Understanding the ins and outs of Twitter, or the Twittersphere as it’s also known, can be mind-boggling. If it isn’t difficult enough getting your head around what #hashtags are and who to follow, you also have the more daunting task of working out what to tweet and how to phrase it.

Twitter is often described as ‘the SMS of the Internet’ and sending a tweet on behalf of your association to over 300 million Twitter users can be daunting to say the least. Your tweets need to resonate with your followers, attract new followers (to hopefully convert to members) and avoid anything that might cause people to unfollow you or think poorly of your association.

In other words, knowing how to use the 140 characters of a tweet involves more than just correct punctuation and grammar.

Twitter is a common choice for associations embracing social networking and online marketing. However there is a big difference between just using Twitter and using it effectively.

For everything an association needs to know in order to be an effective Twitter user look out for the April 2012 edition of Third Sector magazine. To subscribe click here.