Tweetscenes: Give your twitter account a boost!

Twitter mobile app updates for iPhone and Android

twitter — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 23:34:00 +0000

New versions of both Twitter for iPhone and Twitter for Android are available today. Both apps bring back high-demand features, including the swipe shortcut, and they also introduce new design and functionality improvements. Here’s a rundown.

Both apps

Swipe shortcut: Swipe a Tweet in your home timeline to reply to, retweet, favorite or share it, or view the Twitter user’s profile, without leaving your timeline.
“Find friends”: We’ve added a confirmation alert when you select “Find friends”. This notification more clearly and explicitly messages the fact that when you upload your contacts’ email addresses and phone numbers, you can quickly find which of your friends are on Twitter (that is, if they’ve chosen to be discoverable by email or phone number).

Twitter for iPhone

Copy and paste: We’ve returned the ability to copy and paste the text of Tweets and user profiles. Just press and hold to copy.
Link love: The “share” feature used to just give you the option to copy or email a link to a Tweet. Now, if there’s a link within a Tweet, you’ll see the option to tweet, copy or mail that link, or you can choose to read it later. (Select a “Read Later Service” under Settings > Advanced.)

Pressing and holding links provides similar options, along with the ability to open the link in Safari.

Direct messages: We updated the design for Direct Messages and returned the ability to mark all DMs as read. Simply tap the check mark in the lower right corner.
Font size settings: Change the font size under Settings > Advanced.

Twitter for Android

New devices: Twitter for Android is now optimized to run on Android devices running Ice Cream Sandwich, as well as on the Kindle Fire (available today through the Amazon Appstore) and the Barnes & Noble NOOK Color and NOOK Tablet (available February 23 though the Barnes & Noble NOOK Store).

You can download Twitter for iPhone today from the App Store and Twitter for Android from Android Market.

Coming Soon: Twitter Advertising for Small Businesses

twitter — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 13:27:00 +0000

Successful small business owners intuitively know how to build meaningful relationships with their customers. They were the first to use Twitter to talk with consumers in real time, and their creativity demonstrated Twitter’s potential as a marketing platform. Today, some of the most effective marketing campaigns we see come from small, local, or Internet-only businesses—like the mouth-watering photos of @VanillaMoonBake’s cupcakes, or the Tweet contests hosted by @glennztees to promote their latest T-shirt designs.

Soon, small businesses based in the United States will have the chance to take their Twitter marketing efforts to a new level. Starting in late March, we will introduce a new advertising offering that makes it simple for companies of any size to grow their businesses using our Promoted Tweets and Promoted Accounts products.

We’ve partnered with American Express to make it easy for small business owners to advertise on Twitter. American Express Cardmembers and merchants based in the U.S. will be invited to try this new advertising solution before anyone else, and American Express will give $100 in free advertising to the first 10,000 eligible businesses to sign up.

Starting today, American Express Cardmembers and merchants can register to participate in the initial introduction of this new offering via ads.twitter.com/amex. We will launch this new offering more widely later this year.

Sign up here to try this new ad solution.

New version of Twitter, now on for everyone

twitter — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 21:33:00 +0000

In December, we launched a new version of Twitter. It’s been available for mobile phones, via the mobile web, Twitter for iPhone and Twitter for Android, and we’ve been rolling it out steadily to Twitter.com. Now, everyone has access to it. A few of the highlights:

Click any Tweet in your timeline to expand it to see photos, videos, retweets, favorites, and more.

Twitter.com shortcut: You can quickly close all expanded Tweets by pressing “L” (as in Larry) on your keyboard.
Connect is your way to keep conversations going. It’s the place to see who has followed or mentioned you, or retweeted or favorited one of your Tweets.

Twitter.com shortcut: Type “GC” (as in “Go Connect”), to jump to the Connect tab.
Discover lets you tap into a stream of useful and entertaining information, customized just for you. When you use Discover, you’ll see results reflecting your interests. These are based on your current location, what you follow and what’s happening in the world.

