How To Make a Twitter Moment That Stands Out

Stories, moments, threads. All this social media jargon can be hard to get your head around. Not to mention the fact it’s always changing!But don’t fear, Edgar is here to make it clear! This time we are talking about how to make a Twitter Moment.What is a Moment on Twitter? How on earth do you create a Twitter Moment? And what are Twitter’s tips for creating the most eye-catching, share-worthy Moments you possibly can?Need a quick refresher on Twitter Moments?(Maybe got a question or two you’ve always been afraid to ask?)Not to worry - here’s a quick recap of what exactly this feature IS.

What is Twitter Moments?

Twitter Moments is a tool that allows you to curate slideshows (called “Moments”) using tweets from different users. Anyone viewing that Moment can quickly and easily scroll through. Moments are primarily used for telling stories, sharing news, or creating a collection of favorited Tweets.Twitter makes these slideshows available in the Moments tab, categorized by topic so that it’s easy to find personally curated slideshows related to the news of the day that interests you the most:

How to Make a Twitter Moment

Go to Twitter.com and select Moments by clicking ‘more’ on the navigation bar on the left of your homepage.You’ll see a screen like this:

Keep in mind that you can only create Moments on desktop and can no longer create them using the Twitter mobile apps.

How to Create a Twitter Moment

• Click on 'create' to start creating a new Moment
• Choose a title and write a brief description
• Import Tweets to use in your Moment (Tweets you’ve liked/Tweets from people you follow)
• You can use the search bar in ‘Add Tweets’ to find the ones you want to include
• Add your cover image, you can preview to see the size
• Once you’re done, click publish in the top right corne
• Choose whether you want your Moment to be private, public or unlisted

Want to create Moments that wow your followers? Use these handy tips to make sure your Twitter Moments stand out:

1. Write a short headline to spark curiosity

Just like you would with a blog post, write out a few different headline options for each Twitter Moment. Whether it asks a question, teases a story, or promises new and useful information for a reader, an irresistible headline is just as important as the tweets you’ve chosen for your Moment!

Don’t worry about giving away the whole story in your headline, though, because there’s another important thing for you to write just underneath.

2. Give people a taste of what to expect by summing up the contents of your Moment in the description

The cover photo of your Moment gives you room for not only a headline, but a description of the story your Moment is going to tell.In other types of writing, giving away too many details early on can be counterproductive - or at least merit the courtesy of a decent spoiler warning.In a Twitter Moment, though, your description should give a clear picture of what to expect. Think of the description as a summary, whereas the tweets in the Moment itself give a more detailed explanation with links, reactions, and insights from different sources.

There’s one more thing to think about when you’re perfecting your Twitter Moment’s cover:

3. Choose an eye-catching cover photo

Twitter describes the cover photo of a Moment like the cover of a book - and while you’re technically not supposed to judge a book by its cover, you know everyone does it anyway. (Which is why all of our books have fire-breathing dragons on the front.)Twitter Moments allows you to either choose an image from one of the tweets in your Moment or to upload one of your own, and you can even use gifs - so find something that’ll represent the tone and message of your Moment!Once you have the perfect cover, though, there’s the actual content of your Twitter Moment to think about - and Twitter has a few tips there, too.

4. Keep it short and sweet with plenty of variety

Twitter Moments are meant to be consumed pretty quickly - a few swipes of the thumb, and you’re done - so try to keep the number of tweets in yours to around ten.In some cases, it may make sense for all of the tweets in a Moment to be from the same person - if you’re creating a Moment to link together the updates in a single user’s tweetstorm, for example, or if you want to collect a single user’s best tweets on a single topic.Other times, though, Twitter recommends including different voices within a single Moment, so it that it represents a variety of perspectives.Because Moments supports multimedia like images, gifs, videos, and Vines, incorporate different types of tweets throughout a single Moment, too, to better engage your readers.

Tweets like these make it easier to keep your readers’ attention until the end of your Moment - and since tweets with gifs can get as much as 6x the engagement of tweets with text alone, they can also make your Moments all the more interactive.

What kind of Moments will you make?

SO, now you know how to use Twitter Moments, it’s time to get creative! Where will you start?With regular roundups of the best tweets from leaders in your industry?Insightful reactions to the latest news?Links to the cutest animal videos you've seen all week?If you’ve published any Moments of your own, share a link in the comments below!