When helping people plan Twitter parties, we are often asked, “What makes a Twitter party or Twitter chat great? How do we get people to attend?”

While prizes often top the list for attracting participants — and certainly offering a big prize generates a lot of pre-party promotional buzz — attendees often need additional reasons to take time out of their busy schedules to participate in an hour-long, online chat. That’s where content comes in.

You have probably heard the phrase, “Content is King,” and when it comes to Twitter parties, it really can be just that. It’s not just about the giveaways. If you create a chat with great content, you’re likely to have greater participation. More tweets equals greater exposure; perhaps even helping your Twitter party to become a trending topic.

Here are a few elements to include when creating content for a Twitter party or chat:

Participants: Let’s face it-it would be fun to tweet with Justin Timberlake, wouldn’t it? If you’re just not into him, imagine tweeting with someone you admire: a writer, musician, scientist, or athlete. Having a well-known person participate in your chat gets people excited and helps create a lot of buzz about your event, especially if the celeb tweets about it herself. If your company has a spokesperson with a large following, having him or her join in the chat can be essential in drawing a huge crowd. But the guest contributor does not necessarily have to have star power to be a draw. Including an expert on a particular subject to weigh in and answer questions during your chat also can be an important addition to your event. Having someone other than the brand itself as part of the chat adds an authoritative element to the Twitter party that will attract not only more followers but also those followers who are truly interested in the subject being discussed.

Special Offers: Many people follow brands on social media with the hope of receiving a special offer, coupon, freebie or discount. Often tweets mentioning a special offer code or discount get a lot of attention and retweets. A Twitter party host might give a special offer to those who attend and/or sign up to be added to their mailing list. Either way, mentioning that the Twitter party might include a special offer to be announced during the chat can go a long way in helping to get more buzz when promoting your event.

Education: Some of our best Twitter parties have been ones where people walk away with new information or knowledge gained about a subject. How do you add an educational element to your chat? Pick a topic that complements your company’s product or service and use the chat as a way to teach people about it. For example, a stroller company might have a chat about traveling with kids, in which a travel expert offers helpful tips and suggestions on how to make traveling with little ones go more smoothly. Having an expert on-hand to answer questions and give advice helps lend some authority to the chat and also can help create more awareness about your chat’s value for attendees. If you have a blog post or article that describes a suggestion in detail, include a shortened link to it in your tweets. One of the best parties we ever helped with for an organic food company  included product giveaways, a  guest expert about nutrition, helpful tips and links to detailed information about healthy eating.

Conversation: Twitter parties should not be one-way sales pitches by companies. This shouldn’t be an infomercial. Like any ‘real-life’ party, part of the party fun is chatting with other people and making new connections. So how do you get the party started on Twitter? Plan in advance a list of questions or topics (think: icebreaker) to get people talking with you and with each other. However, use this list as a starting point only. While it’s great to have a script of sorts in hand, don’t stick solely to scripted responses. You’re not a robot. Engage in the conversation by answering questions and coming up with new questions in response to participant comments. While it might not be possible to respond to every question during the hour, try to find a way to continue the conversation after the chat, whether it’s on Twitter, Facebook, or to answer lingering questions via email. Whatever you do, make sure to keep an eye on the number of tweets you’re sending. Don’t get too caught up in the moment and respond to every tweet during the hour. A good rule of thumb is to stick to a tweet per minute — that way you’ll be able to carry on the conversation without having your Twitter account locked up and landing in “Twitter jail.” (What exactly is Twitter jail? It’s when you tweet too much and your account is frozen for a while by Twitter. The word on the street is that if you exceed 100 tweets per hour, you’re headed to the virtual slammer…)