20 Surefire Ways To Get More Retweets on Twitter

By Sourav Saha, Published November 14, 2014

Getting more retweets is a great way to extend your reach and influence on the web.

Retweets may turn into gaining more followers, more visitors to your links, and more exposure for your brand.

Getting more and more of retweets is a mixture of art and science.

Now if you want to maximize your retweet potential your the best way is to have a catchy headline, clean English, and cool content to drive your tweet home.

In this article I’ll share top 20 tips to help you get more retweets.

Try these twitter tips out for yourself and watch as your tweets are retweeted far and wide!

1. Great Content

How to get more retweets on Twitter starts with posting messages and content that will be of interest to your followers and have a high probability of being retweeted. It is pretty simple; people retweet info they find interesting. Find out what your niche market is interested in and then give it to them.

2. Retweet Button

Place a retweet button on your website or blog to give your readers an option to retweet it if they find it interesting enough to share it with others. Digg Digg is a great WordPress plugin for your blog and it makes it very easy for your visitors to share your post on Twitter and other social networks with one click. As this scrolls along with your post so your visitors see it and act on it.

3. Hashtags And The @

You can also use the @ sign to tag people in your network so that they would be notified of your new post. For example; @username I appreciate the info! A hashtag may be a keyword that is utilized often. You can even start your own hashtag! Using these two items increases the chances of your message gaining attention and to possibly get retweeted. Some people overuse hashtags so use them sparingly. Hashtags help others identify quality content quickly; again increasing your chances of obtaining more followers. Recent twitter study shows hashtags receive a 16% boost in retweets.

4. Ask For The Retweet

You can also simply ask your followers to retweet. Most people are willing to do favors by retweeting if they are asked to do it.

A few known effective call-for-action phrases for retweets are:

Please retweet
Pls RT
RT

5. Be A Retweeter Yourself

You can start by retweeting your followers content. Many of them will reciprocate by retweeting your content as well. If you always look to give more to others than you expect in return, the return is always greater in the end.

Like everything in life, what goes around comes around. Chris Brogan practices a 15:1 ratio when it comes to retweets — for every self-promotional tweet, he will help promote at least 15 tweets for his followers.

6. Tweet At The Right Time

Casting your tweets at the right time is perhaps the most important factor of all. After all, there is no point pushing out tweets when none of your followers are tuned in, right? According to Dan Zarrella’s The Science of Retweets, 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. EST is the best time to ask for a retweet.

But wait! There is no one-size-fits–all solution for this. Your followers may not be living in the same time zone as Zarrella’s study samples. That’s when Tweriod comes in handy.

7. Reaching Other Time Zones

If you would like to reach people in different time zones, you can schedule some of your posts to be posted while you are away or sleeping. This is a great way to broaden your reach and have an opportunity for retweets in other areas of the world. You can schedule your retweets using SocialOomph or Twufer.com.

8. Show Appreciation

Do not forget to thank the followers who have retweeted your messages. People appreciate the recognition so posting a message thanking the people who have reposted your messages goes a long way in building the retweet relationship.

9. Short Tweets

Make your posts as short, but meaningful, as possible. Short messages are easier to post and the retweeter would be able to add some comments as well. A good rule of thumb is to keep your tweets to 120 characters leaving 20 characters for those who retweet you to add a comment. There are approximately 55 million tweets posted daily to Twitter. Your aim is to make your tweet as interesting as possible to those that follow you.

10. Don’t Flurry Tweet

Somtimes tweeters post multiple tweets in one fell swoop. They dump 10-15 tweets into their feed all at once. Whenever you do this, it makes it hard for people to concentrate on your post simultaneously. Additionally, some view this as spam when they see someone posting multiple tweets on the hour every hour. To maximize your retweet chances, space your tweets out.

11. Be Social

After all it is called “social media’ for a reason. Respond to direct messages, retweets and interact with others who share content that you find engaging. Building relationships is my ULTIMATE retweet tip.

12. Tweet Quotes

Quotes are good for retweets, especially if they strike a chord with your followers. Data shows quotes get a 19% boost in Retweets.

If you wish to build up your Twitter presence using quotes, try to dig up some great ones from the Internet. There are plenty of websites or blogs that collect series of quotes. And, it’s easy to find quotes using Google (just try “best quotes for [your topic]”).

13. Speak Your Audiences’ Language

Before you post a tweet, consider the terms and labels people are using.

Google Trends is handy when it comes to localizing your language. For example, the term “cookie law” is more frequently used to refer to the new law that came into force in the United Kingdom in 2011 instead of “cookie regulations” or “privacy law.” Hence, when you tweet about this incident, it’s best to use the phrase “cookie law” in order to resonate with your followers.

14. Use Retweetable Words

Dan Zarella’s study on over 30 millions retweets shows that the 20 most retweeted words are (in descending order):

you
twitter
please
retweet
post
blog
social
free
media
help
please retweet
great
social media
10
follow
how to
top
blog post
check out
new blog post

If you are trying to get more retweets, consider using these favorable words/phrases more often.

15. Avoid Least Retweetable Words

Here are the 20 least retweetable words according to Dan Zarrella’s report:

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

Notice any trend here? Most (if not all) of these words are common-use words for conversations or to describe mundane activities.

Tweets using these words are simply a big turn off for retweets — c’mon, no one is interested in a tweet about your bedding time or what you are listening to on Sound Cloud — unless of course, you are Justin Bieber.

16. Tweet Links

Based on data tweets with links tweet better than tweets without links. The reason for this may be largely due to the fact that tweets without links are often simple daily updates, which make no sense to retweet.

Do not misinterpret this data and think that tweets without links cannot retweet well. Some of my bolder tweets are on par, in terms of retweets, with tweets containing links to my most valuable content.

17. Tweet Images And Videos

People don’t really engage equally with every tweet that is sent out. Recent Twitter data shows tweets with images are 35% more likely to get retweeted than text-only tweets, and tweets with video links gets 28% more retweets.

But in this case different industries may find different results, and it’s always advisable to do your own testing to figure out what resonates best with your audience.

18. Rewrite And Repeat Your Best Tweets

If you worked hard on a blog post that you know deserves some attention don’t be afraid to tweet it out a few times.

When you repeat your tweet, mix it up. Don’t tweet the exact same tweet every time. Re-word your tweet and you will appeal to different people each time you tweet it.

There are now in excess of 100,000,000 tweets a day. It is harder than ever to get your tweets noticed these days, due to the sheer volume of tweets.

As long as you don’t spam, and add value, it’s fair game.

19. Trending Topics

Trending topics are a powerful way to get into a stream of tweets that as many as thousands of people are tweeting about at once, and this can help a clever tweet go viral fast.

By tweeting about a trending topic you give your tweet greater exposure than it typically will receive. Some people use this tactic on a regular basis and those who do so with success are often retweeted hundreds or thousands of times and can pick up several thousands of followers in the process.

20. Include @mentions To Those Referenced In Your Posts

Include the twitter user name of others in your blog post, and then send a shout out to them on twitter letting them know.

There is a good chance other people will retweet your post when they find out they are in the post you are sharing!

Bonus Tip: 21. Build Relationships With Social Media Influencers

If you can manage to build friendships with twitter giants you will benefit from their exposure when they talk to you, and if they retweet your tweets.

Some people with considerably fewer followers than me retweet my content all the time and when I notice this I often return the favour. Even though someone might have many fewer followers I still appreciate the help.

Last but not the least a superb infographic from Neil Patel of Quicksprout helps you to get more retweets in a visual way.