What is a Twitter list and why should I make one?

What is Formulists and Formulytics?

How can I find new customers on Twitter? 

Some of these questions go back to Twitter basics, all are very important to ask.  To help users and others get quick and clear answers to these questions and more, we have prepared a “how to” and explanation guide on our site to address a number of them. Check it out and let us know what you think.  And if you have you have more questions, just ask!

Tweep Cloud of Vancouverites following at least 5 of 8 food truck accounts

In addition to organizing the people you follow with Formulists, you can also quickly (and easily) sort and filter through the people that anyone else is following or has following them.  This can be useful for anyone looking to nab some suggestions of who to follow from friends, someone they admire or even competitors.  

As one example of how you can use this, Vancouver is starting to get all sorts of new food trucks. So for a newbie food truck (or even a veteran one) looking for Vancouver people to start following, engaging and turning into customers, it can be helpful to figure out which Vancouver people are already following the local competitors.  

A quick search in google led me to a few Twitter accounts of food trucks (or food truck related accounts) in Vancouver: @reupbbq, @DragonTruck, @offthetacowagon, @ComaFoodTruck, @StreetFoodApp (not a food truck but anyone following this account is likely interested in food trucks ;), @CartelTaco, @EatEli and @TheKaboomBox.  

Using Formulists “custom-lists” (under the ‘customize existing lists’ category) I can then add the followers of these eight accounts together and choose to make a list of any Vancouver people who are following at least five of these eight food truck accounts. The idea here is that if you are a Vancouverite following five food trucks on Twitter you’re probably someone that my little new food truck should get to know :). To make sure you keep only people that are following at least five out of the eight trucks, raise the number of “minimum list appearances” from its default value or 1 to 5.

Then filter for location (“Vancouver”), bio words (“foodie”, “blogger”) or number/ratio of followers:

Finally, if you make your list public, make sure you give it a friendly name and description:

Then, create your list!

Your list will appear right on your Twitter homepage for you to easily access and focus on the people on it, but you can also check out the list information and tweepcloud on Formulists.com to see how the people that made it on the list rank.  The “people in the list” tab and tweepcloud are both ways to see some of the top people worth focusing on in that list.  Specifically, people listed high on the “people in the list” tab, or bigger avatars in the Tweep Cloud, are people that are following all eight of the accounts and thus likely some of the bigger Vancouver food trucks fans.  

For those who would like to try Formulists out as a way to grow their Twitter network and discover new and relevant people, there are a few ways you can do it.  

Formulists’ “Expand Your Network” lists each look at one of three different ways we are connected to each other on Twitter- lists, @ replies and follows- to help you find and connect with the people most relevant to what you’re looking for.   Depending on whether you are looking for “like-minded” people, new people to socialize and network with, or the hottest influencers in your Twittersphere, a different Formulists list will be the most appropriate to use:

1. Looking for “like-minded” people (ie: others with your interests, potential competitors if you are a business, etc)

The first two “Expand Your Network” lists use the lists you and others are mutually in together, to help you discover people that are often grouped into the same list category (whether it be for interest in a topic, a city you both live in or some other category).  These people are worth a look because the same set of people are grouping you in the same sets of categories. As an example, here is the TweepCloud of the twenty people most mutually listed with @thecrepestruck, a food truck in New York specializing in- you guessed it- crepes. 

A TweepCloud for a Formulist of “people like @thecrepestruck”. @thecrepestruck is the largest twitter avatar in the cloud and others are ranked by size depending on how many lists they share with @thecrepestruck. 

As you can see, almost all the accounts that were placed in this list are other food trucks in the New York area (aka: likely competitors of @thecrepestruck).  

If you want to hone in on specifically locals that are often listed with you or certain types of people that are, you can filter for both bio and location under “Profile Filter Options”

2. Looking to meet new friendly people in your city or in the Twittersphere in general (ie: sociable locals your friends talk to a lot, etc)

The second of the “Expand Your Network” lists is designed specifically for those that are social on Twitter and are looking to meet new people that are in fact already at the periphery of their social network.  Many of you have probably already had the experience on Twitter where you discovered someone new and interesting because one or more friends of yours was frequently interacting with them.  This list, “Who-My-Friends-Talk-To” makes it simple and easy to see a whole bunch of those types of people in one place where you can start engaging and getting to know them.

You can keep the default form of this list, but for those that are specifically looking to network locally I highly recommend tweaking the list for location and number of friends a person on the list should have interacted with.  

3. Looking for popular, influential people and “hot reads” (ie: most read by the people you choose to follow)

If you are on Twitter to read tweets or you are just looking for new and influential people to get in touch with, then the last of Formulists’ “Expand Your Network” lists, “Fave-Follows”, is a great way to do this.  The “Fave-Follows” list looks at all the people you follow and then finds only the top people that those people follow.  So basically, this is a great list for discovering the “hubs” and most influential and most read among the people that you are following.  

Since, often users are looking for people that are “influential” for a certain topic or area of interest, we recommend adding bio filter words in the “Profile Filter Options” to help you pinpoint just the types of people you’re looking for.  For instance, here is a “Fave-Follows” TweepCloud for a list I made filtering for those who have “dad” or “mom” or “kids” in their bio- aka: Hot Tamale Moms and Dads on Twitter

A “Fave-Follows” list TweepCloud filtering for bios that have “mom” or “dad” or “kids” in them.  A group of really influential moms and dads on Twitter. Those that are bigger “hubs” are shown as larger in the cloud.