Everyone wants to grow their Twitter followers.  If you want to grow yours rapidly (for free), it’s time for some organic growth hacking.  Follow these simple steps to get started today!

1. Prepare For Growth.  Are all of your social media profiles up-to-date?  Is your website responsive to mobile?  Make sure you are ready for rapid growth.  This means sprucing up your image online.  Check your profile on every social media channel – even the ones you don’t plan on actively promoting.  If they exist, someone will find them and they’d better look good!  This means separating your personal profiles from your professional ones.  Once separated, personal profiles should be restricted to friends only.
2. Create a Plan of Attack.  How are you going to proceed?  Do you know your audience?  You must know who you are targeting with your efforts.  To whom does your product or service appeal?  What is the purpose of your growth hacking?  Why are you seeking to grow quickly rather than the more traditional method of slow and steady?  Once you have the answers to these questions you can proceed with actual growth hacking in an effective manner.
3. Twitter Chats.  Twitter chats are a very effective way to get your brand in front of a lot of people at once.  Just make sure you are contributing relevant information to the conversation, not simply looking to promote your brand.  Looking for a larger Twitter chat to join?  I always recommend #BufferChat, #BizChats, and #HootChat for starters.  Try googling “Twitter Chats for (insert your industry).  There are a lot of lists.  Just make sure they are recent.  Many chats began and ended years ago.  You can also look up “#TwitterChat (insert your industry)” on Twitter itself.
4. Use Short, Relevant Hashtags.  Hashtags make it easy to locate similar content on Twitter, but the system only works if everyone tags their tweet with relevant hashtags.  For example #Safety is one of the most popular hashtags on Twitter, but if doesn’t relate to your post, don’t use it just to garner traffic.  Also, don’t spam us all with hashtags that are extremely long. #NoOneWantsToReadAHashtagLikeThisOne.  Studies have shown that tweets with just two short hashtags (and an image) are far more likely to receive engagements.  I would use #GrowthHacking and #SocialMediaMarketing (or #SMM) to promote this article.
5. Target Influencers.  You need to get your tweets in front of a bunch of people all at once.  One of the simplest ways to do so is to be retweeted by someone with a lot of followers.  Research the influencers in your industry and find their twitter handles.  If they have a large number of followers, engage them.  Read their timelines.  What are they retweeting?  Mirror your content (with relevant hashtags!) and be sure to tag your influencer.  Mirror, but don’t copy.  No one wants a copycat and if you are going to repost rather than retweet, be sure to give credit where credit is due (For example use “via @spencerhudonii” if you are reposting this article).
6. Schedule Posts.  You can’t always be on Twitter, but you CAN spend an hour or two a week planning and scheduling your posts.  There are extremely helpful apps such as Buffer and Hootsuite, amongst others.  Personally, I love Buffer.  The free version will work just fine, but if you can afford $10/month the paid version is well worth it.  I can quickly post and/or schedule content from various feeds to all of my social media profiles in one app.
7. Be Consistent.  Consistency is key when building your Twitter followers.  Don’t post erratically.  If you’ve never mentioned sports in your profile or tweets, it may appear odd to your followers if you start tweeting to an athlete.  Also, long periods of inactivity will decrease your follower count and stunt your ability to build it back up again.  Consistency gives your followers the impression that you are active and knowledgeable in your field.

Follow these simple tips and you’ll find your follower counts dramatically increasing in a few short weeks.  Good luck!  If you would like to learn more about growing your twitter followers, contact me on Twitter at @spencerhudonii.  I look forward to connecting with you!