Despite how ubiquitous social media is these days, not everyone uses it. Apps like Twitter can take a lot of time and energy out of your day, getting in the way of the things you would rather work on.

This is especially true for industrious types who always have a project or two stewing in the background. For people like this, investing in social media can feel like a distraction, even if it can boost your marketing in the long run.

So is Twitter worth investing your time?

While there are growing concerns about misinformation and negative mental health aspects associated with social media, it all comes down to how you use the platform. The best thing about creating a Twitter account for yourself or your business is that it is yours to do with as you please.

By not creating an account, you miss out on the negative aspects of social media as well as all of the marketing potential of Twitter. By carefully investing time on Twitter, however, you can avoid the pitfalls while still gaining more Twitter followers and growing your business.

Below, we’ve outlined 11 ways to quickly grow your Twitter followers without having to buy Twitter followers or engage with fake accounts. These Twitter marketing techniques will help you create an online presence that can boost sales and gain recognition without diving into the dark side of social media or purchasing fake followers.

Let’s start things off with a simple and easy change you can make to your Twitter account (and other social media platforms) and grow your follower count.

1. Optimize your Twitter profile

Optimizing your profile is the first step you should take when preparing to grow your following. When people follow links to your Twitter account, click on your username, or visit your profile to learn more about you, they’ll view your profile.

It’s also where people visit to view your tweets, replies, and retweets chronologically. In other words, when someone is getting ready to follow your Twitter account, your profile is a deciding factor in whether or not they click the Follow button.

Fortunately, optimizing your Twitter profile is pretty simple. Just find a profile pic of yourself that matches your brand, add a cover photo with a snappy quote or brand slogan, and add a brief bio that describes yourself in one sentence and includes relevant links, such as a link to your website.

2. Follow influential people with similar interests

The second step, and arguably the most important step, in growing a Twitter following is to start following other accounts. Anyone who has used social media for longer than a few weeks has probably noticed the trend that people are much more likely to follow you if you follow them first. This strategy is so battle-tested that you’ll often come across accounts with very few tweets and a thousand followers simply because they’ve followed 2,000 other users.

While we don’t necessarily recommend doing this (it’s a little transparent and not likely to garner meaningful engagement), the results don’t lie. The best way to figure out who to follow is to simply use the app. Look for accounts you’re interested in, follow people who engage with your content, follow influencers in your niche, follow their active followers, etc.

3. Tweet consistently (every day)

If you’re not used to being active on social media, tweeting and retweeting every day can feel exhausting, but it’s absolutely necessary!

Countless studies have shown that the accounts that grow the fastest online are the ones that post regularly. This is so overwhelmingly the case that it’s rapidly changed the way media is created and consumed, from movies to shows to music.

Again, this isn’t as hard as it may sound, thanks to apps that allow you to schedule your social media posts. By using these tools, you can spend an hour every weekend scheduling your tweets for the week. This way, you can still tweet spontaneously when inspiration strikes, but you also have a series of tweets that will be posted even if you don’t open Twitter for several days.

4. Tweet and retweet at the right times

The time of day that you post is important for a few key reasons, but one reigns above all — there are peak times when Twitter users are most active.

There’s a bit of science to this. Users in the same country or timezone likely wake up around the same time, work at similar times, eat at similar times, etc. For this reason, it’s possible to pull trends from Twitter and find out when your tweets will be exposed to the most active users.

In general, the best time to post is 9 am every day of the week, with Wednesday and Friday being the best. Unsurprisingly, 10 am to 4 pm are the worst times to post on any day, given that these are the hours people spend at work, school, or running errands.

5. Post visual content like photos and videos

Another trend in social media growth hacking is using visual content as much as you can. Videos and photos get the most engagement on any social media platform, making them a powerful tool to grow your profile.

This is as true of Twitter as it is of any other platform, even though Twitter started as a text-centric platform. Adding photos and videos to your tweets makes them more eye-catching and bigger on other users’ screens. So, as long as it’s relevant to what you’re tweeting, try to include photos every chance you get.

