What is your charity's name and mission?
The National Trust @NationalTrust - we're a conservation charity, protecting historic houses, gardens, woods, coast and countryside - and opening them for the public to enjoy.
How long have you been using Twitter and whose idea was it?
We joined in November 2008, and it was one of our content managers on the digital media team who first started it up.
What have you enjoyed so far whilst using Twitter?
I love the "instant reward" nature of Twitter. It takes so little time to post a tweet, but then when people start replying, retweeting and clicking on your links it's great. I also love it when our posts trigger conversations or debates - for example, when we ask questions such as where people like best to go on holiday in the UK, and we get loads of responses. Twitter enables the National Trust to show a more human and fun side, and is great for engaging with people.
It's also interesting to learn what kind of information people actually want, and to adapt your messages accordingly. We post a mixture of news stories, links to our own website, links to other websites on topics that relate to our own work and interests, and the odd bit of triviality and fun that doesn't necessarily relate to our own work at all. People love to talk about things that are topical, or completely trivial - and it helps to show that we're human!
Have there been any incidents of followers doing something wonderful for you?
Lots of little things that give you a warm and fuzzy feeling - I love it when I recommend a place to visit and then people people tell us they've taken up the recommendation and had a great day out. Lots of people share photos with us on Twitter from their National Trust days out, or tell us things like when they've made a recipe we've tweeted for their family and it's gone down a storm at Sunday lunch.
What has been your biggest challenge to date?
I haven't really had any major challenges with Twitter - it's a pretty easy to use tool, doesn't take up much time, and most people within the organisation and outside of it have been supportive. Twitter fits well with the National Trust's strategy of deepening engagement with people, so it's been supported from a high level within the organisation, which helps a lot.
However, because Twitter is such an immediate medium of communication where you act quite spontaneously, I do have a fear of tweeting something that's deemed inappropriate or accidentally breaking an embargo. But that's the risk of such a spontaneous medium, and the upside is that Twitter is such a fast-moving place that if you do make a mistake, people generally move on to the next piece of news within a few minutes.
Do you have a Twitter tip for other charities?
It's a two-way conversation - don't just use it to direct messages out, but also respond to people personally and remember to retweet or share other people's information, not just your own. Be topical and relevant to what's going on in the outside world, and track your links using a site like http://bit.ly or your own analytics package (via a campaign code on the end of the URLs), to help measure how many people are clicking on the links you post (and use this to show the value of spending time on Twitter to others in your organisation).
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