Twitter Message Design

Wisdom from Web Guru Jakob Nielsen re optimal Twitter message design

1. Don't start with word "Announcing" -- "Of course it's an announcement — otherwise I wouldn't be posting it..."
2. "Remember that users tend to read only the first few characters as they scan down a list. Make them count."
3. "Frontload attractive keywords to make the message more scannable."
4. "Users have become somewhat hardened against event promotions" ... make users "feel like they're getting concrete and useful info."
5. Twitter time passes 10 times faster than email time. "One of the big downsides of stream-based communication compared to email newsletters is the highly ephemeral nature of the postings: Once they scroll off the first screen, they're essentially 6 feet under. A look at clickthrough statistics for links posted to Twitter vs. those circulated in email newsletters shows ... lots of clicks the first few minutes, and then almost none. In contrast, email continues to generate clicks for days as people work their way through their inboxes.