Effectively using Twitter

Twitter is the latest social media source to use for marketing and business development purposes on the web with the simple aim of attracting and directing attention of consumers to sales points. Twitter allows a company to monitor how influential individuals think or feel as well as engage the consumer via active networking. For businesses, Twitter is an additional media channel connecting with current and potential customers increasing your product or brand awareness. In its most obvious form, Twitter is seen as a traffic generation tool for your existing website, storefront, or other traditional source of media. This placement of links within profiles and conversations can become an especially powerful tool as a trusted direct sales pitch. The catch is as a lead acquisition tool it doesn't always reach the audience you want. Twitter users are typically web savvy and it is difficult to target a specific subset of the general demographic or determining the level of potential interest. No options exist to advertise within Twitter, Twitter marketing is a task that involves two-way audience engagement, on the part of the business owner or marketer. Due to the very low entry and maintenance cost a Twitter presence can net your company a very high ROI(return on investment) for advertising.

Setup

Once establishing that Twitter is a tool you wish to utilize in your marketing program the next step is setting up your Twitter account. The set-up process is simple, the directions on set-up at www.twitter.com. After the initial set-up you will want to establish an original identity for your Twitter page. This is accomplished by uploading a custom thumbnail picture of yourself or corporate logo to the Twitter page. You will need to adjust the stock Twitter colors to match your business or corporate colors. Finally, include a custom background making the page uniquely tied to your own business. The first 2, uploading a picture and adjusting the colors, can be accomplished by using the Twitter interface. The third step may require a little design work for a professional result. A professional, original, and unique look to your homepage adds legitimacy to your tweets.

Content

Just because Twitter limits the user to 140 characters DOES NOT mean that content is unimportant. It means that the content distributed by Twitter needs to be relevant, exciting, and most importantly social. Tweets are the beginning of a dialogue, starting point of a conversation, and an effort to develop trust with the consumer. Your potential followers are web savvy and understand that a business Twitter account is to increase profits. It is important that you develop your content in a way that delivers value with each message. Here is an average content plan:

1. 40% Industry relevant content not company related.
2. 20% Personal information about the people in the company.
3. 20% Responding to remarks or asking community questions.
4. 10% Promotion of the company not related to direct sales.
5. 10% Tweets related directly to sales.

If you notice the very last item on the list is promotion of sales. Twitter, properly used is directed as value added to the consumer experience. Your 140 character Tweets should provide interest and direction to other sales tools such as a website, email, customer service, or simply building your brand as an expert in the field. The largest percentage of Tweets is keeping the consumer up to date within the industry or about factors that affect the industry. These can take the form of retweets(more on this later), other informational websites, or 140 character snippets of information.

The purpose is to develop your Twitter account as the place to find industry information on the web. The second percentage is to give your company a face. Social media is indeed social and adding a social component to the company is very important. This can include general birth announcements, employee awards, promotions or simple facts about the marketing manager. Obviously, various companies have different levels of comfort with personal information. A small business IS the owner and will probably find it a bit easier to divulge personal information to the online community. Regardless how much freedom is given to the Tweet Manager it is critical to give the company a human quality.

The next section will progressively get easier as you develop a following and set yourself up as an industry expert. Followers most likely will begin Tweeting questions, praising, or maybe even complaining on your Twitter feed. It is important to provide immediate feedback and answers to the followers. In the beginning, this may take the form of asking general questions to the community in an effort to encourage dialogue. Another 10% of your tweets should deal directly with the promotion of the company. Historical facts, current conditions, or "what the company is currently implementing" are great things to include in this section.

Finally we reach the 10% that can be used as a direct sales pitch. This seems like a small amount but, in reality, nothing can turn a subscriber off quicker than a company only talking about sales.

Remember Twitter is most effective as a way to direct traffic and enhance your other sales and advertising techniques. Once you achieve visibility, both your company profile and your client prospect levels will rise. The word of mouth that can come from a particularly intelligent tweet or series of tweets can result in hundreds or thousands of dollars in free advertising. If you provide tweets that appeal to your followers, you'll gain credibility and be on your way to forming valuable relationships.

Additional Tips

A few additional tips can be helpful as you enter the world of Tweeting. I think by making use of the below tis you can increase the effectiveness of you journey into the social media world.

• An outside application can greatly enhance your Twitter experience. I highly recommend TweetDeck as a Twitter manager. You can pick it up @ www.tweetdeck.com. It can also manage your Facebook and LinkedIn accounts.
• Commitment is important to your success. Particularly if you or your company are just entering the social media world it can take several months or even up to a year to develop a significant social media presence. Do not give up and keep at it as social media, Twitter or a different platform, are here to stay and will transfer from one platform to another.
• Hash tags, keywords prefixed by "#", beef up a tweet. They can emphasize a word, "classify" a tweet to a particular subject and make it easily searchable. For example, "We are happy to present a donation to Habitat for Humanity" might become, "We are happy to present a #donation to #Habitat for #Humanity. As social media becomes increasingly searchable hash marks are a great way emphasize your tweets.
• If you use Twitter for your organization, put some funny stuff or a personal message in between your 'business tweets'.. It gives more of a personal twist to your tweets. Consider adding pictures via www.twitpic.com. Don't be afraid to put a bit of spark in your tweets. Followers will love to know there is an actual person behind that Twitter machine.
• Use links effectively. Including links to in a tweet is great. It adds meat to your message and can contain more information for followers. Be sure you don't only list your own website but include other places containing great information. To save space your can use www.tinyurl.com or other tool to shorten the length of web addresses.
• Don't fear the re-tweet. If one of your followers tweets something interesting add an RT @"original tweeter" to the beginning of the tweet to give credit to the originator and re broadcast it over your own network. You can also acknowledge a great tweet by interacting with another user. Simply add a @"name" to your tweet to mention them by name. For example, "@Brainstormfeed Great event over the weekend." In social media adding interaction with others is a great use of Twitter.
• Know when to Tweet and pick the best times to tweet. Twitter users who tweet continuously are seen as 'noisy', and often loose followers. Spread your tweets over time. Don't overdo the amount of tweets you are broadcasting. Remember: quality masters over quantity. On average 1 to 3 quality tweets per day are effective. Ration a few tweets for slow news days. Scheduling your tweets effectively is equally important. When you have important messages to tweet, make sure you tweet them, or re-broadcast them at peak times. The busiest (and fertile) times on Twitter is when people arrive in the office between 8 and 10 am. Weekends have low Twitter traffic. Statistics show there is a very low chance your important tweets will be picked up during the weekend.

Please contact us if we can assist you with your social media implementation.