Devon Brown has made ViralTwitterSecret, a pretty slick (web-based) tweeting script available …for free.

You’ve seen the app before on other sites…

…but what’s especially nice about ViralTwitterSecret is the ability to re-direct your URLs.  For free.  No upgrade.  No pressure.  Free.

Use Without A Website:

Any time someone offers you a re-direct option, is an opportunity to use an affiliate link without the hassle of creating a webpage that requires uploading, promoting, and maintaining.

Think CPA, Clickbank …anything that gives you a link to sell someone else’s product.

With ViralTwitterSecrets, simply use the redirect option to send people to your affiliate offer (see the web-based form below). Easy peezy.

Use With A Website:

Of course if you DO have a website, try this strategy:

1) Create a special offer for ‘Twits’ only.  The link in the tweet takes people to a landing page detailing your Twits*-only offer.

(* term of endearment ;)

2) Your landing page displays your ViralTwitter form instead of the traditional option form.  In order to receive your special offer, people must be prepared to tweet for it.

3) They fill out your form, your tweet shows up in the twitter-sphere, and people are re-directed to a “Thank You” page where you simply ask them where to send their gift (via your autoresponder).  Voila, Instant optin list!

4) Of course, don’t forget… you can also re-direct these same people to another, related affiliate sales page (think upsell), using the confirmation page option in your autoresponder.

Viral Outline:

Tweet > Landing Page > Thank You Page > Salespage

This is just one of many effective (and subtle) ways to use Twitter for your marketing efforts.

Finally… someone has created a way to make links clickable on my Twitter background.

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The best way to get started harnessing the power of Twitter is to just jump in with both feet by creating an account and starting to tweet!  A twitter account will only take you a few minutes to create and you’ll be addicted in about 15 minutes afterward.

The main Twitter page is certainly not confusing or difficult to navigate. Simply go to Twitter.com and you will see a page that looks like this:

Click the green button that reads “Get Started – Join”, and you will be taken to very basic registration form that looks like this:

Choosing your username:

Give some thought to your username if you’re using it to represent yourself as a person, or a marketer, and not just your website. This is the name people will know you by, so try to find an available name that suits you, and not just a name like “twit579J” that would look like a spammer’s account.

You are able to choose a name that i a maximum of 15 characters (without spaces) so you need to use that limit wisely. If you want to choose a name that directly promotes your business, that’s acceptable, but having a sort of personal touch seems to work better on the big scheme of things.  The key to all this is the “being social” part, and in most cases, a more personal name will seem more genuine.

Other Settings:

Once you’re finished creating a username for your account, you’ll be taken to a screen that auto-suggests some followers for you. You can quickly glance through these or you can simply skip this step and be taken right to your new account home page.

That was basically it. No sweat, right?

Now, you’ll have a page that asks you the infamous “What are you doing?”.

However, don’t forget that, unless someone happens to stumble across your account, nobody is going to see you until you have followers so you might want to add a tweet or two and then head off to find some people you’d be interested in and choose to follow them by clicking the “follow button” at the top of their page.

Customize And Personalize Your Account:

You still have some settings in the backend of your Twitter account that looks like this:

From here, you can choose to set a couple notification preferences (such as mobile communication via Twitter), add a short bio, and customize your Twitter page a little bit visually (which is highly recommended).

Twitter has some built-in designs for the background of your page under the “design” tab, but you also have the option of uploading your own custom image to be used as a background as well!

That’s it! Now that you have an account, start tweeting and networking in!

What’s up tweeples? Anyone who wants to follow me, please do so, and send me a quick tweet on Twitter.

If that makes absolutely no sense to you, then read on, because you need to get involved and grasp the power of  one of the hottest (if not THE hottest!) marketing tools available on the Internet right now!  That tool is known as Twitter.

Twitter is a website that allows you to keep in contact with people in an ultra-compact way known as micro-blogging.  The term fits Twitter perfectly as each post made from a user is limited to a maximum of only 140 characters. Now, when you first get a glimpse of the size of a 140 character message, the first thing that comes to mind is probably something like “what could I possibly say of any value that would fit into that amount of space?”.  However, once you start particpating and get the hang of things, you’ll quickly be amazed at how informational a “tweet” can be.