Twitter.com shortcut: “GD” (as in “Go Discover”) takes you to the Discover tab. If you want to go directly to Activity, enter “GA”.
Embed Tweets on your website by copying and pasting one line of code.
Take a tour of the new experience.
Check out the new Twitter brand pages from accounts like @NPRNews, @Audi and others.

By the way, you can see more shortcuts by typing “?” when you’re on Twitter.com.

Twitter Recap: GRAMMYs 2012

twitter — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 18:33:00 +0000

Whether or not you were able to watch the #Grammys live on Sunday night, you probably heard about the biggest Twitter moments. Here’s a quick look at how the night played out in Tweets.

People sent 10,901 Tweets per second (TPS) as Adele won Record of the Year — the peak TPS moment of the night.
“Grammys” was mentioned in more than 5 million Tweets on Sunday between noon and midnight PT.
The most mentioned artists (in descending order) during that same 12-hour period were: @OfficialAdele, @ChrisBrown, @NickiMinaj, @Rihanna, Whitney Houston.

"Ooh! A bit of snot." - @officialAdele choking up then laughing and wiping nose during her acceptance speech for Album of the Year #Grammys
— Twitter Music (@TwitterMusic) February 13, 2012

And the first Ad Scrimmage winner is . . .

twitter — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 00:56:00 +0000

At the end of the Super Bowl last weekend, we launched Twitter’s first-ever Ad Scrimmage competition. For a week following the game, Twitter users headed to adscrimmage.twitter.com for a chance to view and vote via Tweet for their favorite Super Bowl ads. And today, the results are in! Congratulations to Samsung’s #votefornote campaign.

Calling all fans of our big ad, there's still time to Believe in Love with a #VoteForNote in the #AdScrimmage! smgm.us/wpP
— Samsung Mobile US (@SamsungMobileUS) February 10, 2012

In decreasing order of the percentage of the vote they earned, these are the runners-up:

Disney #avengersad

H&M #beckhamforhm

Mars/M&Ms #VoteMsBrown

Kia #KiaBigGameAd

You can view all the winning ads here.

This year’s Super Bowl was one of the biggest sports events ever experienced on Twitter and the ads are a big part of what drives the conversation. There’s more info on the Twitter Ads Blog about the program and the winning campaign.

Securing your Twitter experience with HTTPS

twitter — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 21:20:00 +0000

Last year, we added the option to always use HTTPS when accessing Twitter.com on the web. This setting makes your Twitter experience more secure by protecting your information, and it’s especially helpful if you use Twitter over an unsecured Internet connection like a public wi-fi network.

Now, HTTPS will be on by default for all users, whenever you sign in to Twitter.com. If you prefer not use it, you can turn it off on your Account Settings page. HTTPS is one of the best ways to keep your account safe and it will only get better as we continue to improve HTTPS support on our web and mobile clients.

Read more about how to keep your account secure here: support.twitter.com/articles/76036…
— Safety (@safety) October 18, 2011

Watch the GRAMMYs unfold on Twitter

twitter — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 19:56:00 +0000

This Sunday night the 54th annual GRAMMYs will air on CBS. As with so many other live events on TV, one of the best ways to experience the show is to follow the conversation on Twitter. When the show starts, use #GRAMMYs to see what the world is saying about the performances, the nominees and winners, who’s wearing what and lots more.

We’ve teamed up with over 25 artists across several genres including pop, electronic and indie rock to bring you GRAMMY commentary you won’t see anywhere else. These “couch commentators” will be tweeting what they think about the show as we’re all watching. Check out the list and follow your favorites:

@afinefrenzy, @greysonchance, @steveaoki, @st_vincent, @thewantedmusic, @michellebranch, @mrchrisrene, @piatoscano, @teganandsara, @haleyreinhart, @skylargrey, @karminmusic, @preciousweapons, @erichutchinson, @neontrees, @ChevelleInc, @theglitchmob, @jfkmstrkrft, @crystalmethod, @tranquilmammoth, @graffiti6, @tanlines, @sebby_g, @jasonderulo, @neonhitch, @EricTurner

Finally, our own @TwitterMusic will be on the ground, live tweeting. Coldplay (@Coldplay), Katy Perry (@KatyPerry) and David Guetta (@DavidGuetta) will all be performing and tweeting from the event and Chad Smith of the Red Hot Chili Peppers will also be live-tweeting from the theatre as well; he’s @rhcpchad.

