Where Do Twitter Trends Come From?

Have you ever wondered where Twitter trends come from, how they are started and how they get to be so popular? First and foremost, there are algorithms that determine what is trending and what is popular at any given time.

For businesses, it is very important to be aware of the trends of the day and to start their own trends when possible. A trend is started by one person creating a hashtag and then having a wide range of people also use it so it is picked up by the Twitter algorithms. Below are some ways that you can use these trends to the benefit of your business.

The Origins of a Twitter Trend

Most people on Twitter have no idea how the trends are culminated or from where they originate.  Basically what happens is that there is a trending algorithm that seeks out topics that a wide variety of people are tweeting and retweeting about. The majority of trending topics come from retweets with the rest coming from the tweets of the major networks on news stories that are currently a hot topic.

Hashtags are also great sources of trends particularly when they have not been seen by the algorithms before. Because of the changing nature of trends on Twitter, a trend can be hot for ten minutes and then can fall off only to come back and be a top ten trend again.

Starting a Trending Topic

The best way to start a trending topic is to create a hashtag that others can use and share with their followers. This has to be done by making many tweets using the same hashtag but this is tricky because you don’t want to come off as spam either. It is a fine line to walk but if you get your followers involved in the process your hashtag can become a trending topic.

[Image Credits: www.lifehacker.com]

One way to do this is to offer a discount to any one of your followers who gets the most retweets featuring your hashtag. This gets the hashtag trending beyond your network of followers and can be beneficial in bringing in new business.

How to Find Trending Topics

One way to find trending topics is to simply look on the left hand side of your Twitter feed and it shows the top trends at that time. They can change throughout the day as new trends hit the algorithms and older trends drop offer.

Another way to find trending topics is to use one of the many websites that actually were created for the purpose of tracking Twitter trends along with the hashtags that are popular. You can also find applications for smart phones that also track these trends and post them regularly on the apps.

Any business owner needs to either follow and use these trends on their own or hire someone to do this because it is vital to getting their business noticed by the algorithms as trending. The most important trends are those that are localized so geo tagging on Twitter is also just as important to gaining more followers. Of course you can also purchase more followers but you still need to concentrate on the trends on Twitter.

   Tina Fouts

About the Author:

Tina Fouts has helped many companies to achieve localized trends on Twitter and has been writing for more than ten years online.