewise, if someone decides to follow you then you will get notified. (See Notifications – remember the third icon on your Timeline)

Find and follow 2 or 3 local Twitter feeds - use Search to find examples below.

@secretmersea @colchesterarts @merseaislandboy

➢ Find and follow bowls clubs and organisations Find your bowls club’s Twitter feed and follow it Find and follow 2 or 3 bowling-related Twitter feeds - here are some examples:

@WMBowls @CentreJacks @FalconBowlsClub @BowlsDA @Griffinharlow

Twitter will soon ‘learn’ your interests and will ‘suggest’ other similar Twitter accounts.

Step 5: Privacy, Retweeting and Direct Messages

Before we look at communicating within Twitter, it is useful to spend a few minutes on Privacy.

 Keep SAFE Online: Get to know the Privacy Settings for Twitter

The Privacy settings you choose will largely depend on why you are using Twitter. For example, a large organisation or a bowls club would want to promote itself and it would do this through their tweets. By keeping its tweets public this would enable its followers to retweet to their followers, who can also retweet down the line to their followers and so on. An individual, on the other hand, may wish to exercise more control and ensure their tweets remain private and therefore seen by his/her followers only. (See Step 3 for Public/Private Tweets)

Go through all the Privacy and Safety options within Settings and Privacy (click on your avatar).

➢ Responding to a Tweet

Look at a tweet that you have received on your timeline, and the icons below them:

These icons represent (in order from left to right) Replying Retweeting Liking Sharing

➢ Replying

You can reply to the tweet and Twitter will put the @handle at the beginning of your tweet. If the @handle is the first text in the tweet, it will mean that only you and the @handle recipient will view your reply, and anybody else who follows BOTH of you.

➢ Retweeting

You may have noticed some of the tweets from the accounts that you are following have the words similar to “West Mersea Bowls Club retweeted”. If you receive a tweet from someone you are following, and you then wish to forward it on to your own followers because you think it would be useful to them then you retweet it. On a larger scale, this is how tweets can go “viral”.

Note that if the retweet icon is greyed out, then this means that you cannot retweet it. This is because the person who tweeted it in the first instance has made their tweets Private (see Step 3 about Private Tweets) and therefore his/her tweet cannot go beyond his/her followers.

Step 5: Privacy, Retweeting and Direct Messages

Do you know who your followers are? Find a recent public tweet (from a large organisation or a local group) on your Timeline that you think your followers would like to know about. Retweet it! You have the option to put a comment (this is helpful) which will appear above the original tweet and gives the context to your own followers.

The other two options are:

Like You are indicating that you like this tweet Share You can share the tweet outside of the Twitter environment, such as Mail, Whatsapp, Facebook.

➢ To see your Tweets on their own

1. Click on your avatar then Profile 2. Click on Tweets or Tweets and Replies 3. Return to your Timeline

➢ Sending a Direct Message

You can send a private message to a follower – ie it will NOT appear on your timeline. Look at the MESSAGES (email icon) on your main Twitter screen (see Step 2). Click on the blue email icon at the bottom right of screen and find the follower you wish to contact. If you cannot find your follower then this means that the follower has disabled this function – see below.

 Keep SAFE Online: Do you want other people to contact you directly?

Anybody can contact you via DIRECT MESSAGE – s/he does not need to be a follower. If you wish to disable this function, then follow the steps below: 1. Click on your avatar 2. Choose Settings and Privacy 3. Choose Privacy and safety 4. Look for Direct Messages 5. Under Receive message request, disable this option. Note: If you have this option enabled, then you receive a Direct Message from someone, then disabling this option will not stop you receiving further messages from this person as the conversation has already been initiated. If required, you will need to block this person.

Step 6: Using #Hashtags

➢ RECAP: The @handle is to identify people or groups

➢ What is a Twitter Hashtag #?

A hashtag – eg #playbowls #quiz - can be described as a theme or a topic. You can tweet with other people about a topic without knowing their Twitter handles.

The hashtag #wmbcnet (West Mersea Bowls Club NETwork) enables club members to have a ‘conversation’ without the need to include the members’ individual handles.. You just include the hashtag in your tweet – see example below. You can put more than one hashtag in a tweet if relevant.

It’s the semi-finals next month and our club is playing! Anybody interested to go and watch? #wmbcnet

Another scenario of when you could use #wmbcnet is at Club Finals when you could announce – as a tweet – the winners of each Final as they occur, and members who were unable to be at the clubhouse could keep up with the action via Twitter!

➢ How to view a hashtag conversation

1. Using the Search option, type a hashtag – try #playbowls. 2. Some popular hashtags will be trending. 3. If you are in a ‘live’ Tweetchat ie several people tweeting simultaneously with the same hashtag, then you will need to refresh the screen – just swipe down from the top. 4. As you may wish to use the same hashtag more than once, you can save the hashtag as a ‘saved search’ which will save you typing it next time. Click on the 3 dots at the right of the Search box, and choose Save Search. Next time you choose the Search Twitter box, you can view either Recent Searches or Saved Searches.

Tweet a message to #wmbcnet, and follow the conversation!

Step 7: Pictures and website links

➢ RECAP: Remember your followers will see EVERY tweet you post

➢ Including Pictures in your Tweet

A picture is a thousand words! A photo of an event grabs the eye better than a string of text about the same event. You need your tweet to stand out amongst a constant stream of tweets. For a bowling club, it is an opportunity to share a photo of a bowling event or a flyer.

1. Start a new tweet – remember the quill icon. 2. Your keyboard will be shown on your device, but just above it will be more icons. 3. The first icon (like a landscape photograph) enables you to select an existing photo from your device, whilst the Camera icon means that you can take a new photo.

 Keep SAFE Online: Be aware of the Location Feature (teardrop icon) – this can identify where you are.

Tweet a photo of an unusual object (or an everyday object shown in an unusual way) and share it with #wmbcnet

➢ Including a website link in your Tweet

You may have discovered a brilliant website that you want to share with your followers.

1. Using your usual web browser, go to the website that you want to share. 2. To the right of the web address, look for the SHARE option. It will either be the 3 dots or the SHARE icon 3. Click on it and it will show Twitter as one of the applications to share to. 4. Click on the Twitter icon. 5. The address of the website will now be inserted in your tweet. It may be a long address but it will be shortened automatically. 6. Insert your own tweet text either before or after the link but take care not to split the link itself!

Step 8: Multiple Tweets and Polls

➢ RECAP: You can tweet text or a picture or a website link

➢ Using Multiple Tweets

When you want to communicate a long message, it is sometimes useful to split the message and post in multiple tweets ie two or three tweets together on a Timeline.

1. Start a new tweet – remember the quill icon. 2. Your keyboard will be shown on your device, but just above it will be more icons. 3. Look for the + on the far right and click on it. 4. Do your second tweet. 5. Tweet them!

 Have a go at doing a multiple tweet! 1. In your first tweet, include the website address of a resource that you find useful 2. In the second tweet, tell us why you like this website resource.

➢ A bit of fun – what does this do?  Start a new tweet, look at the icons above the keyboard and have a look at the third icon from the left (next to the teardrop icon).