A “tweet” is the user’s term that replaces what you would typicall refer to as a “post”, or a “message”. In fact, many Twitter users also refer to themselves and others as tweeples.

The Basics Of Twitter

Twitter is a social platform that allows users to share their tweets with each other in real time similar to a chat program. There are millions of people currently signed up with profiles on Twitter and the messages range from every end of the spectrum from life’s little chit chats, to marketing tips and business deals.

When you create a profile on twitter, you get to choose a unique user name, and your page has a bio section that also allows you to upload a photo, create a short bio, and link to a url of your choosing.

This same profile page has a link that reads “follow”.  This is where the magic happens. When you’re using Twitter, you only see updates (tweets) from people that you choose to “follow”.

As your list of followers grow, so does your network capabilities as you can reach all those people who have chosen to follow you, instantly. The power lies in your network. As you begin to capture the interest of your followers,  you have the potential to reach their network of followers as well…and so on…and so on.

Twitter is free, it’s fun, it’s great for business networking. The only possible bad side is that it takes discipline to not get addicted and spend too much time on it when you should be working on other things, so maybe you better stick to a rigid schedule with your “tweet blogging”!

Anything that makes life easier, or is deemed a “time-saver,” is a popular commodity online, so it’s not surprising to see several applications being developed that add a little extra functionality to Twitter for it’s users.

There have been several application released that allow you to schedule your tweets for a later time and date.  Many of Twitter’s users feel that this takes something away from the heart and soul of Twitter, which is the whole idea of being social, and connecting, often in real time. However, there are also a group of users who embrace the convenience and automation that many of the add-ons bring.

To help you get an idea of what’s available out there, here are a few of the popular ones right now, and what they can do to add a little convenience to your twitter experience:

Tweet Later
This is probably the most popular service right now for scheduling your tweets. If you want to schedule one, or a series of messages to be broadcaster at a later time or date, then you can do that easily with Tweet Later. This handy little ap also allows you to follow anyone who follows you automatically, as well as send them an automated message when they follow you.

Social Too
This Twitter helper lets you automate the following of new followers as well. It also gives you the option of having lists sent to your email of people who both follow and un-follow you. Now, most people advise to not put any weight in who unfollows you, but others like to keep tabs in case there is a pattern of un-follows that match up with types of messages that they are tweeting.

Tweet My Blog
A pretty popular trend is to tweet your latest blog post (if you have one). If your blog is built on Wordpress, then you can use Tweet My Blog to automatcially Tweet your latest post.

There’s definitely no shortage of add-ons and additional tools being released to make expand on the ever-increasing growth of Twitter.  Probably the most efficient ones that everyone can find a use for are the Twitter desktop applications that allow you to tweet from separate client in a small window instead of spending all your Twitter time on the actual website.

Right now, the two most popular Twitter desktop apps are TweetDeck and Twhirl.

TweetDeck:
One thing that can happen once you build a huge list of followers is that you get overwhelmed by trying to keep up with the long list of non-stop tweets from your network. TweetDeck is a lightweight application that allows you to break down that information into organized groups that are a lot easier to manage.

The TweetDeck screen can be set up to be split into columns that show groups of messages separately such as replies, direct messages, but also can show lists of specified groups as well. So, let’s say you have football buddies mixed in with your Twitter network of Internet marketers. You can have two separate columns  – one for football, one for Internet marketing, and simply add users to the appropriate groups.

The organization in TweetDeck drastically kills the noise, and it’s very easy to use. This is definitely the top choice for a serious Tweeter.

Twhirl
Twhirl is quite a bit smaller than TweetDeck, with not as many features, but still is a great little application that let’s yo follow your Twitter stream easier than refreshing the twitter website all day.

If you don’t need all the organization features of TweetDeck, then you might want to try something a little more compact like Twhirl. It still has the main features you need like search, url-shortener, etc. You can also cross-post to other social networks (Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.) which is a nice feature.

Regardless which app you choose, either will surely add convenience to your Twitter experience.  Now, go tweet from your desktop!