Twitter is a very popular social media platform. The news media is always talking about the latest Twitter fights among celebrities and tweet faux pas from politicians and other famous people. Often, it can be easy to assume that Twitter isn’t a serious marketing tool for your business, but you’ll find that you might be counting out a very powerful social voice by avoiding Twitter. It’s not only an influential platform to get your message out to customers and potential clients, but it’s also a terrific way to network and connect.
Twitter Marketing
You may be thinking that only 140 characters aren’t enough to get your message out there and that this isn’t right for your business, but you’d be surprised at how wrong you can be about it. In today’s busy society many people want to get their news and marketing messages in short snippets. They can decide if they want to share the information quickly thanks to Twitter’s retweet function; click an embedded link to learn more; or write a tweet in response to the message. This is why Twitter has held on to this brief format because it’s short and succinct. Every word should be chosen carefully to get the right message out there to your clients and customers.
Twitter Basics
- Social media offers a lot of benefits to businesses that decide to use these platforms. They are available at no cost and provide a great way to connect with others. Another wonderful benefit of these social media outlets is that they are pretty easy to learn when it comes to the basics. Twitter is no different; you can quickly and easily sign up for a business Twitter account. After you’ve established your account, it’s time to start interacting with the public, and communicate with your target audience.
- You can use a maximum of 140 characters for your tweets. Hashtags are a great marketing tool to include because they connect with specific audiences and can be found during searches. For instance, you can use #Twittermarketing to promote a post or gain attention for people interested in that hashtag subject.
- You can also follow other businesses and interact with them to help build your network. Ways to interact with other Twitter users is by replying, retweeting, liking a tweet, or mentioning another user by inserting the @ symbol before a Twitter username. This may seem complicated at first, but in a short time, you’ll get the hang of using this platform. If you already use this in your personal life, it will be a breeze to adapt to using this in your professional life.
Check Out the Competition
- Begin exploring Twitter by checking out what the competition is up to with the social media platform. If your local competitors aren’t on Twitter yet, great! That gives you an edge. You can always look at companies similar to yours in your state or overall to see what kind of messages they are sharing as tweets and interactions. Take a look at how successful the different actions are to see if they are getting retweets, likes, and replies on their Twitter account. This can give you a lot of information on how you can start growing your Twitter audience before you even get started.
- You can also look outside of your competition for great ideas on how to best market on Twitter. Check out this Twitter feed for an insightful look into what makes a great Twitter account along with more awesome information on marketing using this platform.
Twitter Demographics
Twitter user demographics may be right up your company’s alley when it comes to your target market. Demographically speaking as of 2013, about 23 percent of all people using the Internet also used Twitter. This number is comprised of individuals between the ages of 18 and 49 who are often college educated, in the higher salary brackets, and happen to live in urban areas. If that 23 percent doesn’t sound very big, here’s another piece of data, there are over 300 million active users on Twitter. These numbers speak volumes, and past demographic trends show that the use of Twitter is continuing to rise. It’s time to start thinking about your ideal client and what demographics they fit into. This will help you when it comes time to discover your target market and start campaigns meant to interest individuals that fit your niche.
Connecting with Your Target Market
- There are a number of ways that you’re able to work towards connecting with your target market after you’ve created your business Twitter account. First, you can make it easier for your audience to find you by using keywords in your Twitter bio for your account. Look for users that you can target by creating a list of those who have remained engaged with Twitter in a recent amount of time.
- Some people use Twitter very infrequently, and that’s not the audience you’re looking to connect with on a whole. You want to find those users that have been active in the past month or two. You should also do some research on hashtags. Look to see what hashtags are popular with your intended audience, and how they are using it. This not only helps you connect with your target market but also gives you ideas on what hashtags to use in the future to get their attention.
- Be sure to organize your lists through Twitter’s built-in tools or you can go through a third-party application if you want to manage your lists in a more detailed manner than can be had by the tool located in Twitter. You’re also going to want to use analytics to keep track of what’s working when you try to connect with your target market and what doesn’t work. This will help you better narrow down your efforts for the future.
Interactions with Your Audience
- It’s easy to think that there isn’t much more to Twitter than writing up a short message of under 140 characters and sending it out into the Twitterverse. But Twitter is so much more than just short messages. You can embed links to interesting articles you’ve posted on your blog or found online that you want to let your followers know about.
- You can tweet pictures to your followers. This is a pretty powerful type of tweet, especially if you work in a field where visual images are vital. For instance, if you’re a remodeling company, you can share before and after pictures of your projects to get your audience thinking about how they can use your company for their home remodel projects. The same strategy can be used by companies that produce products or even restaurants showing off their daily features in pictures. What do you think will be more enticing to get your customers to come in? A short sentence telling them the special of the day or a picture that shows them how delicious your special looks?
- Don’t forget the standard in marketing: your call to action. Think about the action that you want your audience to make with the tweets you send. This doesn’t necessarily have to do with buying your products or requesting a consultation. Your call to action could be asking your followers to retweet your information with their followers or engaging them to reply to your post. Call to actions don’t necessary have to always be about getting them to buy, but also getting your followers to help spread your message to others who may become future customers.
Post Frequency
- There is no easy answer on how often to post tweets or interact with your followers on Twitter. One Twitter user started a conversation about how to interact with their followers. Basically, the question comes up on how often you can post to keep your audience engaged without edging into the territory where you start to annoy them. A good rule of thumb is about three tweets a day to get the right amount of engagement without annoying followers.
- The best way to determine what works the best for you is to follow the analytics of your Twitter account. For instance, a company involved in recent news will need to tweet more than a company that offers plumbing services. This can help you not only to find how often to post but also when to post. You want to get maximum engagement with your audience by finding the right time to post your tweets.
A Twitter Assistant
Using a powerful tool like Twitter for your business shouldn’t be ignored. It’s not just for celebrities and politicians, but a good way to get in touch with your current customers and those you’re hoping will become customers. Signing up for a business account is simple and free, so there’s nothing stopping you from harnessing the power of this social media platform for your needs.
It’s easy to start feeling a little overwhelmed with the prospect of getting involved in another method of marketing or worry over having to find time to fit yet another task into your busy schedule. You don’t need to let this little obstacle stand in your way. Here at WPamplify are can help you with your Twitter marketing needs. Contact us today to learn how we can get your business in front of over 300 million Twitter users quickly and efficiently without you having to worry about learning another platform or working more hours. We are experts in the field of social marketing, and we’ll help grow your business one tweet at a time.
