How to make a twitter bot with no coding required in 5 minutes

A properly configured twitter bot can take your brand or personal accounts growth to the next level. Twitter bots are able to automatically favorite and retweet tweets from a targeted hashtag or phrase, send messages to new followers, or schedule tweets to be posted when you are away from the computer. These bots are utilised extensively by large companies and social influencers but generally require dedicated teams of programmers to create and manage them effectively. This route is both costly and requires years of coding experience to setup. This guide details how to make your own dedicated twitter bot without a single line of code in just 5 minutes using the BotGhost twitter bot maker platform.

To get started head over to http://www.botghost.com/.

How to create your own twitter bot

Step 1 — Setup

Once you are over at BotGhost click the sign up button in the top right hand corner on the home page. Unlike other twitter botmakers BotGhost doesn’t require you to go through the process of generating api keys. Instead, simply sign in through your twitter account and BotGhost will handle the rest. Once you have successfully logged in you should see the screen below.

There are a few parts of your dashboard which you should know about:

• Side Panel — Details the available functions that your bot can perform as well as the general settings of the bot
• Start Bot Button is located in the top right and will start the bot once you have it configured.
• The dashboard tab details general information about your bot including
• Its status, bot type (premium or not) and the currently active functions

It should be noted that some features require a premium membership ($9 a month). BotGhost uses Stripe for payments so no credit card information is stored. The next step in your bots creation is to actually setup and configure.

Step 2 — Configuration

BotGhost uses a series of different unique functions which you can configure and turn on/off individually. When you add a new function you must restart your bot in order to save your changes. These available functions include:

• Scheduled Tweeting
• Follower Messaging
• Auto Favoriting (Premium only)
• Auto Retweeting (Premium only)
• Targeted Following (Premium only)

Scheduled Tweeting

Scheduled tweeting allows you to setup and define tweets to be sent out at different time intervals. This could include tweeting out a new product, an affiliate link, blog post or a very special announcement. This function is especially useful in its ability to schedule tweets when you would normally be asleep or away from your device, allowing you to reach an audience which are usually online outside of your schedule.

To Setup scheduled tweeting first click on the ‘Tweeting’ link on the left hand side navigation menu under functions. This will bring up two interfaces, the area where you add a new function and the currently active scheduled messaging functions. BotGhost functions are simply actions your bot will perform.

The area above is where you add a scheduled tweeting function. You will need to enter a function name which will simply be an identifier for the function and enter the actual text of the tweet under ‘Tweet Text’. Your tweet text can of course include hashtags and links. Finally enter the frequency of the actual tweet and click Submit to add the function. If successful your new function should show up in the table on the right of the page.

This does not mean the function is currently active. You must restart the bot by clicking the start/restart button in the top right to save the function.

Once you have restarted the bot your function will be active and your tweet will be posted incrementally. Note: Your tweet won’t be posted straight away but instead after your defined interval as passed (i.e if you defined the tweet to be posted every hour, it will wait maximum one hour to post the tweet).

Follower Messaging

The follower messaging makes your bot automatically message new followers of your twitter account. This could be useful to redirect users to a new account, give a link to a special promotion for followers only or simply thank them for following. To get started simply click the Follower Messaging option on the left hand side menu. Setting up this function is similar to the one above, simply define a function name and then enter the actual message content. Once again click submit and then restart the bot to save changes.

Auto Favoriting and Retweeting

These two functions are premium only functions that come with the BotGhost twitter bot maker. Retweet and favoriting bots are arguably the most critical for growth and follower gain. These functions allow you to define a target hashtag or phrase to retweet or favorite from a certain number of times within an hour. I recommend not going too overboard as twitter does look down upon automated spam.

This is the interface for the retweeting function (the favoriting function is virtually identical). Like before define a function name and then set the target hashtag or phrase for the bot to retweet or favorite from. You can specify multiple hashtags or phrases by separating them with commas. You then must set a maximum number of retweets per hour. The maximum is 100 but I recommend somewhere around the 5–15 mark as you don’t want to spam and get your account locked.

Targeted Following

The final function on BotGhost allows for targeted following. This function will cause your twitter bot to follow the followers of another user. This is especially useful for following your competitors followers or someone in a similar niche as you. Setting up this function is similar to the ones above. Define a function name, the target user you want to follow from (without the @ sign) and then the maximum number of followers. Finally as always restart the bot to save changes and start up your bot with its new functions.

Turning on your bot

Once you have added all the functions you want simply click the start bot button on the top right of your dashboard. If you have the required bot type your bot will start and that’s it! Your bot will now be running and carrying out your functions. I recommend reading up on twitters rules for automation before starting your bot so you don’t get your account locked.