How to Engage on Local Tweets
This article will show you how to engage in one specific tweet category called ‘Local Tweets’.It is part of our series of 8 articles 'how to engage on Twitter covering the following 8 categories of tweets: Opinion, Emotion, Authored Content, List, Local News, Endorsement, Question & Request, Event.
As you try to build relations with new people, you may notice that they sometimes tweet about local matters. Local matters are great opportunities to engage with people on a personal level because they’re something you share with them by nature. Local tweets generally span the following facets:
Where: A state, town, neighborhood or a local landmark (park, museum, restaurant, church…)
What: The content can be either personal, community or business. Personal relates to a real-life experience of the person tweeting. For example, a tweet about a local favorite restaurant is personal. Community relates to a specific general place (likely state or city) and usually, the person is tweeting content from a third-party source. For example, a tweet ranking the quality of life in a city amongst other cities is community. Business relates to local business news. For example, a tweet about the creation of a new headquarters in Boston is business.
Here are the different tactics to engage on a local tweet.
1) A tweet about a personal and local experience
Of course, you have the option to simply Like and RT if you feel it’s relevant. It helps the person to spread the news that they felt was worth sharing. But, because it’s personal, you can also do some mirroring if appropriate. Mirroring is the behavior in which one imitates another. Mirroring can establish rapport with the individual who is being mirrored.Hence, you can reply to a local experience by sharing your own similar experience; For example, if the tweet is about a neighborhood you’re familiar with, you can add your own experience if you live/work/visit there. If it’s about the person’s favorite restaurant, respond by thanking them for the tip (or share your own experience if you’ve been there) and sharing back one of your favorite restaurants.
2) A general tweet about a place
At a minimum, you should Like and RT again for the same reason indicated above. If you have additional data points or facts that are relevant to the content of the tweet, you could add them through a reply, which will truly acknowledge your interest in the person’s tweet. For example, if a person tweets about the innovation ranking of cities in the US, where Boston (for example) is number 2, you may reply something like "Oh, that’s probably why company XYZ established their new lab there!". You could also do some research online to find more relevant data points and facts if the topic/location is particularly interesting to you.