This post has taken an interesting turn. My original thought was to feature individuals, as well as big brands in this set of examples.  That turns out to be an entirely different post, as few big brands have actually “branded” their Twitter backgrounds.  Valuable no cost space to show their unique brand, being wasted. Why? Maybe it was over looked as they hashed out their ROI justifications.

What the big brands have missed, the savvy business professionals have not. What do I mean? Take a look at these creative backgrounds, not only shows their brand, but also contains useful information in addition to the mini bio of 160 characters and your single URL link.

Sonny Gill

In this background Sonny Gill has managed to show his brand logo, email, AOL IM, Google Talk and shows the symbols of six of his other networks; Linkedin, Plurk, Facebook, Digg and StumbleUpon.

It is simple, clean and sleek, yet packed with valuable information.

Armano

I am constantly inspired by David Armano’s graphic illustrations, so it was no surprise his Twitter background would be as inspiring. He has his brand logo, expanded bio and information of address for five other networks. As a personal touch, a photograph of his motorcycle, showing more of his personality and interests.

Mayhem Studios

Calvin Lee updated his background just yesterday. Thank you Calvin! He gave me one more great example for my this post. He has managed to show his brand logo, website, blog and email addresses. In addition, four alternative network addresses, he is available to engage; on Linkedin, Bizmik, Facebook and Skype.

Michael Bertoldi

In this simple, clean and sleek. Michael Bertoldi has his brand logo, email address and five symbols of other networks he engages his community; Linkedin, Deli.cio.us, Facebook, Digg and StumbleUpon.

Amber Naslund (aka AmberCadabra)

Amber Naslund’s Twitter background is simple, clean and has focus on her branding. She has matched the images, log and colors between her Twitter background and her blog. Nice transition and no doubt it is the same brand.

Cheryl Smith

Cheryl Smith’s Twitter background is a great example of  branding. Her Twitter background is clean, simple and has focus on her branding. What is most nice is when you go from Twitter page to blog. The transition is smooth and almost transparent.

Need help creating a custom or semi custom background?

Not everyone wants to spend precious time on branding, yet wants to set their Twitter page apart, so I have listed a few sources to help those who want to create something, quick and easy. Here are a few websites to help, some services are free, others have are fee based.

Twitbacks -This application allows you to be creative, without any design or illustration skills.  You can add your name, company, website, blog, bio, photo, logo, phone, email, twitter name and add social network icons. As of this post, the service is free.

Twitterbacks – They make it simple for those with Photoshop or any software capable of editing a PSD file. Go ahead and download a file and construct your own Twitter background.

There are many other great backgrounds out there and over time I will locate and enjoy more. If you have a good background, please drop a comment and give us your Twitter page link.  I also made a Flickr album with more backgrounds I have admired.

Conclusion

Have you looked at your Twitter background? Do any of these samples inspire you? Will you create your own creative background? If you create or always have a creative Twitter background, please post a comment with a link.  All creativity welcome.

I admire these professionals for thinking outside the box and taking advantage of what has been missed by many big brands. To learn more about them, click their Twitter Background. Enjoy.

Related articles:

• • Using Twitter to Enhance Your Social Network

  37 More Information Packed Twitter Backgrounds

You have selected a Social Networking service, created your profile, selected a photo of yourself and invited your contacts to join your network. Now you have built a network! Congratulations!

The network you have created is an important one. You have invited people to become part of your network community, so what is your plan? How are you going engage with your community?

Being active and engaging in your community is vitally important. The same time you invest in your personal face to face relationships, you will need to invest in growing and enhancing your online relationship.

Twitter is an exceptional tool to engage community. Why Twitter? It allows you to communicate in real-time, share information, get help to questions and build relationships. People share many aspects of themselves on Twitter, much more than the carefully planned bio on their profiles. Twitter allows you to gain unique insight and open the doors to many new relationships quickly.

Overview of Twitter Basics

1. Account – Setup a free Twitter account.
2. Name – Pick a meaningful user name that you can use in all of your networks. Be consistent.
3. Avatar/Photo – Be easily recognizable. Select a photo and use it consistently over all other social applications.
4. Bio – Complete your one line bio, telling visitors a little about yourself.
5. Location – Put your location in your profile. This will help local Twitter users locate you.
6. About You Page/URL – Add a URL to allow people to learn more about YOU.
7. Customize Twitter – Create a custom background and promote your brand.
8. Invite Your Connections – Locate your connections on Twitter and invite non Twitter users to join in the conversation.
9. Set Notices – Set your notice preferences for followers.
10. Promote Your Twitter Account – Promote the fact you are on Twitter on your networks, in groups and in the Twitter Yellow Pages.
11. Managing Tweets – Simple tools to help you engage with the community.

