How to Find Friends on Twitter: A Guide to Making Connections

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Making friends on social media can seem overwhelming, but X (formerly Twitter) is a great place for you to start. With all the different conversations and topics popping up, you’ll be able to find people who share your interests and are down to connect. Read on for our guide on engaging with X to make friends and navigating X’s features to find like-minded people to follow.

Method 1
Method 1 of 2:

Making New Friends through X’s Engagement

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  1. Click the silhouette icon and hit “edit profile.” Upload a profile picture or avatar that represents you or the content you’d like to post. Add a brief bio that will tell potential friends what you do, who you are, and maybe even where you’re from. [1] Check out these sample bios:
    • Talk about your work and interests: “Stand up comic by night. Sit down office worker by day. Austin TX.”
    • List out a few of your defining characteristics: “Food blogger, ethical-sourcing specialist, mom to two werewolves, allergic to mushrooms.”
    • Keep it simple and professional: “Journalist/Traveler. MFA. Writes for The News Source. Former Fulbright Scholar.”
  2. Tweet about your interests so other people can find you. Ask “how can I add value?” to the conversation. When you’ve got a great tweet or piece of content, pin it to the top of your feed so users who come to check you out can see it. [2]
    • Add visuals to your tweets to increase their appeal. [3]
    • Post at least 3 times per day, but aim for quality over quantity. [4]
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  3. [5] Interact with posts both by people you’d like to befriend and posts by celebrities or influencers who are part of a community you like. By engaging with content you like, X's algorithm will start to expose you to more of it (and in turn, expose you to potential friends). [6] Here’s a strategy for engaging with a post from a potential friend that goes a step beyond just retweeting: [7]
    • Scroll through their feed and find a tweet about something they like or their off-platform content (like a personal blog).
    • Grab a quote from something they’ve mentioned or copy the URL of the site.
    • Tweet the quote or URL and mention the person (by using @ and their username) and say “thanks!”
  4. As soon as someone mentions you or your favorite celebrity posts, reply to their post. That way the person who posted will see you’re engaging with their material. As a bonus, your post will get more views and traffic since it’ll kick off the discussion. [8]
  5. Ask a question or give a compliment to start a conversation. [9] To send a DM, click on the mail icon and click “new message.” Then, fill in the handle for the user you’re trying to reach. [10] Check out these sample DMs: [11]
    • “Thanks for sharing that fan art. You really captured the essence of the series. How’d you come up with that idea?”
    • “Loved that article on gratitude. Where do you find stuff like that?”
  6. Participate when a business or celebrity you like hosts an X chat. X chats occur at a specific time and use a designated hashtag so participants can keep up with the conversation. To join in, write out a tweet and include the hashtag the company/celebrity tells you to use. As the conversation flows, look out for users who make funny or interesting points that capture your attention. Then, either follow them or reply to let them know you like their content.
  7. Then, join Facebook or LinkedIn groups that are relevant to content you like and topics you’re interested in. People will be able to follow you as well as the original platform. [12]
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Method 2
Method 2 of 2:

Finding People to Follow

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  1. Click this tab on your profile page or home timeline. While the tab will often start with celebrities, X will keep adjusting follow recommendations based on who you choose to follow. As an extension of this feature, X will email you suggestions of who to follow. [13] Take a look at their profiles and posts to see if you might be interested in befriending them!
  2. This method lets you find common ground through the people you follow. Pick an influencer or friend and click on their profile. Then click “Followers” or “Following” to see who else they’re connected to. Scroll through and follow bios that look interesting to you. [14]
  3. Scrolling through “For You” content allows you to find people with similar interests. Hit the icon shaped like a hashtag to access the Explore tab. Scroll through the “For You” posts or category posts (like trending, news, sports, and entertainment) to find interesting people you’d like to follow. As you engage with the content and other users more, X will tailor the Explore page to your interests.
  4. Type a hashtag related to your interests into the Explore tab search bar. Using a hashtag instead of a general topic tab enables you to look for people who are talking about really niche interests, keywords, or timely/trending topics. Include hashtags in your posts so that other people searching for that topic can find what you’re saying. [15] Try not to use more than 2 hashtags per tweet, and remember hashtags can’t include spaces. [16]
    • Type a topic like “#indiemusic” or “#collegebasketball” into the search bar at the top of the Explore page.
    • Click a hashtag on a tweet to explore other tweets with that hashtag.
    • Type a hashtag for an upcoming event to find other people who might be going, too.
  5. Lists allow you to subscribe to a set of people in order to see those posts together in your feed without having to follow all of them. [17] Find Lists of interesting people through the “Discover new lists” prompt or check out other people’s Lists in their profile. [18]
  6. Adding your address book lets you see what people you know are tweeting. If you’re on a computer, from X’s home page, click “More,” then click “Settings and privacy.” If you’re using the app, click your profile icon and then “Settings and privacy.” Next, go to “Privacy and safety.” Find the “Discoverability” option and follow the prompts to let X access your contacts.
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Expert Q&A

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  • Question
    How do you gain popularity on Twitter?
    Melissa Rodriguez
    Marketing & Advertising Specialist
    Melissa Rodriguez is a Marketing and Advertising Specialist and the Founder of Social Media Relations out of Los Angeles, California. With over 5 years of experience, she specializes in branding, content production, social media marketing, and public relations. Melissa holds BS degrees in Global Perspectives and Corporate Finance and Accounting from Bentley University.
    Melissa Rodriguez
    Marketing & Advertising Specialist
    Expert Answer
    Twitter enjoys great replies, retweets, and great sarcastic tweets. To increase your popularity on Twitter, you could take somebody who has a very high profile tweet and provide a very clever retweet or response reply to them, that could easily go viral, because everybody's going to like it, comment on it and continue the conversation.
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      References

      1. ↑ https://www.wired.com/story/how-to-setup-twitter-search-hashtag-and-login-help/
      2. ↑ https://www.searchenginejournal.com/get-social-media-followers/208397/
      3. ↑ https://hbr.org/2014/12/the-art-of-aggressive-social-sharing
      4. ↑ https://hbr.org/2014/12/the-art-of-aggressive-social-sharing
      5. ↑ Melissa Rodriguez. Marketing & Advertising Specialist. Expert Interview. 23 April 2021.
      6. ↑ https://hbr.org/2021/04/how-to-make-friends-on-the-internet
      7. ↑ https://www.profitablesocialmedia.com/a-better-approach-to-connecting-on-twitter/
      8. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IHKk9CzY6iU&t=94s
      9. ↑ Melissa Rodriguez. Marketing & Advertising Specialist. Expert Interview. 23 April 2021.
      1. ↑ https://help.twitter.com/en/using-twitter/direct-messages
      2. ↑ https://hbr.org/2021/04/how-to-make-friends-on-the-internet
      3. ↑ https://www.searchenginejournal.com/get-social-media-followers/208397/
      4. ↑ https://help.twitter.com/en/using-twitter/twitter-search-people
      5. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UzXGwpkaVPw&t=42s
      6. ↑ Melissa Rodriguez. Marketing & Advertising Specialist. Expert Interview. 23 April 2021.
      7. ↑ https://help.twitter.com/en/using-twitter/how-to-use-hashtags
      8. ↑ https://help.twitter.com/en/using-twitter/twitter-lists
      9. ↑ https://www.searchenginejournal.com/get-social-media-followers/208397/

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