You may have heard about Twitter before and its popularity. Many bloggers and designers as well as companies and celebrities use Twitter already. Just what is Twitter all about?
The Twitter Definition
It is a microblog, thus its service is called microblogging. It is like a smaller blog, wherein you only work through 140 characters to send across your message. What you need to say has to be concise, short, of interest and direct to the point. It is a simple means of communication within a group of people who really want s to hear what you have to say.
How does Twitter Microblog Work?
Actually using Twitter is really easy. You simply register for an account with Twitter and you may instantly post messages with 140 characters. Such messages are known as “tweets”. Once a tweet is posted, it just goes into your Twitter feed. Those who follow your tweets will always see the update you just made within their own account in Twitter. These are the same with the RSS feed of a blog and how it communicates with the RSS readers.
People use Twitter so much as your Twitter followers are subscribed to many people. So if you tweet now, you will just gain exposure on their account’s main page for a short while only. The feeds of Twitter are variably set to public by system default. This signifies that searching any Twitter user is possible and to look for their past tweets too.
The Viability of Twitter for the purpose of Marketing of Small Business
Twitter is comparable with Facebook. Most companies say that Facebook is the next best thing in the future of marketing. This concept is still in the stage of “To see is to believe”. At present Facebook already implemented some CPC ads and hopefully it will also pave the way for more paid advertising for Facebook users.
Twitter may follow Facebook’s footsteps thus will provide a consistent avenue for reliable revenue and sales in the long run. It will work, but maybe not for an average owner of a small business who still doesn’t have a big database of email list.
The Twitter Challenge and Finding its Worth
Like any other form of Social Marketing, one of the major Twitter challenge is that a long term perspective is needed but still cannot be done with any other activities related to short term revenues. Known companies are said to have gained success with Twitter. They have an advantage as they already have a big prospect and client database who already know what kind of company they are and may have purchased already before from them. Twitter is considered another method of message communication.
Twitter is considered not a substitute for email marketing, PPC, SEO or even banner advertising. It should be another communication method with your database so that more information may be obtained about you so as to make the clients and prospects feel at home spending money with you. Dell is a typical example of a company using Twitter in a successful way. Dell tweets its very limited special offers in their database. This method is even faster as compared with the processes of direct mail campaigns and email marketing. The Dell Company is one of the biggest story of success to date, and generated revenue of about $1 million using Twitter in the year 2008.
The Time Worth of Twitter
Try to experiment with Twitter and always remember that Twitter is not direct marketing, but rather it is social marketing. You need to spend more time on Twitter if you like to be successful online, and you need to filter your other strategy elements first. Through this method, your time will be used well when you implement first the stated strategies. Once you accomplished this and you are making full use of all of those areas, Twitter is another strategical method in reaching your audience.
Another Twitter benefit is you can send short messages via your mobile phone. You do not need to be in front of your computer when you tweet. Even when you are shopping, or you are in a car, or you are just plain bored–you can tweet.
Getting Started with Twitter
If you are now ready to tweet with Twitter, a guide is all you need to get the most out of Twitter.
- A free Twitter account must be created and will be done in just a matter of minutes.
- Look for people you know and for people you want to follow in Twitter; then hit the Follow button found below the thumbnails so that you will be able to follow their tweets.
- Tweet anything about yourself. Within the maximum characters of 140, tweet about short, interesting and concise.
- Since you are not a big company yet like Dell, use Twitter to talk about yourself, information of interest, your life to your followers. The utmost goal is to build a relationship with your potential customer so that they may feel comfortable to spend money with you. Tweeting about the holidays, family or articles on blogs and on news sites, among others. Try to build relationships within the stated 140 characters or less.
- If you have a new product or if you happen to know about a product or if you have a special offer of your product, you may tweet about it. A higher information-rich content ratio to sales messages may be attained through this process.
- Bear in mind on how other big successful companies use Twitter. Follow such companies like Dell and check out how they use and how they Tweet. Find out from them what really is appealing and how you will respond and how to implement all of the methods to yourself.
- If you already have a Twitter history, you can send an email to your database list thus providing them a basis to follow you on Twitter like limited time discounts for uses of Twitter or even posting short contents that is exclusive for Twitter, among others.
- Better get advance copies of new eBooks and articles by having a subscription at the Twitter feed.
What to Keep Away From
Take note of the essentials that you should keep away from. This will deter instead of helping you and your Twitter followers.
- Avoid the habit of following people who follows you. Let us say you are following around more than 100,000 people, it will be hard for you to find the tweets of the people you really know and would like to follow. So it is advisable if you follow the people you really want to learn from and listen to what they have to tweet.
- Stay away from programs that are run by an automated software and manages your Twitter followers and responding automatically to them. At first it may be a good idea but there is never a good thing with automation together with social marketing. Take note that Twitter is really about creating relationships.
- If you can, try to follow only people that you know unless of course you like to know them better or you like to learn about their business. In the end, logging in to Twitter will be as enjoyable so as to see the activities of other people.
Twitter is another building relationship process with your clients, even with your prospects. But it doesn’t necessarily follow that the average owner of a small business will greatly benefit from this practical application. Further, this should still not be a major part of your marketing strategy right now. Let us just hope Twitter will be able to evolve into a better strategy of monetization for such small businesses soon.
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