Twitter…A Big Misunderstanding.

In the past few years many of us have had the itch to create a profile on Twitter. Maybe you heard about your friends using it, maybe you heard about a huge tech company using Twitter on the news or maybe you don’t have a clue about Twitter and wonder why you should care. In it’s simplest terms Twitter is a 140 character or less micro-blogging website. While many people make the mistake of posting unnecessary and uninteresting content on their Twitter feed (such as what they had for lunch), you don’t have to make the same mistake!

Unfortunately, for many people using Twitter for business purposes they will fail miserably, however by following a few simple steps we’ll show you how to get the most out of this social media gem!

The Basics Of Twitter

Before we get into the lesson we will go over a few key Twitter concepts.

Tweet – A tweet refers to your 140 character micro-blogs which are sent out to your followers.

Handle – A handle is your username. For example our username is @climbnewheights. Try to make your handle short and descriptive and also make sure to snag your own personal name as a twitter handle in case you plan on building your personal brand in the future.

Follow – A follow is the act of adding someone to your list of pages that you wish to receive updates on. These page’s posts will appear on your home page feed.

Replies – A reply is when someone tweets directly at your handle. These are normally directed specifically at a tweet that you had sent and is a great opportunity to get a conversation going!

Retweet – A retweet is a republishing of another users tweet. Retweets mean that people enjoy your content and wish to share it with their own followers. Retweets are a sign that your business is doing something right.

DM – A DM is short for direct message. Twitter allows users to send other users direct messages.

Hashtag – A hashtag is a way of categorizing tweets. When you use a hashtag your tweet will get lumped in with all of the rest of the tweets pertaining to the same hashtag. This makes Twitter very searchable which is great for monitoring what is said about your brand, business, or campaign.

Twitter For Business: Getting The Most Out Of Twitter

1. Who to follow? When you first get started on Twitter you may be in a panic wondering who you should follow. While you may be tempted to follow your favorite movie stars and actors you should probably save that for last. We recommend signing up on a website called twellow.com. Twellow is like the yellow pages of Twitter users. You can use it to find like minded people in your industry and follow them. When you follow people that are similar to your industry their followers will begin to follow you and this will give you a starting point. You can also place your own Twitter handle up on twellow in order for other people to follow you as well!
2. Post great content. While this one may be a no brainer you may be scratching your head thinking, “well that doesn’t really give me any help.” No worries my friend, we’ll clear that up in a moment. Some examples of tweets to post include: contents about upcoming events, retweeting other people’s great content, tweeting engaging content such as asking a question, tweeting links to great websites, tweeting random (but interesting) thoughts and finally tweeting links to your blog posts.
3. Post frequently. The truth of the matter is that Twitter is extremely crowded. If you follow upwards of 150 pages, one tweet will only be on your screen for a couple minutes, if you’re lucky! For that reason alone it is imperative that you don’t rely on a tweet a day to get you noticed by your followers. Likewise you can use the personal brands of your employees to post the same links but at different times with different headings in order to get maximum exposure for tweets such as blog posts or other important information.
4. Reply to conversations. Using that handy reply button at the bottom of your favorite tweets is a great way to join the conversation with people in your industry and get you noticed.
5. Use Twitter search to meet objectives. Aside from being annoying for most people who aren’t in the know about Twitter, hashtags serve a great purpose. That purpose is that Twitter is highly searchable. Use it to search for people mentioning your brand if you’re concerned with your companies reputation. Use it to find the winning contestant in your latest promotional giveaway. Use it as a real-time customer service gateway. Use it in any way you see fit, get creative! You can even set up your Twitter searches as RSS feeds and follow them so you can keep your company’s reputation in check at all times or check up on your latest contest, etc.
6. Make yourself retweetable and easily followable.While Twitter limits their posts to 140 characters it is great to make your tweets even shorter than that so it gives your followers the ability to copy your tweet and add their own content to retweet to their followers. Don’t worry you will still get credit for your tweet but this option is great for getting in on the conversation of twitter. Getting involved in communities is a great way to get the most out of your usage of Twitter. One way you can do this is to use a link shortener whenever you post a link to Twitter. Services such as Hootsuite, Google, and Bitly all offer link shortening services which allow you to post links to interesting articles without the url taking up most of the tweet. Other techniques just involve shortening the tweet itself so people can add their own content when retweeting to their audience. Our last tip is to make yourself easily followable by including your twitter handle on all your marketing materials and all other social media websites that you frequent.

Well that was it for this week’s how-to guide to Twitter for business. We hope you’ve enjoyed it and learned a thing or two. For questions, comments or concerns please don’t hesitate to contact us or leave a comment on our blog. Thank you!