For now, let’s forget about trying to build up your list of followers. Even before you register a Twitter account, consider these 5 tips and avoid wasting precious time on Twitter.
Will you benefit from Twitter? Is your product or service interesting or helpful enough to promote and build followers?
First off, not all companies belong on Twitter, and not all companies will benefit from being on there. Most companies can always use more customers and visitors, but is Twitter the place where you should be spending your time and resources? Some industries may require more time than you can afford to invest. Take a lawyer for example. Just one or two clients may justify the amount of time spent on Twitter, but what type of information can you share on Twitter? Building a loyal following takes more than just sitting there on your computer typing about case you’re working on, simply because you can’t directly discuss the case, and you may not want to give away free legal advice on Twitter.
But now take a shoe company that can be on the other side of the spectrum. Think of all the things you can talk about on Twitter, even if you’re still a small shoe company that isn’t sponsoring a single athlete. You can still talk about new shoe designs, start discussions about reviews of your shoes, or poll followers for new ideas or recommendations. Oh, the possibilities are endless. Any shoe companies out there want me to run a Twitter account for them?
Analyze your competition. Are your competitors on Twitter? How much do they use it? Who is making the most of it, and how?
Let’s take a look at who will be competing with you for followers and vice versa. Hmm who do you want to take followers from? The best part about taking a look at your competition, is that they may already have a large following that you can specifically target with your tweets. More on how to do that will come in the future.
Not only do you want to take a look at their followers, but analyze their stats using a service like Twitalyzer or Tweetstats. Play close attention to how often they retweet, and how many times they tweet in a day or a week. If it’s working for them, shouldn’t it work for you also? Now what if you tweeted just a tiny bit more often than them, or sent more replies than them?
Create your own personalized background design. Brand your Twitter account.
Twitter allows you to create and import your own personal design into your Twitter account. This design, if done correctly, will always be visible, even if users scroll down. Consider these few factors when creating your design.
First, make sure that your design is consistent with the logo on your website. Eventually, we’ll look more into integrating your website into your Twitter account. Are you one of the many businesses that still doesn’t have a website? Don’t worry, just keep your design consistent with your logo. I’ll hold off on screaming at you to create a company website for now. We’ll talk about that later also.
Secondly, be sure to include your contact information. This means ANY means of getting in touch with you. Email, phone number, and yes… your Facebook address. This is even easier now that Facebook allows you to have a direct URL for your profile.
Third, look around at other profiles to start getting ideas of what you would want your background to look like. Sounds simple enough right? Good. Now get cracking on your design.
Who can help you promote your account?
Ever hear the cliché “It’s not what you know, but who you know”? Well, it applies to Twitter as well. Followers don’t just magically appear out of thin air. Your Twitter account will require just as much marketing as any other part of your business. When you first started your company, (hopefully) you didn’t just sit around and wait for people to call you or walk through your front door. You most likely called up all your friends, or sent out a mass email telling them that your shop is now open for business. Then you asked them to tell everyone they knew about your company. Why should Twitter be any different?
Send your friends an email. Tell them about your Twitter account. Tell your current clients about it. There’s no reason to neglect them just because they are already buying your products. If they have their own accounts, they can help you out with 2 major parts of marketing on Twitter. First, they can follow you, which should be your first goal. Second, they can start talking to their followers about your products and services if they have had a great experience.
Also, please don’t make the same mistake that tons of people out there are making. Take advantage of the tools you already have at your disposal. All the email programs I can think of allow you to include a signature in all of your emails. Add your Twitter URL to your signature. And while you’re at it, take another look and make sure that your website and Facebook URLs are on there. It should only take 2 minutes, but can ensure that all the people you email see your contact information. Some email programs, like Mozilla Thunderbird require an Html file for a signature. If you need help creating one, shoot me an email and I can help you out.
Do you have resources, services, or products that can be given away?
Some of the most successful companies that are on Twitter have regular contests and giveaways to promote specific products or services. Think of your inventory, or your services. What can you afford to give away for free, and how much of it can you give away? Consider this as part of your marketing budget. If you’re a candy store, consider giving away free samples to visitors that mention your Twitter account when they come in. If you’re a service provider, how about 5% off their next invoice?
One of the best promotions that I can remember seeing on Twitter happened earlier this year toward the beginning of summer. Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream (if you haven’t heard of them, you need to go find a huge tube of their ice cream immediately) had a promotion where there gave away a free scoop of ice cream at all of their locations for about 4 hours in the middle of the day. As soon as they tweeted about the promotion, thousands of followers began to retweet, and then their friends retweeted, and so on.
Soon, I caught wind of it from Kenny Hyder, who was sitting in the office next door. Next thing I knew, we were hopping into his car in the middle of the day to go get ice cream. Before that I didn’t even know that there was a Ben & Jerry’s store 2 minutes from my house and 3 minutes from my office. That, my friends, is why you need to do giveaways on Twitter.
Now most of the things I mentioned should just be common sense, but you would not believe how many people don’t think of them when they start getting antsy about creating a Twitter account. Get the most out of your time. Like with everything else, be efficient. Efficiency leads to less time wasted. And since time is money, it will lead to less money being wasted.
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