Let’s Get Started

1. Account

Set up a free Twitter account or consider getting several accounts and avoid others from obtaining your brand, domain, product names, etc.
Twitter names/ID’s are getting as popular as Domain names. The best way to protect your brand is to reserve your name now. Twitter allows you to register one user name per email. Have other email addresses available to this purpose.

2. Name

Keep User Names Consistent. Use your real name, company name, blog title or a brand name. Be consistent between networks. It is much easier to develop relationships with your network, when they immediately recognize you across applications.
Seriously, using your real name on Linkedin, nickname on Flickr, and yet another on Twitter gets confusing for the best of us. Same goes true to avatar photos, be consistent.

3. Avatar/Photo

Select a photo and use it consistently over all other social applications. Be easily recognizable. In most cases an avatar in a 100 x 100 pixel size, in a JPG, GIF or PNG format, works across most applications, but there are exceptions.

Example: A 100 x 100 pixel size photo appears pixilated in TweetDeck’s larger profile window. Using a larger size of 1000 x 1000 file size, not exceeding 700 k, works best overall.

Special thanks to my friend Simon Salt, for allowing me to feature him as my example.

4. Bio

Complete your one line bio in fewer than 160 characters. People will look at your bio and by this brief description decide whether or not to follow you or engage in conversation. Make your bio interesting, by being “REAL”. Not everyone works 24 x 7, so put a mix of interests in your bio. Even business people have interests in sports, arts, family fun, pets, video games, gardening, etc.

5. Location

Put your location in your profile. Include the name of your city and state, or at minimum the county and state. This will help Twitter users locate you and your business on TwitterLocal.

6. About You Page/URL

Create URL to allow people to learn more about you. In Twitter you can add one link. Which link to choose? What is best, website, blog or one of the many other profiles you have created? Which one is best?

Connect to all of them. How? Create a custom landing page, just about you, and provide links to all of your social profiles. A little thought goes a long way. Make it easy for people to find, learn, engage and connect with you.

Please, avoid creating a link that appears like spam, which will turn people off immediately.

7. Customize Twitter

Let us not forget the “Visual” aspect of you or and your brand. Continue with the consistency with a custom background to match your website brand. It can be enhanced to be a , company logo or personality. Caution: Avoid creating a background that looks like a “sales” piece. The appearance of spam is a turn off to many.

• Creating your background

In this example, we used Adobe Illustrator, but any graphic software will work if you can export into GIF, JPG or PNG format.

Format: GIF, JPG, PNG.” Images must be smaller than 800k.
Canvas Dimension: 795 px by 400 px (this was viewed on 15, 21 & 23” monitors)
Top Branding Dimensions: 39.428 px by 795-821 px

• Change Design Colors

Select colors that enhance custom background graphic. You can change the RGB colors for the background behind your graphic, text, link colors, sidebar background fill and sidebar border.

To activate the color wheel, click on one of the fields; background, text, links, sidebar or sidebar border. Click on the color wheel to select the desired color. The color wheel will put the appropriate web or RGB colors in the appropriate field. You can also directly input your web hex color information if you have it available.

Important note: until you SAVE CHANGES, your preferences will not be changed. If you do not like your selections, CANCEL and begin again.

8. Invite Your Connections

Locate your connections on Twitter and invite non Twitter users to join in the conversation.
You can import your contacts from Hotmail, Yahoo, Gmail, AOL and MSN. Note: if you use Outlook, you can export your CSV file and import into one of these free services.

9. Notices of Tweets in your timeline

These settings allow you to control the replies that appear in your timeline.

In the notices section of your settings page, you can choose how you will see the @replies of others. You have three options:

• all @replies: see all of the @replies made by people you follow, whether or not you follow the person to whom the reply is directed.
• @replies to the people I’m following: see @replies from people you follow directed toward other people that you also follow. This is the default setting.
• no @replies: never see any @replies in your timeline, ever

10. Promote Your Twitter Account

• Twellow

Twellow is like the Twitter Yellow Pages. You can search by name, Twitter user or by category. Members can set up a brief bio or an extended profile with links to a variety of their social networks. , as well as your web or blog URL’s.

