Twitter is a social networking tool that allows individuals to send short text messages known as tweets.
The tweet below is exactly 140 characters, which gives an example of how much—or how little—room you have. You need to make every word and character count.
Writing Tweets: The Basics
Keep your tweets:
- Short
140 characters maximum. Twitter counts down from 140, and lets you know how many characters you have left to use. - And Even Shorter
If you want others to forward your tweet (re-tweet), you may want to use fewer than 140 characters. Remember that Twitter provides a stream of short updates for those people, organizations, or issues you want to follow, and gaining a following (via re-tweets) is often a goal of those who use Twitter. On average, try to reserve at least 20 characters so your message can be re-tweeted. - Meaningful
Pare down the information to keywords, and put what you consider to be the most important information first. Phrases will suffice (no need to use complete sentences). For example, if you want to write a Profile that will help link you with other users, especially with other Excelsior University students, you might start out with something like this (and you still have 48 characters left to use):
