7 Twitter hacks you need to know about

Stay up-to-date with the way of the Twitter algorithm so your posts can be successful. Like, did you know hashtags aren’t helping you?

by Randi Zimmerman of Symphonic Blog

Truly understanding every aspect of how Twitter’s algorithm works has never been particularly easy. However, there are a couple factors that we now know for sure which can make or break your efforts. From whether that blue checkmark really matters to how many hashtags you use, here are some new updates to the algorithm that can help you boost the reach, engagement and traction of your content in no time.

Links are bad… unless it’s in a thread.

Twitter’s algorithm marks links negatively, and often considers it spam. If you do want to share a link, you can share it safely below within a thread instead.

Likes > Retweets > Replies

Likes are valued the highest on Twitter, followed by Retweets and Replies. To be exact, each Like gets a 30x boost, each Retweet gets 20x, and each reply only gets a 1x boost.

Be nice… or else.

If you get blocked, muted or reported for spam/abuse, you’ll be feeling that pain for a while. The more this happens to you, the less anyone is going to see your content moving forward. Some things that you should always avoid include any kind of hateful speech or sharing sensitive or inappropriate media, but you can also reap these consequences for being straight up annoying to people on the platform. Don’t be a bully. Just follow the rules, be nice and respect Twitter’s Official Guidelines, and you should have nothing to worry about.

That blue checkmark is more than just pretty.

Sadly (or not?), that coveted blue checkmark no longer means what it used to. Now, it means that the account has an active subscription to Twitter Blue and meets their eligibility requirements. If you had a blue check before, I’m sure you noticed it’s absence last month when Twitter officially removed them for everyone who wasn’t subscribed to the new program. If you do pay for it, it’s more beneficial to your content than just a visual perk, your reach is automatically extended.

Not sure if you’re eligible? Check out their eligibility criteria right here to make sure.

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Images & videos help a lot.

When you post videos or pictures on Twitter, these get a 2x boost on the platform. That means post all the backstage photos and behind the scenes clips you want, you little rockstar. 

Stick to your niche.

Twitter groups together similar topics (and users), so straying outside your niche can actually impact you negatively. In addition to being able to follow specific accounts, Twitter lets users also follow specific topics. That means if you find your content falls under one of those topics, you’ll be pushed to that whole audience of people who are into that.

“So we use machine learning to find related Tweets from these conversations. This could mean they Tweet a lot about the Topic or interact a lot with Tweets about the Topic. From there, we find the Tweets that are most interesting to those people, using algorithms, keywords, and additional signals.” Twitter explains on their website here.

Whatever you’re best at, keep doing it and stick with it. You’ll grow a larger audience and be shown to more people, all thanks to the algorithm.

Stop using multiple hashtags.

One or two hashtags is all you should be using. Period.

In this article from Twitter, they stated clearly:“One to two relevant hashtags per Tweet is the sweet spot so you can keep your message concise. It’s best practice to keep every Tweet focused on one specific message, rather than trying to communicate multiple ideas. If you do need to say more, that’s where Tweet threads come in.”

To wrap it all up…

The algorithms for all your favorite social media platforms are constantly changing. These factors were shared to the public straight from Elon in an effort to make it’s processes clearer and work with the community to create a better site for everyone. Whether you like some of the changes or not, things are in fact changing and will continue to do so! If you truly want to keep growing on Twitter, all I can say is ride the wave or drown in the current.

Good luck!