3 Reasons You Should Be Using Twitter Lists (And How To Get Started)

Twitter’s ‘Lists’ are a handy little feature that even some of the best and most popular Twitter users simply don’t make the most of. Simply put, they are a way of categorising Twitter accounts. When viewing the list, you’ll be able to see the tweets of anyone in the list - only people in the list. First I’ll review some of the benefits and then go into more detail about how to use Lists.

1. You’ll cut down clutter and save a lot of time.

As anyone with a pretty active account will agree, the number of people you follow can jump up pretty quickly. It’s not long before you’re often left flicking through a newsfeed full of tweets you just aren’t that interested in. What if you don’t want to unfollow anyone? You followed everyone for a reason, right?

Twitter lists let you jump immediately to what you’re interested in and what you want. Add a few of your favourite news sources into a Twitter list, and you’ll have a ‘News’ list to flick through on your daily commute. Like keeping up-to-date on what your old friends are up to? A ‘Friends’ list means you won’t have to spend time looking them all up individually.

2. Turn Twitter into a content farm.

This is almost a more advanced benefit of point one. Once you’ve been actively using Twitter long enough, you’ll notice that some accounts stand out to you above others. You may even develop some favourite accounts that you know always post great content.

Why not put them all into a list?

Keeping an active and interesting twitter account will be a much less daunting task if you have a do-to resource customised for all your needs. You can check this list regularly to make sure that you’ve got the most up-to-date and interesting content on your Twitter page. If they’re really great accounts, maybe you’ll even be able to use it to farm inspiration for your own content, or material for a different platform like a blog.

3. Track your competition; without having to follow them.

The best kept secret about Twitter lists is a simple and effective one. You don’t have to be following someone to add them into a list. What this effectively gives us is a quick and simple way to review the competition without them ever knowing.

So long as the list is kept private, they’ll never even know you’re looking. But beware; this feature means that anyone could easily be doing the same to you. Stay on top of your game, and always tweet to impress!

How to use them

The easiest way to access your Lists is by clicking the gear icon in the top-right of your Twitter screen:

When you click Lists, you will be directed to your Lists screen. This shows you all the lists you’ve currently got and the number of people in them. If the list name has a little padlock next to it, that means it’s private. You can also see other individuals’ lists that you’ve followed and lists that you’ve been added to by other people (if their list isn’t private.)

You won’t be informed you’re in someone’s list if it’s private. You can subscribe to the lists of other users by going onto their Twitter profile and clicking ‘More’, then ‘Lists’.

Next up is adding people to the list. Start off by searching for them with the bar in the top right. Once you’ve searched your term, click ‘People’ on the left. This isn’t essential; it just makes sure that your search results are only individual accounts rather than tweets and pictures too.

Click on the gear icon next to the ‘Follow’ button to bring up a drop-down menu. Click ‘Add or remove from lists’. This window will then appear:

Check the box that corresponds to the list you want the desired account added to, and it’s done. You can add an account to as many lists as you like. Once your List has some accounts in it, you can go back to your Lists menu and click on the one you want to view.

Et voilà! You've created your very own customised Twitter feed!

If you’re interested by this article but want to learn more, why not try one of our training courses? Contact Jack or call 01892 52013 for more information.