How does Twitter rate as a Marketing tool?

[minttwist]

How best to use Twitter is a devloping debate. I use it for following tweets that provide practical, applicable advice that helps me to design and market websites for my clients.

Should my clients be using Twitter as a Marketing strategy? What should the strategy look like?


This guy has advice about how to use Twitter as a marketing tool (and he has a LOT of followers):
http://twitter.com/guykawasaki

MintTwist use it to provide helpful and periodic Web Design tips for clients and followers:
http://twitter.com/MintTwist

 

[swbcanning]

Should you use Twitter as a marketing tool?

That falls into the same category questions as:

Do I want to get more customers?

 

[swbcanning]

Sorry just realised I didn't acutally add a response.

In all seriousness as a marketing tool it is extremely effective. We have seen times when we have gained 10 to 15 new clients a day purley from a new twitter post. There is also a member on this forum who got in the paper puely foir havingtwitter.

FACT: There is no reason not to use Twitter!

 

[DuaneJackson]

It works for me, example discussed here.

There is also a member on this forum who got in the paper puely foir havingtwitter.

T'was I. In the Telegraph no less.


I don't think for most people it's as straight forward as posting a message and getting double digit new clients of the back of it each day. What do you sell, swbcanning?

Personally I don't like the twitter.com/minttwist feed, or any feed that's just a company name.

I prefer to hear from people rather than brands.

For me, I just like to engage with customers, commerical partners, and competitiors. It sometimes raises eyebrows that I talk to/about compeitiors on there. But I don't see it as a problem

 

[richardjeaton]

Yes, I use it myself for delivering news to other people in one of my marketplaces (SaaS) as well as keeping up to date with goings on myself.
Just search for "richardjeaton" on Twitter...

I also use it for an ecommerce client (search for "cycleclothing") for keeping people updated on sales/promotions which is working well.

So far I have generally found it to be a fantastic resource - if you work at it then it will work for you. If you sign up and expect things to magically happen then you'll be sadly disappointed!

We have been so impressed that we are currently working on a Twitter tool ourselves! This will harness the power of Twitter for business use but make it so much more manageable and easy to use. Our initial alpha test results have so far been very very positive

Thanks

Richard

 

[minttwist]

There seems to be alot of discussion about how to use twitter. Not least whether to use it as a Personal or Corporate medium...

MintTwist are using twitter to engage with potential partners, employees and clients. However, MintTwist does not win new clients directly and does not plan to use it as a sales channel.

MintTwist, does plan to continue to use twitter to reflect the corporate identity - and not any single particular person (ego?).

 

[DuaneJackson]

MintTwist, does plan to continue to use twitter to reflect the corporate identity - and not any single particular person (ego?).

How boring. Are all your posts on here also going to be talking about yourself in the third person?

Hands up all those who want to "engage with a corporate identity"? No? Noone?

Even Sage make sure you know the names of the people behind the keyboard.

 

[OfficeHounds]

After reading this post about Twitter, my curiosity is raised. What kind of information do you post on Twitter about your business? I have a Virtual Assistant business, would I use Twitter to give organisation tips? I'm thinking about giving Twitter a try, but I'd be grateful for some tips!

 

[AndyP]

OK...finally people that seem to have a handle on this. I wouldn't call myself "too" out of touch in marketing terms (altho maybe I am!!) but I seriously just don't "get" twitter. Try as I might I just don't jell with it but I am sure that I am missing the obvious and the penny will drop at some stage...but for the benefit of doubt can somebdoy please just explain to me in brain-dead terms how I need ot approach this as a business amrketing tool? Please?....

Thanks

 

[AndyP]

btw...I can also spell when I pay attention!

 

[inspiremydesign]

Sorry just realised I didn't acutally add a response.

In all seriousness as a marketing tool it is extremely effective. We have seen times when we have gained 10 to 15 new clients a day purley from a new twitter post. There is also a member on this forum who got in the paper puely foir havingtwitter.

FACT: There is no reason not to use Twitter!

