Twitter - Startup #2 - Making an Avatar

Image by Torley via Flickr

Previously I spoke just about choosing a name on twitter. In this post I'll address choosing an avatar.

An avatar is a picture you choose to represent you online. It can be of you (most often) or of anything else. The avatar I use on twitter is a picture of me put through a photoshop like website (befunky.com).

When choosing an avatar there are a couple of things to keep in mind.

• Branding - if this is a company account you want to remember to make an avatar that is not only recognizable, but is consistent with your company brand / logo. If this is a personal account, remember that a personal brand is just as important as a corporate one. Make it yours.
• Recognizability - this may be slightly redundant, but it is important enough that it deserves to be its own point. Your avatar is how people will first see you and recognize you afterwards. They look at your name as well, but that's the second thing most tweeters look at.
• Do not Change lightly - this is a whole blog by itself (it's already been written by someone else - Diana Adams @ bitrebels.com), but to put it succinctly, once you establish yourself on twitter changing your avatar, will confuse people.
• Remember that your avatar determines the first impression other tweeters will get of you.
  

Next: Making a Background