25 Creative Tweet Prompts to Help You Banish (140 Character) Writer’s Block

By Lauren Dugan on September 23, 2011 5:00 PM

While it may seem that some prolific Twitterati never run out of things to say in 140 characters or less, our guess is they struggle with Twitter writer’s block from time to time just like the rest of us. It isn’t always easy to condense your ideas down into 140 characters. We’ve got 25 creative tweet prompts for you, to help you banish Twitter writer’s block and spice up your output.

You can use these prompts to reinvigorate your tweeting if you’re stuck for something to say. We don’t recommend stretching too far if you’ve really got nothing on your mind, but just use this as a “cheat sheet” of sorts to add a creative twist to your tweets and get yourself out of a rut.

Finish the sentence:
1. Twitter is best used for…
2. I can’t believe [trending topic] is trending because…
3. My favorite celebrity tweeter is…
4. If I could change one thing about Twitter it would be…
5. I can’t stand it when people tweet about…
6. I love using Twitter on my smartphone because…
Questions to ask your followers

7. How do you find useful things to tweet?
8. Have you ever participated in #FollowFriday?
9. When did you join Twitter? Why?
10. How often do you change your bio pic?
11. Which do you use Twitter to do more of, listen or share?
12. What was the best tweet you’ve ever read?
13. Who is your favorite person to follow on Twitter?
14. Do you tweet from your computer or smartphone more often?
15. What dashboard do you use to access Twitter?
Tips and advice

16. Tell your followers one of your best productivity tips
17. Tweet about one Twitter account you find extremely useful
18. Share a piece of advice for people in your niche
19. Explain one type of Twitter etiquette you think others might not know about
20. Recommend a trend that you find interesting
21. Share any cool Twitter tools you’ve found
Misc.

22. Hold a 15 minute competition to see who can tweet the funniest joke
23. Ask for help with a project you’re working on
24. Conduct a poll
25. Share a positive thought or quote

Top 5 URL Shorteners (And 3 Honorable Mentions)

By Lauren Dugan on August 19, 2011 3:30 PM

Twitter’s 140-character limit has forced the internet to get a little creative in how it shares links. You’ll likely have noticed that links on Twitter aren’t in your standard www.websitename.com/articlename format – instead, they’re shortened using URL shorteners to take up as little precious characters as possible. We’ve compiled a list of 5 great URL shorteners you can use to share your links on Twitter without worrying about going over the character limit (and 3 honorable mentions, too).

Here are my favorite five URL shorteners, in no particular order. These are among the most popular URL shorteners out there, and they offer features like stats, tracking, and integration with some of the most-used Twitter dashboards.

1. bit.ly

Bit.ly is the most popular and one of the oldest URL shorteners. It offers instant tracking, stats, and the ability to have vanity URLs that signify your brand (for example, we use mbist.ro for our parent company, Mediabistro).

2. goo.gl

Goo.gl is the official URL shortener from Google. It’s one of the newer URL shorteners on the block, but it’s becoming quite popular on Twitter. It allows you to track when your shortened URLs were created and how many clicks they’ve received.

3. Owl.ly

This is the official HootSuite URL shortener, which can be used as a stand-alone shortener on the web, or while logged on to the HootSuite dashboard on the web or mobile.

4. Deck.ly

This is the official TweetDeck URL shortener, which can be used on the TweetDeck desktop application, Android and Chrome (with support for iPhone and iPad forthcoming). Deck.ly allows you to write tweets longer than 140-characters and either display them within TweetDeck or link to them within another Twitter platform.

5. Su.pr

Su.pr is StumbleUpon’s official URL shortener. It allows you to syndicate content to StumbleUpon, Facebook and Twitter at the same time, suggests the best time of day to post, and allows you to schedule posts in the future.

The following 3 URL shorteners might not be ultra popular, but they deserve an honorable mention in this list for offering some innovative features (or just having a really cool name).

lnk.co

This URL shortener service offers an interesting proposition: make money by tweeting shortlinks. Although it does allow you to use its service without this, if you register, you can apparently earn money when people click on the links you shorten. We haven’t tried this out, but the idea is pretty neat.

fur.ly

This one gets points for a pretty cute name, but fur.ly also has a unique method of shortening links. It allows you to input multiple links at once and shortens them into a single URL. When clicked, a fur.ly link will bring you to a web page that shows each link in sequence.

moourl.com

This is just a bare-bones URL shortener, but with a twist: it’s super, super cute. If you want to smile every time you shorten a link, use moourl.

This isn’t the definitive list of URL shorteners, just some that deserve a mention. Do you have a favorite that didn’t make the list?

10 Awesome Twitter Tools for Musicians (And Music-Lovers, Too!)

By Lauren Dugan on July 29, 2011 3:30 PM

Twitter is a great way to share content, and what better content is there than your favorite band or some tracks you’ve put together yourself? We’ve compiled a list of 10 great Twitter tools for musicians and music-lovers to share what they love with their followers. So crack out those headphones, get your toes ready for tapping, and check out these tools!

twt.fm

twt.fm lets you share music with your Twitter followers. After logging in with Twitter, you type in an artist or a track into the twt.fm field and it will generate a track page that is skinned like your Twitter profile that you can tweet out, and your followers can listen to without having to download a thing.

Song.ly

Song.ly is similar to twt.fm, but it doesn’t skin the song page like your profile, as you don’t have to sign in with Twitter before sharing a song.

Tra.kz

Tra.kz is a URL shortener service designed specifically for bands and artists to share their music with their fans. It allows musicians to create a page with their single, and share it using a shortened link via Twitter.

Famecount Music Chart

Check out the hottest musicians on social media with Famecount’s Music Chart. You can see which of your favorite (or not so favorite) music stars have the highest Twitter count. You can browse this list just for fun, or use it as a target for your eventual rise to musical fame!

Twitpic

While Twitpic is infinitely useful for sharing photos on Twitter in the general sense, it’s the perfect tool for concert-goers and musicians, too. You can share pics of your latest jam session, your first time crowd surfing, or the after-party using this Twitter-specific photo sharing tool.

tweeturmusic

tweeturmusic is like a Twitter jukebox – it lets you listen to your favorite songs, and tweet them whenever the fancy strikes you. It leverages the Play.me community, and offers plenty of songs for an almost endless playlist.

Twiturm.com

Twiturm.com is a Twitter-based community for musicians to share their audible products with fans. It allows musicians to upload an MP3 file and turns it into a web page that can be tweeted, shared, and tracked.

Swift.fm

With Swift.fm, you can share, discover, and enjoy music in a Twitter-based community. Musicians can promote their songs via Twitter, fans can interact with their favorite musicians, and Swift.fm is even working to include talent discovery services for labels in future releases.

Tuneticker

Tuneticker automatically tweets your iTunes activity to your Twitter account, using the hashtag #nowplaying. This is a great little desktop app for sharing your musical tastes with your followers, but you might want to only use it on select occasions, or you might turn people off with music tweets every 3 to 5 minutes.

Tinysong

Tinysong allows you to type in the name of a song, and serves up an array of options for listening to – and sharing – that song. As Tinysong accesses Grooveshark’s massive library of full songs, you’ll never run out of music to listen to or to tweet.

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