Twitter Series 101: Get Retweeted! Taking Dan Zarrella’s Advice

At the start of this Twitter 101 series, we set about exploring strategies to increase our Twitter following, knowing that an increased Twitter following leads to a stronger brand voice and social media campaign.

As your following increases, there are additional goals to strive for, like earning retweets. Earning retweets exposes your messages to a broader audience as your follower’s followers see your tweets via retweets. According to “the social media scientist” Dan Zarrella, “the likelihood of a tweet being retweeted increases dramatically each time it is retweeted.”

Dan is widely renowned for his social media savvy, hailed by Rand Fishkin as “someone whose expertise is backed by more data than nearly anyone else in the marketing field”). In his various reports, Dan explores what works and what doesn’t when it comes to retweeting.

Takeaways from Dan’s Science of ReTweets Report

• More than 50 percent of all retweets contain links.
• Nearly 1.5  percent of overall tweets are retweets.
• Retweets use longer words and require a more advanced reading level than tweets.
• 2:30 p.m. is the peak time for retweeting.

10 Most ReTweetable Words

• you
• twitter
• please
• retweet
• post
• blog
• social
• free
• media
• help

Takeaways from Dan’s 5 Scientifically Proven Ways to Get More ReTweets

• Nearly 80 percent of all retweets are news-related.
• Retweets that contain a self-reference are less likely to be retweeted.
• Retweets that mention Twitter are more likely to be retweeted than those that mention Facebook.
• Simply asking for a retweet can boost a tweet’s retweetability.

20 Least ReTweetable Words

• listening
• bored
• back
• some
• tired
• tomorrow
• hey
• gonna
• sleep
• well
• bed
• night
• home
• work
• watching
• but
• lol
• haha
• going
• game

Dan’s research yields useful information to think about when crafting your tweets. Keep these factors in mind as you create tweets that will hopeful lead to retweets. And remember, always leave 20 characters at the end of your tweet so users can easily add “via @ ____” when retweeting your tweet. To read more from Dan, check out his latest book The Science of Marketing: When to Tweet, What to Post, How to Blog, and Other Proven Strategies, published this month.

Kristi Kellogg is a journalist, news hound, professional copywriter, and social (media) butterfly. Currently, she is a senior SEO content writer for Conde Nast. Her articles appear in newspapers, magazines, across the Internet and in books such as "Content Marketing Strategies for Professionals" and "The Media Relations Guidebook." Formerly, she was the social media editor at Bruce Clay Inc.

See Kristi's author page for links to connect on social media.