Twitter hasn't always had the "List" feature, but even though it's new, I find that it really helps me sort out things on Twitter.
Unless you have some tools in the bag, you'll quickly feel overwhelmed and swallowed up in what I call "The Twitter Rushing River.
" Here's how I use the List Feature.
First, I go to the page of the person I want to follow.
On the left of the page, under the name, is the Follow button.
All the way to the right is a button that says "Lists.
" If you click on that, and you don't have any lists set up already, the only option says, "New List.
" If you have lists set up already, you'll see a list of the names of the lists and you can just click and choose which one you want this new twitter friend to fit into.
But first, let's suppose you don't have any lists and you want to set up some.
Go to your homepage.
Look on the right sidebar and you'll see Lists under the Search field.
Click on Lists.
Then you'll see New List appear as an option.
Click on that.
A box will appear and you will be asked to name this list.
Let's pretend you are going to create a list of your family members.
Put "Family" in the List Name field.
Then you will be asked for a short description.
So, I would write: This is a list of all my family members who use Twitter.
You only have 100 characters for the description, so don't be wordy.
Now, you will be asked whether you want this list to be public or private.
I will put "private" on this list, because I don't know why anyone else would want to know who my family members are.
If you don't care who sees or accesses your list, mark it as public.
It is also interesting to note that you can put people in several different lists - they can definitely overlap.
Because some lists are public, you can follow other people's lists.
If you visit someone's Twitter page, you can look at their public lists on the sidebar.
If you click on one of the lists, you will see a stream of the people who are part of that list.
At the top of the page, you will see a button that has the words, "Follow This List.
" So, you may be wondering, why in the world you'd want to follow someone else's entire list? Well, just pretend that you are a big fan of Seinfeld.
Let's say you find someone who has a Seinfeld list.
You could just add the whole bunch of them at a time, and have a group of people instantly who share a common interest.
Pretty cool, huh? You can also scan people's lists to see how they're using them, and even get new ideas on what kinds of lists you may want to set up.
A Little-Known Feature You Need to Know One more hidden feature you may not be aware of - you can find who has you on a list.
Go to your main page, and look at the bottom of your lists.
You will see the words "View All.
" Then you can choose to see the Lists Following You, and another tab will tell you Lists You Follow.
From here, you can choose to follow people who have you listed whom you may not have even known about.
As I mentioned earlier, the more tools you have to help you manage this Mighty Rushing River of Twitter, the more fun it will be and the more productive as well.
Happy Tweeting! To get a full library of instruction about how to use Twitter, go to Make Twitter Work.
You simply won't believe all that's available to help you harness the power of Twitter!