Twitter Keyboard Shortcuts that can Improve Nonprofit Supporter Engagement Efficiency

As part of our Social Media series for nonprofit fundraising,  I recently wrote that Twitter maintained 3rd place in the American market share for March 2013 amongst all social media platforms. Despite a low 1.72% share Twitter is a very popular network that maintains a fairly active community of users which many nonprofits are using to increase its engagement opportunities. In the past I have written about various user suggestions to optimize the Twitter experience including Twitter setup tips, management tools to measure analytics and understanding key Twitter metrics. Although the platform is incredibly user friendly navigating from one section to another and having to click various parts of the screen can be cumbersome. I am huge fan of keyboard shortcuts and always prefer using a shortcut over my mouse so I was incredibly excited when I stumbledupon an article outlining the various keyboard shortcut options that Twitter had that I never knew existed.

Although there are 25 shortcuts in total, I found that there are quite a few that can be very beneficial for time efficiency and maximizing productivity. Below are the shortcuts which Twitter has grouped into three types and for each type I have separated them into two sections – most and least used, as it’s probably better to commit shortcuts that are more often used to memory.

ACTIONS

Most Used – Tweeting, communicating with and interacting with others should really be the main function of any Twitter initiatives. These five action shortcuts make it incredibly easy to interact and keep up with the conversation.

• N – New Tweet
• F – Favorite
• R – Reply
• T – Retweet
• M –Direct Message

Least Used – Generally reading the actual tweets that are displayed in your timelines should be sufficient to capture the message of the tweet and seldom is opening a tweet required. The need to block a user is also not a very common action but it may happen at times. These are actions that require some additional thought that adding a click of the mouse doesn’t allow but is just as efficient.

• Enter – Open Tweet Details
• L – Close Open Tweets
• B – Block User
• U – Unblock User

NAVIGATION

Most Used – All these navigation shortcut keys are beneficial as it helps you maneuver through the platform fairly easily.

• J – Next Tweet
• K – Previous Tweet
• Space Bar – Page Down
• / (forward slash) – Search
• . (period) – Load New Tweets

TIMELINES

Most Used – Although two keys, it’s easy to remember that the first one is always G for ‘go-to’ and the second (with one exception) is the first initial of the type of timeline you want displayed.

• GH – Home
• GC – Connect
• GD – Discover
• GR – Mentions
• GF – Favorites
• GL – Lists
• GM – Messages
• GU – Go to User

Least Used – Unless you are constantly making adjustments to your profile and settings, these shortcuts are not likely to save very much time. Though I understand the benefits of the Activity timeline, I don’t find it as useful as I’m more interested in what is being said rather than who people are following and what they are “liking” as it lists all your connections with no filters.

• GA – Activity
• GP – Profile
• GS – Settings

It may seem like quite a bit to take in, but generally starting with a few short cuts at a time will help you learn them quickly. The best shortcut overall however is ? (question mark) as it immediately opens the ‘Shortcut Menu’ on the screen for you.

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Miratel Solutions is a Toronto call centre, eBusiness, and letter shop mail house specializing in professional fundraising services including telephone fundraising, online fundraising, lottery services, donation caging, donation processing and other donor management services. We are committed to our CSR business values in all contact centre services and mail house operations and advancing the missions of the nonprofits we proudly serve.