____________________

LoL seriously?!

 

[mattlast005]

Twitter is without a shadow of a doubt a fantastic tool for businesses to use. But the problem is a lot of business do not use this correctly. Many business almost see this as a direct selling tool. This is the most supid thing to do. Remember people its known as a 'social' media marketing tool. So rather than focusing on going on about your specials offers or just sell, sell, sell mode focus building a community/ a following for your business.

I hope this helps.

 

[minttwist]

I totally agree. By following current customers, potential customers, suppliers (and potentials), partners (and potentials) and other resources you can keep yourself connected to all the constituents of your business. This way it does work as a business tool.

Elliott King, Director,
+44 208 349 8213

http://twitter.com/elliott_king

 

[DotNetWebs]

Some see the whole thing as immature, with a imature terminology, as potentially time wasting, and encouraging the usage of poor communication

I think there is an element of truth in that especially since the tabloid press jumped on the bandwagon getting all excited about the likes of Stephen Fry and co..

However did a little deeper, choose who you follow carefully, use a decent Twitter client and it becomes an ever maturing technology that can save you time and improve your communications skills (because it forces you to get your message across in one or two sentences rather than paragraphs of marketing waffle).

Regards

Dotty

 

[minttwist]

Agreed. Using Tweetlater you can auto-follow targeted profiles.

 

[Deleted member 53707]

This has been an interesting post. I'm hoping this isn't a stupid question.

Why would you want to follow somebody if you're trying to post information to get business?

I don't really know how Twitter works, other than you have a fixed number of characters that you write. I thought it was mainly for teenagers who write things like "going to the pool on my first day of holidays" or some such.

 

[si-skyline]

hehe, this thread reminded me that I wanted to join twitter. I think its best when you yourself is the one with the twitter/facebook pages. as it gives a person a real some one. like when e-maiing a company it normally starts with dear sir/madam, on the other side knowing Jenny @ sales it would start Hi Jenny.

I like it more when knowing the person behind the company. the problem arises when you use a normal profile and customers are looking at what your doing such as a drunken night out on friday night with that nice picture you you being sick up a wall :/

 

[jingwen]

I have using twitter too,but only a little person log in our site from twitter,maybe i need to write more pull sentences.

 

[Marzy]

I will start using twitter as well for my business

 

[MarqueMyWords]

I'm using and developing presence on twitter for my current employer (a restaurant.)

I completely agree with many of the experiences listed in this thread already, especially some point that Duane at Kashflow raised regarding interaction (with a brand.)

As the restaurant I work for is in Birmingham, I'm carefully targetting and following Birmingham based people, this has snowballed and their friends quickly latch on and follow us as a result (or in return.)

I couldn't tell you how this has converted in terms of generating covers (sales/meals) but I think that the power of Twitter is that it allows a brand to take an interest in the day to day lives of its customers/followers and in exchange allows them to learn more about the people behind the business.

 

[webpromoterservice]

twitter has been working quite well for some of our sites,but the negative aspect is it has sent spammers to our websites and forum.
i guess everyone on twitter is looking to promote themself and you will always get nasty spammers wherever you go.

 

[minttwist]

Why would you want to follow somebody if you're trying to post information to get business?

An important part of business is understanding your market, industry and competition. By following Twitter profiles that give you an indication of what is going on in the macro environment, you can learn a lot.

As well as this, by using Twitter in a focussed manner, over the medium/long term you will get followers and be able to engage with potential partners and clients.

I know this because we do it for our clients every day.

Best wishes.

 

[Flexicose]

Got to be worth a try.

I will have a go and see if people are interested in our area of health, but with 8m+ people with arthritis plus pets, there has to be a way to get their attention.

Maybe I should do two, humans and pets :|

How often do you need to post to keep things moving?

 

[DuaneJackson]

How often do you need to post to keep things moving?

At least 2-3 times a day IMO.

 

[minttwist]

You can link a twitter account (automatically) to a Blog using 'tweetfeed'. This will save you from having to duplicate communication between these media.