• Communication Materials

Email Signature – Include your twitter name in your email signature. A simple and professional signature can be created with WiseStamp a Firefox extension enables you to easily customize & add personalized email signatures on any webmail service (Gmail ,Yahoo ,Aol mail, Hotmail).

Business Cards – Include your twitter address near your blog and/or website information.  One Twitter user @adellecharles, suggested if your card has too much information and it begins to look busy, you could consider adding a Twit Bird as a symbol.  I love this idea!

As @Twalk said, “Many of us operate in multiple niches, so why not have mult. biz cards”. This is a great idea. Going to an event or conference, want more than your normal biz card has on it? Try Moo cards.

• Join a Twitter User Group

Facebook has a group named “Twitter”, with over 8745 members.
LinkedIn has several pages of groups, one prominent group Tweeple, has over 1700 members.

11. Managing Tweets

There are a variety of desktop and mobile applications that will help you organize and manage your Twitter communications are available.

• TweetDeck – My favorite and most valuable tool is TweekDeck. Why? I can create different columns and categorize my followers, topics of discussion, clients, etc. Plus the added benefit of having Twitscoop built directly in the application and the expanded profile viewing in the side panel.
• Twirl – This application also runs on Adobe Air, but is a compact version, taking up much less room on your monitor.
• Twitter RSS feed – Keep up with Twitter updates by subscribing to Twitter via RSS Feed. You can subscribe to any Twitter user or even track your own feed.

Just go to the users page and click on the RSS feed at the bottom left hand side of their page. Note: You do not have to follow them, to get their feed.

Closing

Now that you are easily recognizable, linked to your network connections, promoted your account so others can locate you easily, you are ready to begin engaging with your community.

You can communicate in real-time, share information, get help to questions and build stronger relationships.

Writing this post was a great re-check of myself, soon realizing I had been a bit lax in following my own advice. I found a few of my avatar photos were not consistent, my landing page needs work and I will consider a new style of business cards with room for my Twitter address, or at minimum a Twitter Symbol.

People are creative, with creative ideas, what are yours? How do you promote yourself on Twitter? How do you manage your Twitter steam? What tools and tricks work best for you?

Does anyone have the perfect background size for all monitors? I tested 15” to 23”, but there must be an overall method that fits all? No?

Look forward to hearing your tips and tricks!

Related articles:

• Twitter – How Do You Manage the Noise?
• Brands Using Twitter

Anyone who knows me or engages with me on Twitter, soon realizes I believe in the power of Twitter.  It has become one of my favorite daily social networking tools.  A surprise considering I started with the question “what is a twitter”.

No morning paper for me anymore, just coffee, blogs and my Twitter peeps, for the first hours each day.  Topics change by the minute as information is spread through Twitterville.  Over the past few weeks, I have noticed an increase in brand discussion, the leading question, what brands are on Twitter?

The blog Fluent Simplicity dedicates an entire page titled “Twitter Brand Index”, listing the brands by category. It is the most detailed list I have seen thus far and the author includes details on how to add your brand to their index.

New brands seem to be popping up very quickly, everyone wanting to test out this new form of marketing.  Are companies just jumping in or do they have a well thought-out plan? Do they have policies and guidelines? Do they have a plan of things they want to achieve?

Yesterday, I came across a post by David Armano, titled “Guidelines for Brands Using Twitter”.  He is providing a few suggestions for brand managers, agencies and brand employees wanting to engage in the Twitter community.

Some simple and sound advice:

• Be Generous
• Be Transparent
• Provide Value
• Listen, Before Talking
• Context, Context, Context

David Armano goes into depth in each category and provides some examples of companies using Twitter to brand and engage with the Twitter community.

Please read his full article “Guidelines for Brands Using Twitter”, as well as the Twitter Brand Index by Fluent Simplicity.

If you are not already, follow one of your favorite brands; share your thoughts, suggestions and other tips you would like to see a brand use to engage with you on Twitter.  Do you have a good example of Brand interaction on Twitter, we would like to hear about that too? Let us know which brands you now follow and why? Is there any brand that should not be on Twitter, why?

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