Many businesses are realizing the benefits of creating and maintaining a profile on the popular networking site, Twitter. For a relatively small time-input, business owners are able to interact directly with their target customers, exhibiting their personality while simultaneously enhancing their credibility. Twitter is currently regarded as the best place to build online communities, allowing you to grow brand loyalty among a sea of competition.

While posting and interacting on twitter is relatively simple, it may be intimidating to build your own account. Here is a step-by-step guide for establishing your own twitter profile, and customizing it for business use.

Step 1. Establishing your profile

Navigate your browser (Safari, Firefox, etc.) to http://www.twitter.com. On the righthand side of the page, highlighted in neon green, is the SIGN UP NOW button. Click it.

Now enter your information as asked. Enter your first and last name in the first field. This can be the actual name of the person running the account, or it can be your business name.

Next, pick and enter a USERNAME. It should be something unique to you, preferably a variation of your name (for personal-focused accounts), or your business name (for professional accounts). In general, it’s recommended that your username be between 5-12 characters.

Next, enter a PASSWORD that’s unique to you. It’s recommended that you don’t use any dictionary words, and that you include either a capital letter, a number, or both. These measures ensure your account stays secure — don’t share your password with anybody.

If you don’t want to receive promotional or informational emails from twitter (recommended), uncheck the box that reads: I want the inside scoop–please send me email updates!

Lastly, enter the security-code words you see in the box below (click get two new words if you can’t understand the original ones), and hit CREATE MY ACCOUNT.

If you entered all your information correctly, you’ll be forwarded to the SEE IF YOUR FRIENDS ARE ON TWITTER page. If you’d like twitter to search your email contact lists, click on the appropriate icon, and enter your information. If you’d just like to do this later, click on SKIP THIS STEP (at the bottom of page).

That will take you to a page with suggestions of people to follow. You can add more manually later, but for now, check 3 or 4 profiles that interest you. Following a few people to start will help you ‘get’ how twitter works. When you make your selections, press FOLLOW.

You now should be forwarded to your new homepage. And voila… you have yourself a twitter profile.

Congratulations! Have a lollipop, take a quick walk, or just raise your arms in celebration.

Step 2. Adding a profile picture

Adding a profile picture is the most important and easiest way to personalize your new account. Your profile picture is the first thing most people will look at deciding whether to “follow” you, and will be displayed next to each one of your updates.

For accounts with a primary person updating it, it’s alright to use a personal picture. It’s even encouraged. Just make sure it’s a closeup, because twitter only displays a small thumbnail. Strict business accounts can use your logo.

To add your profile picture, first click the PROFILE button, located in menu to the upper righthand side of the page.

Now, to the left of your username, there’s a space for a profile picture. To add one of your own, click on the green PLUS sign.

Once you’re on the add a picture page, click the CHOOSE FILE button. Select an image from somewhere on your computer — I use a Mac, and have all my photos stored in iPhoto. Once you’ve found a photo, click on it to select, and click CHOOSE (in the bottom righthand corner).

If your image is too big — the maximum allowed size is 700k — you have to resize it. You can do that in PhotoShop, if you have it, or online at http://mypictr.com.

Once you see that your picture has uploaded, click SAVE, and you should see it displayed next to your username.

If that worked, go back to HOME, and you should see your new profile pic. Sit back and admire it.

Step 3. Writing your bio

After a profile picture, your bio is the profile element that communicates the most about your business. For person-centered profiles, your bio might give readers an idea of what you do for work, what you do for fun, and what your personality is like. For business profiles, the bio should tell readers about your services, your identity, and perhaps one fun fact about your company.

Twitter bios should be written in sentence form (resist the urge just to make a list), and are only a few sentences long — the max is 160 characters. They can be challenging to write, so do so first in a word processing document.

When you have your bio finished, click on SETTINGS, and enter your text into the box that says: ONE LINE BIO.

While you’re at it, also include your website address (URL), and your business location. Even for Internet businesses that lack a true brick-and-mortar location, it’s advisable to enter something here. Saying you exist ‘on the Internet’ doesn’t give people much to connect to. Try to place yourself somewhere.

After you enter this information, hit SAVE. Then click on PROFILE, which will take you back to your page. Here, you can see the (awesome) results. It should look something like this:

Step 4. Customizing your profile

Just like each website has its own identity, you can now customize the look and feel of your twitter profile (recommended). Go to SETTINGS –> DESIGN, where you can choose a twitter background theme. The theme will be displayed on your homepage, behind the updates from your network, as well as behind your twitter profile page.

If you can’t find something you like, or just want a more-intricate background theme, visit http://www.tweetygotback.com, and pick out your own design. The website is linked directly to your twitter account, to make upgrades as easy as possible.

Because we’re from Boulder, we picked a mountain-themed background, and applied it to our account. It’s looking good. At this point, your page should look something like this:

Step 5. Start tweeting!

If you’ve completed steps 1-4, you now have a fully functional, personalized and customized twitter business profile. Now you’re ready to start using the service. You can post tweets, follow your friends or network contacts, respond to their updates, send direct messages, and more.

If you want information about how to use the features on twitter, or about how to maximize the brand awareness you get from twitter, I recommend you start with this YouTube video, this blog post, or the many more you can find all over the Internet.

Also, I’ll be writing more-detailed posts about the use of twitter as a marketing tool soon. So if you’re interested, make sure to stop back by this blog!

Please leave any questions you have in the comments section.

Happy Tweeting!