Twitter SMS: Now available for satellite providers

twitter — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 21:02:00 +0000

Twitter began as an SMS service. Today, we continue to build out SMS capability because we recognize the importance and value of making our service available to every person on the planet. No matter what device people use — from the most advanced smartphone to the simplest feature phone — people around the world should be able to send and read Tweets.

Of course, there may be times when people cannot access SMS. We’ve been working on some solutions when that occurs:

Satellite operators
We’ve partnered with the two largest satellite operators, Iridium and Thuraya, to give their subscribers access to Twitter SMS. Now, even if phone lines and the Internet are inaccessible — for example, in a war zone or after a natural disaster — people will be able to share news and stay informed via Twitter.

Long codes
We work with as many carriers as we can to support SMS around the world. If your carrier does not currently support Twitter SMS, you can still Tweet. Just use one of our long codes.

Here’s a full list of mobile carriers and satellite providers that support Twitter SMS, and as always, you can follow @twittermobile to find out when even more carriers offer it.

Post-Bowl Twitter analysis

twitter — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 21:06:00 +0000

The results are in: People love to share the experience of watching the Super Bowl with millions of other viewers from around the world. Whether it’s cheering for your team, commenting on the halftime show or discussing the ads, it seems you have a lot to say about this annual tradition—and you’re using Twitter to say it.

Here’s a fun fact: in 2008, Twitter’s largest spike in Tweets per second (TPS) during the Super Bowl was just 27. Three years later, fans sent 4,064 TPS, which was the highest TPS for any sporting event at that time.

This year, the TPS peak was 12,233 Tweets. The spike took place in the final three minutes of the game, during which fans sent an average of 10,000 TPS. Madonna’s performance during halftime was a big hit, too—there was an average of 8,000 TPS sustained during her performance, with a peak of 10,245 Tweets.

In the image above, you can see a few more data points from last night, including how some of the hashtags performed that were displayed on-air in the ads. If you missed any of those ads, head to adscrimmage.twitter.com to check them out and vote for your favorite via Tweet.

Roar of the crowd: Super Bowl on Twitter

twitter — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 19:34:00 +0000

From @TimTebow leading the Denver Broncos to a shocking overtime win (and a new record for sports-related Tweets per second: 9,420) to San Diego Chargers receiver @ericweddle1’s sideline Tweets from the Pro Bowl—we watched all of the NFL post-season’s most memorable moments come alive on Twitter.

And while the @Giants and @Patriots’ rematch and halftime show play out on TV, the national conversation is happening well beyond your den: it also happens on Twitter. Follow your favorite NFL players, coaches and commentators during the game, or just search for #SuperBowl to see how everyone is reacting to the action on the field.

Here's what @Giants & @Patriots'll be fighting 4 Sunday: Lombardi trophy, on-set 4 Super Bowl LIVE. #nfltotalaccess twitter.com/nflnetwork/sta…
— NFL Network (@nflnetwork) January 30, 2012

To discover new accounts related to the Giants or the Patriots, follow @GiantsTweets and @NEPatriotTweets. These accounts automatically select and retweet the top Tweets from official team accounts, coaches, players, owners and local media.

Of course, it wouldn’t be the Super Bowl without the creative ads, and this year we’re introducing a Twitter twist. Immediately after the game, you can replay all of the ads that aired during the game and Tweet votes for your favorites on adscrimmage.twitter.com. We’ll announce which ad dominated the post-game Twitter conversation on Feb. 12, a week from Sunday. Learn more about the program here.

Twitter is the best place to see and share your take on everything Super Bowl—and for sports-related Tweets all year long, follow @Twittersports.