6. Share inspirational quotes to gain free Twitter followers

People love inspirational quotes! They always have and likely always will. Thanks to social media, it’s become easier than ever to share or create catchy quotes that others will love.

The great thing about quotes is that they are relevant to just about every type of Twitter account out there. If you’re an artist, you can share quotes about art or make pieces based on a specific quote. Comic artists can create inspirational comics. Photographers can share quotes overlaid on beautiful photography.

Even businesses can get in on the inspirational action. Posting inspiring quotes that are relevant to holidays or current events is a great way to make your business more personable and can build on your brand’s values.

7. Take advantage of Twitter threads

Twitter added a handy feature in 2017 called threads that allows you to more easily post long-form content on the site. Twitter threads are simply tweets that you link together so they can be read in sequence or separately. It’s Twitter’s way of bending its character limit.

These threads are also known as “tweetstorms” and are great for creating excitement and increasing the chance of engagement from other users. You can use these to tell stories, share the story behind new products, or explain updates to your followers.

8. Seek out new followers in your niche

Now that you have a solid toolkit of Twitter tips at your disposal, it’s time to figure out where to target your efforts. You can gain some followers by blindly using polls, threads, and following other users, but you’re unlikely to see growth that matches the level of effort you’re investing in the platform.

Finding the “right” followers is all about knowing who is most interested in the social media content you hope to share. Identify what your Twitter brand is, the type of content you’ll share, and then think about who is on the other side of your tweets, liking and retweeting them.

After you have a solid mental image of who you want to make up your following list, start targeting those users on Twitter. Go to the accounts they’re likely to follow, use the relevant hashtags you think they’re using, and concentrate your efforts on grabbing their attention. Twitter also suggests accounts and surfaces relevant tweets on your Twitter feed, so you might not even have to look that hard.

9. Use SEO where you can

Something that businesses are great at implementing throughout their website but are less great at implementing in social media is SEO. SEO, or search engine optimization, is what makes your content searchable. The better your SEO, the easier it is to find on Google.

Though businesses and bloggers actively engage in SEO constantly on their website, few realize that SEO is just as important on social media. Your username, display name, bio, number of followers, and tweets all play a role in how searchable your account is, both on and off of Twitter.

To grow Twitter followers, you need as many eyes on your Twitter account as possible, so it’s not hard to see why implementing SEO into your account would be beneficial.

10. Promote your Twitter account everywhere

Part of improving your SEO is making your Twitter account as visible as possible. If people don’t know you have a Twitter account how can they follow it?

To do this, you’ll need to share your Twitter account every chance you have. This includes putting links in your profile on your website, podcast, YouTube channel, Facebook page, Instagram, and any other social media accounts you have. Additionally, try to use the same username or handle on all of these platforms to make it easier for others to find your Twitter account.

By doing this, you’re breaking your Twitter bubble. Now you can accrue followers and interest outside of Twitter interactions. You won’t rely on snappy tweets and strategic followings alone to build up your Twitter followers, which will allow you to grow much faster.

11. Branch out

And finally, building off of the advice we just gave in the last tip, branch out from Twitter. Twitter is of course a great way to build Twitter followers, but it is far from the only way.

Branching out by launching a blog, starting a podcast, or uploading to a YouTube channel will provide you with synergy. As each of these accounts grows independently, they will also funnel growth to the others, creating a cycle of growth among all of your accounts.

Additionally, adding in traditional forms of engagement like weekly newsletters will also stimulate growth in your Twitter followers. Doing things outside of Twitter will inevitably bring traffic back to your Twitter account - so long as you are linking back to your Twitter account everywhere you can.

How quickly can you reach 10,000 free Twitter followers?

Growing a social media account is not easy, but it’s not impossible. By utilizing these tips, you can boost the growth of your Twitter following, making it an excellent avenue for marketing and building your brand.

For more website, marketing, and social media tips for small businesses, you can check out the rest of the B12 Resource Center for more tips and advice. And be sure to follow B12 on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.