Twitter is one of the most popular social media sites that users go to, in order to connect with friends and catch the latest news among other things.
Users, however, complain that the 140 characters are too few for them to express themselves fully. Fortunately, there are ways to maximize on the limiting characters and ultimately pass your message across.
Origin of 140 Characters
The limiting word count on Twitter is thought to have come from the founders of Twitter Inc. who stuck with the constrictive number to enable users to send messages via their phone, since the standard character count for an SMS is 140. Twitter allows for an additional 20 characters for the username of the person tweeting. Since Twitter initially started as a mobile messenger, the character count stuck even after diversifying to computers and more complex smartphones and tablets.
Twitter messengers are called tweets while Twitter users are known as Tweeps.
Brevity
You are forced to be brief so that you write the point you want to convey in the least words possible since the Twitter messenger does not allow spill-over of excess words. You are supposed to make your point within the character limit and not endless paragraphs.
Double Tweet
If 140 characters are not enough for you to pass your point across there is no problem. Type another tweet after the first one to follow up the previous tweet. Be sure to post them in quick succession so that your followers can read them in the order you have sent them. If you delay in tweeting the remaining portion of the tweet, your followers will get confused and lose track of the information you intended to convey.
You might want to include the phrase “to be continued” or “cont’d” in short in order for your followers to expect more content.
Share Links
If you are a blogger or a web admin with a substantial number of readers you better share a link instead of tweeting the entire blog because of course it will not fit. Consider adding other multimedia messages rather than just words. Use photos and videos to summarize your points in a way that will catch the curiosity of your followers.
The beauty of sharing links is that links relieve you of the task of explaining. You can abandon that task by directing the readers to the post and go poetic. That way, the readers will be curious to know what is that you posted. You can throw in a few quotes and words of wisdom to lure your followers to your tweet. If they like it they will re-tweet and eventually it may go viral.
Mind Your Language
One reason why words go overboard the limit is poor spelling and grammatical errors. If you choose words carefully and eliminate grammatical mistakes, the words will fit. Be concise. Avoid repetitive words. Use the most appropriate words to make your point.
Twitter has introduced emojis. These cartoon characters will shorten your character count because of their visual appeal.
Diversify
This is for Twitter developers, upgrade your messenger to include other updates rather than status update such as “at school” or “at work”. Nowadays people tweet about weather, news, sports and mundane things like food. Twitter took the cue by adopting “What are you doing?” or better still, “What’s happening?” It can do better by freeing people to write about anything they want in their tweets.
Twitter can learn from Google+ how to make conversations natural rather than frustrating them by allowing users to type as much as they want and track their chats easily.
source:- http://pressandupdate.com/twitter-go-beyond-140-character-limit/
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