If you’re new to Twitter, you likely feel rather accomplished every time you remember to send a tweet. But there’s something else you need to do every time you use this social media channel. It is important to paint your tweets blue.

So what do I mean by that? When a Twitter user paints his tweets blue, it means that he is taking advantage of every opportunity to engage other users. This is important, because the more engagement you have, the more people see your tweet, and this can ultimately grow your list of followers, which is the goal.

Now, you’ve likely heard the words ‘handles’ and ‘hashtags.’ These are the two keys to painting your tweets blue. But what are they and how do you use them? A handle is the username a company or individual uses on Twitter. For example, my personal handle is @jathanfink.

Using the image above as a reference point, FirstWorks wrote this tweet about a review I wrote for a chamber music concert. To ensure that I saw their tweet, FirstWorks used my handle in the text, as well as the handles for the radio station I originally wrote the blog for (@WBSM1420) and the violinist who performed in the show (@TimFain).

By using all these handles, FirstWorks took the initial step toward painting their tweet blue (because handles turn blue when used in a tweet). The organization gets traction for this post because the station, Tim and I all saw and likely shared the post with our own Twitter followers. See how that works?

Hashtags, which are words or phrases with a pound sign in front of them, are used to track trending themes on Twitter. In this example, composer Philip Glass doesn’t have a Twitter account, so a handle wouldn’t be available. Still, people who attended the show would likely tweet that they were at the performance, thus the hashtag #PhilipGlass is used.

If someone sees that hashtag in a tweet, which would also be blue, they can click the hashtag and it will show them what other users are tweeting about #PhilipGlass as well. Thus, more people will see the post and interact with it.

Painting your tweets blue is a vital step toward using Twitter most effectively and is thus a great tool for getting the most interaction among other users and building your base of followers. I hope this brief tutorial gives you new ideas to use in growing your social media channel on Twitter and thereby building your brand.