You're Going to Call Me WHAT?! Changing Your Twitter Handle

A Twitter handle is the username that people see on Twitter when they look at your profile- mine currently is @natashaattal. The great thing about Twitter is that you can change your handle at any time without losing your mentions or followers. Beware though because once you switch handles, your old one is up for grabs so make sure to immediately lock in your old name (instructions on this below).

Since I noticed several people that I follow changed their Twitter handle lately, I decided to dedicate this post to how to change your Twitter handle and 3 reasons why you may want to change it.

(pic found on google images

How to Change Your Twitter Handle:

1. Choose a new handle name that will work best for how you want to market yourself or your brand. Hans Kullin has written an informative article on Strategies for Choosing a Twitter Handle that should be helpful.

2. Log in to Twitter, click on Settings and enter your desired new handle in the "username" field. Twitter will tell you if that username is available or not.

3. Once Twitter accepts your new handle, enter a password and click Save.

4. Sign out of your main (the one you just edited) account and then Sign Up for a new account. This will be where you set up a new account with your old handle username.

5. In the new account (where your old handle is used), post a tweet saying something along the lines of "I have moved to @X. Please follow me there for updates."

*You may also want to announce to your followers prior to making the change that your handle will be changing shortly. People love a heads up.

Reasons to Change Your Twitter Handle:

1. Recognition: Many people originally joined Twitter with their common online username or possibly a random name (remember the good old days of aol instant messaging and trying to conceal your identity?- my "crypted" name was Tashu0284). Changing the handle to your real name or personalizing it to what you tweet about is a great way to redesign the way you market yourself or your brand and allow people to find you online.

2. Personalization: Some people like to tweet as a brand and others like to tweet with their personal brand attached to it. Tweet with the name you want to be known for - often times that is by tweeting as yourself. For now, that is what I have been doing but it is different for everyone depending on the way you want to be perceived.

3. Develop a Professional Profile: You may have started tweeting with your name and have since built a following around linking to your business or blog. In this case, if you want to focus more on the business, you can change your handle to your business or blog name if they are available. I suggest keeping your name in the profile even if you switch the handle.

Thanks to Jordan Reid from Ramshackleglam Blog for the inspiration for this post. Her name changed from @JordanBerkow to @ramshackleglam a couple weeks ago and I figured it would be a good topic to discuss. If you like lifestyle blogs, make sure to check hers out. She is great!

Let me know what you think about changing Twitter handles and any success (or failure) stories!