If you follow MintTwist on twitter you'll see that some tweets are auto generated by the Blog:

Tweet crimes that don’t pay: By Tim Bradshaw, FT KFC, the fast food chain, learnt a thing or two about the.. http://bit.ly/129jGt

... and others are manual posts like this "ReTweet":

RT @elliott_king Learn how to read and write "twitter". link: http://bit.ly/uisXT

http://twitter.com/MintTwist

 

[Rhys0980]

i am yet to get any business leads directly to my website from twitter, however i have heard that it is a good tool

 

[Jason2244]

Sorry just realised I didn't acutally add a response.

In all seriousness as a marketing tool it is extremely effective. We have seen times when we have gained 10 to 15 new clients a day purley from a new twitter post. There is also a member on this forum who got in the paper puely foir havingtwitter.

FACT: There is no reason not to use Twitter!

I can think of a few. Time taken to Tweet and if you don't update this could look bad. I think this probably the reason we don't do it. It's easy to lose interest in this.

 

[Spiderden]

If you want to gain more followers with an interest in your sector, two easy methods to use are.
Checkout the followers of others in your sector, and follow any you think will be interested in what you do. The chances are, they will follow you back.

Use Twitter's live search for keywords in your sector, if someone posts something of interest to you, follow them and if you have anything to say about their update, reply to them. Replying to them will almost always get you a follow back.

I wouldn't recommend using the automated services for following such as Hummingbird as they make you look like a spammer, do it by hand and use the personal touch.

Just by using the two methods above I grew my following to 3,700 in 3 months. I no longer put any effort into increasing my following as it now increases automatically from retweets, #followfridays etc

Another thing that helps is to use a keyword in your ID or name, some people use Find People to search.

 

[julian_shaw]

What I've learned is that it's as good for keeping up to date as it is for marketing.

 

[redtreeland]

i started this news page: http://twitter.com/BBC_UK_News a few weeks ago just to test out the waters, no promotion, and already quite a lot of followers.

 

[Spiderden]

i started this news page: http://twitter.com/BBC_UK_News a few weeks ago just to test out the waters, no promotion, and already quite a lot of followers.

Expect a slap from the BBC for doing that.
They already have quite a large presence on Twitter.

You should at least state in your profile that you're not an official BBC Twitterer.

 

[minttwist]

Just interested to know - on what grounds could the BBC dish out a slap?

I heard that CNN bought out a 'twitter profile creator' who re-tweeted their articles without their permission.

 

[YODspica]

Twitter, is amazing, just ask my 6000 followers

 

[4PlayHeaven]

I agree. I too dont quite "get" Twitter. Other than just posting tweets. HOw does it work as a marketing tool. The other night i got over 50 visiters from there in about two hours to my site, all to one product. I have no idea how are why as i have only posted twice and nothing in last 3 weeks. I have a facebook page which is obviously a good way to market your site. Can someone please explain Twitter as amarketing tool in simple terms.

 

[realex_jonathan]

We've been using Twitter a lot lately. It's proving to be a great tool for connecting with your customers in a different way and gives you the opportunity to put special offers up on twitter, driving traffic to your sites. You can also build up a decent following on twitter and make new connections, it's an excellent networking tool

 

[applemaidcleaning]

i use it helped my website ranking ect i have reached the limit now of how many people i can add or follow one of them

 

[betterlife]

Then, how about Facebook?

 

[minttwist]

Then, how about Facebook?

Facebook can enable far more engagement and is more effective as a marketing tool (per follower) - however, it takes much more work, concentration and engagement to build up connections.

 

[singularity35]

I understand that twitter is an excellent marketing tool when used properly. any tips on how to optimize twitter?

 

[EcommerceFreak]

There are so many of these types of networks inc facebook, twitter, Bebo, Friendster etc. Are they really effective or is it just a method of socialising for teenagers without any real marketing success? I'm thinking of using facebook to promote but I don't know if I'd just be throwing away my money?