A Beginner's Guide To Twitter For Business

A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO TWITTER FOR BUSINESS

LET YOUR COMPANY SOAR

Of all the social media platforms, Twitter can be the most difficult for businesses to master.

Here’s a beginner’s guide to help get your business started.

KNOW YOUR PURPOSE

Before you even sign up think about what you want to leverage the platform for. Do you want to use it to market your company brand.

Or to engage with your community? Or both? You’ll need to think a little outside the box, and be prepared to be creative.

Are you prepared to answer customer queries and complaints on the platform? You need to define your purpose to yourself, and be honest with yourself as to whether

or not you have the time and resources to do it properly.

LEARN THE PLATFORM

Twitter has a 140 character limit, which is pretty short, so if people are @ replying to you, or RT-ing you, you don’t want to chew up their limit with a long name. Go as short

as you can while still putting your brand name front and center.

Retweets will grow your reach, so you should aim to get as many retweets as possible.

A hashtag is what Twitter users use to indicate a topic. Usually, the only people who will see your tweets are your followers but if you add a subject using a hashtag everyone who is following that hashtag will see your tweet.

Hashtags are a great way to grow your follower base.

GET SOME FOLLOWERS

It’s no use tweeting if nobody can see what you tweet! The best and easiest way to gain new followers is to tweet interesting stuff, using hashtags judiciously.

If you’ve thought about your purpose, the kinds of hashtags you should be using will follow naturally. Don’t use hashtags that are too broad; think about your brand and

your industry, and what people interested in that industry might like to see.

Keep an eye on the ‘trending topics’ that show up on your Twitter side bar – if something relevant to your business is trending, jump on that Hashtag! Following

people is another great way to gain followers – often they’ll follow you back.

THINK ABOUT TONE

What is your brand and what kind of tone will strike the right note for it? Casual or professional? Witty or serious? There needs to be a through-line between your brand and the

tone you use on Twitter – a mismatch could be disastrous.

If you’re selling medical supplies, or dental services, you don’t want to be too flippant. If you have more than one person tweeting from your brand account, it’s crucial that you talk

to everyone about the tone they need to use.

DEFINE A STRATEGY

Leading on from that, whether you’re the only one tweeting or there are a number of people using the account you should set out your Twitter strategy in a document that

you make sure everyone reads.

Cover all bases – from purpose, to tone, to how to handle customer complaints. Even if it’s just you tweeting, this document will help you keep your head if you have

the misfortune to get caught up in a Twitter-storm (mercifully very rare, but it pays to be prepared!).

UPLOAD A LOGO OR AN IMAGE TO YOUR PROFILE

If you’re a blogger, get a good head-shot of yourself and use it as your profile picture. If you’re using Twitter to grow your brand, use your brand logo.

Remember that this image will accompany every tweet you send – so it needs to be good!

CREATE TWITTER LISTS

Lists are a way of curating the people that you follow on Twitter. If you follow a lot of people, it can be easy to get lost in the noise.

By creating lists, you can bring some order to the chaos.

You could have, for example, a ‘Marketing’ list, a ‘Sales’ people list, a ‘Thought leaders’ list and so on; each one populated only by people who tweet on those topics.

When you add someone to a list they get a notification – if they’re flattered, they might just follow you!

TWEET AND RETWEET INTERESTING CONTENT

Twitter moves fast - much faster than something like Facebook – and if you’re not interesting, nobody will listen. Keep up with industry news and tweet about things that pique your interest. Let people know when you do something new with your business.

If you don’t have one already, consider starting a company blog so you have interesting content to tweet out to your followers.

USE THE 80/20 PRINCIPLE

Twitter itself suggests that businesses follow what they call the 80/20 principle. That means that 80% of your tweets should focus on driving interactions with your

followers, using retweets, replies and likes.

Once you’ve built a rapport with your network, you can start a mix in direct offers or promotions that get followers to take actions, such as clicking on a link or making a

purchase from your website.

If you push too much, too soon, your followers will abandon you.

USE IMAGES

As on any platform, images are worth a thousand words. Show your followers behind-the-scenes of your business; show them your new product as you develop it;

show them the day-to-day of your business life.

If your followers feel that they know you, they’ll trust you.

DEFINE YOUR GOALS

Once you’ve dipped your toe into Twitter, it’s time to define some goals beyond ‘creating brand awareness’.

Create monthly goals – like increasing your followers or increasing the number of people who see your tweets, or increasing the number

of conversions that come via Twitter.

Then pursue them using all the tops we’ve covered. Use the Twitter analytics homepage to help you measure how you’re doing.

GOOD LUCK!