Twitter is an internet phenomenon. What started as a simple way for individuals to keep in touch with friends and family is now a powerful tool allowing businesses to interact and engage with new and existing customers. In this presentation, BusinessZone.co.uk editor Dan Martin uses real examples to dispel the myth that Twitter is all about celebrity tittle-tattle and show how companies of all shapes and sizes can use the social network to market products and services, manage brand reputation, improve customer relations and build a strong community of brand advocates.
27. Get in touch www.twitter.com/Dan_Martin [email_address] www.linkedin.com/in/danmartin2008
Notes de l'éditeur
Twitter and sites like it mean someone can post negative comments and be accessed by millions within seconds.
Twitter can be used to manage this customer feedback and negativity. One example is BT which has several corporate feeds including @BTCare which it uses to respond to customer issues. As well as responding to tweets aimed directly at the account, the agents behind the feed search for references to their brand and publicly respond. When a customer’s issues is resolved, their praise is also public – a win win.
Smart registration Your profile is searchable – use keywords relevant to what you do and who you want to find it. Mention sector, target audience, location – whatever’s relevant Change it on a regular basis – it’s a marketing tool that’s completely free! Twitter uses can search profiles based on location through search.twitter.com and directories such as Twellow.com
It’s isn’t all how many followers you have; it’s the quality of those followers. Use search engines like search.twitter.com and twellow.com to find people relevant to your organisation and follow them; chances are they will follow you back
Use every opportunity you can to promote your social media presence – these buttons are on BusinessZone.co.uk Put them on your website, your business cards, your marketing material It is also possible to embed your Twitter feed into your website – Google loves new content so use it!
You must still give value and pitch yourself as an expert so regularly search for topics of relevance and answer questions – services like Twitalert – like Google alert – will allow you to keep track of particular keywords/subjects Also use Twitter to ask questions, gather information, ask people what they think of you/your organisation/your Twitter feed Also use Twitter to special events – get your CEO/directors online for an hour and take questions from the community – accounting software company Sage recently did it and it worked well – even answered questions from competitors – I wrote about it!
Despite benefits/popularity of online, face-to-face is still important so tweet-up! Tweet-ups are meet-ups arranged through Twitter. Tools exist which you can use to promote them – e.g. twtvite.com – set up online invitations, track mentions, print names badges If running a conference, arrange a tweet-up in lunch/coffee breaks – the chances are at most events they’ll be someone tweeting. Use them to discuss ideas for your organisation, find out what’s on the mind of your members, are you addressing their needs, what added value do they want?
Use the real-time search engine on Twitter. Find out who’s talking about your brand. If they are, respond. If no-one is talking about you, you need to ask why!
Twitter may be on the internet but use it to make local contacts. Build up local networks. Services like twitterlocal.net will help.