{"210881":{"#nid":"210881","#data":{"type":"news","title":"How to Get More Followers on Twitter","body":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EWhat do all Twitter users want? Followers \u2013 and lots of them. But unless you\u0027re a celebrity, it can be difficult to build your Twitter audience (and even some celebs have trouble). Looking at a half-million tweets over 15 months, a first-of-its-kind study from Georgia Tech has revealed a set of reliable predictors for building a Twitter following.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\u003Cbr \/\u003EThe research was performed by Eric Gilbert, assistant professor in Georgia Tech\u2019s School of Interactive Computing. Gilbert found that Twitter users can grow their followers by such tactics as:\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cul\u003E\u003Cli\u003EDon\u0027t talk about yourself: Informational content attracts followers at a\u0026nbsp;rate 30 times higher than content focused on the tweeter. The study found\u0026nbsp;users talked about themselves in 41 percent of their tweets on average.\u003C\/li\u003E\u003Cli\u003EBe happy: Twitter is mainly based on weak social ties (most followers do\u0026nbsp;not know each other offline), which makes it more important to stay away\u0026nbsp;from negative posts such as death, unemployment and poor health.\u003C\/li\u003E\u003Cli\u003ECool it on the hashtags: While hashtags are definitely useful tools for\u0026nbsp;expressing emotional commentary or tying tweets to larger events or\u0026nbsp;issues, they can be abused. Researchers found that the higher a Twitter\u0026nbsp;users\u0027 \u0022hashtag ratio,\u0022 the less likely they were to attract new followers.\u003C\/li\u003E\u003C\/ul\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cTo our knowledge, this is the first longitudinal study of follow predictors on Twitter,\u201d Gilbert said. \u201cFor the first time, we were able to explore the relative effects of social behavior, message content and network structure and show which of these factors has more influence on the number of Twitter followers.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EWorking with Ph.D. student C.J. Hutto and Sarita Yardi, now an assistant professor in the University of Michigan\u2019s School of Information, Gilbert examined the tweets of more than 500 Twitter users. After identifying 2,800 terms that convey positive and negative emotions, the team scored each term based on a sliding scale of positivity. They were then able to determine whether Twitter users who used each term gained or lost followers.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe team discovered that certain identifiable strategies in message content and interaction with other Twitter users, as well as the structure of one\u0027s Twitter network, have a predictable effect on the number of followers. For example, Twitter \u0022informers\u0022 (users who share informational content) consistently attract more followers than \u0022meformers\u0022 (users who share information about themselves).\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u201cFollowers are Twitter\u2019s most basic currency, yet little is understood about how to grow such an audience,\u201d said Gilbert. \u201cBy examining multiple factors that affect tie formation and dissolution over time on Twitter, we\u2019ve discovered information that could help technologists design and build tools that help users grow their audiences.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003EThe team\u2019s findings are summarized in the paper, \u201c\u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/comp.social.gatech.edu\/papers\/follow_chi13_final.pdf\u0022\u003EA Longitudinal Study of Follow Predictors on Twitter\u003C\/a\u003E,\u201d which will be presented this week at the \u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/chi2013.acm.org\/\u0022\u003EACM SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems\u003C\/a\u003E in Paris, France. To view research by other Georgia Tech researchers at SIGCHI, visit \u003Ca href=\u0022http:\/\/chi.gatech.edu\u0022\u003Ehttp:\/\/chi.gatech.edu\u003C\/a\u003E.\u003C\/p\u003E","summary":null,"format":"limited_html"}],"field_subtitle":[{"value":"Georgia Tech Study Examines Best Methods for Gaining Twitter Followers"}],"field_summary":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EWhat do all Twitter users want? Followers \u2013 and lots of them. But unless you\u0027re a celebrity, it can be difficult to build your Twitter audience (and even some celebs have trouble). Looking at a half-million tweets over 15 months, a first-of-its-kind study from Georgia Tech has revealed a set of reliable predictors for building a Twitter following.\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"field_summary_sentence":"","uid":"27556","created_gmt":"2013-05-02 10:58:22","changed_gmt":"2016-10-08 03:14:12","author":"Michaelanne Dye","boilerplate_text":"","field_publication":"","field_article_url":"","dateline":{"date":"2013-05-02T00:00:00-04:00","iso_date":"2013-05-02T00:00:00-04:00","tz":"America\/New_York"},"extras":[],"groups":[{"id":"1299","name":"GVU Center"}],"categories":[{"id":"42941","name":"Art Research"},{"id":"153","name":"Computer Science\/Information Technology and Security"},{"id":"143","name":"Digital Media and Entertainment"}],"keywords":[{"id":"59841","name":"Twitter; Eric Gilbert; C.J. Hutto; Study; Tweets; Followers; Social Media; Research"}],"core_research_areas":[{"id":"39501","name":"People and Technology"}],"news_room_topics":[],"event_categories":[],"invited_audience":[],"affiliations":[],"classification":[],"areas_of_expertise":[],"news_and_recent_appearances":[],"phone":[],"contact":[{"value":"\u003Cp\u003EMichaelanne Dye\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u003Ca href=\u0022mailto:mdye@cc.gatech.edu\u0022\u003Emdye@cc.gatech.edu\u003C\/a\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E404-385-4015\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cp\u003E\u0026nbsp;\u003C\/p\u003E","format":"limited_html"}],"email":["mdye@cc.gatech.edu"],"slides":[],"orientation":[],"userdata":""}}}