Founded in 2006, Twitter has become a veteran social media platform of the internet and powerful tool for celebrities and athletes to communicate and engage with their fanbases in succinct 280 character ‘tweets.’ Today, Twitter boasts 336 million users and counting, making it one of the largest social media networks globally. Beyond funny celebrity tweets and hashtags, Twitter can also be used as a powerful marketing tool for businesses and companies to connect with their customers and employees. More and more companies have been setting up Twitter accounts to better promote their brands and connect on a more personal level than ever with consumers. It can also be used to increase conversion rates, visibility, and website traffic for your business, if used correctly.
Here are some tips to make the most of opening a Twitter account for your business!
Communicating Directly
Twitter is an easy to use, direct, and wide-reaching method of keeping your followers up to date with your brand and engage directly with consumers. Your followers are allowed the option to reply to your tweets, and the poll tool on Twitter can allow for you to quite literally get a feel for your customer base opinions and wants concerning your brand.
Keeping up with Latest Trends in the Industry
A Twitter account can be a useful tool to closely watch trends in your industry. Doing a quick search on Twitter of a hashtag related to your business or industry can reveal a tons of quick links to profiles, blogs, and articles related to your field. The fast-moving pace of Twitter can allow you to keep up with trends, and make sure your business is evolving with the current trends of your field to remain competitive. You can also utilize the user-friendly and communication-based nature of Twitter to befriend your competitors and collaborate with them, or watch the recent trends they are applying to their own businesses and assess whether they have been successful.
Traffic to your Web Pages
Opening a Twitter account will increase your brand’s awareness. Twitter has a large user base, and using Twitter can help you reach a wider range of potential customers, and Twitter delivers and drives more traffic to your business’ website. Tweeting daily and often will increase your visibility and generate higher click rates.
You can catch your customers’ attention through special offers, announcements, or contests on your Twitter page, encouraging followers to engage with your website by driving followers to complete questionnaires on your website, sign up, or leave comments. If your special promotion is valuable or enticing, it can lead users to spread information about your business quickly throughout the platform through retweets and likes.
Networking
Reaching out to other profiles on Twitter is incredibly simple, whether you use the reply button, or the more personal direct message function to communicate. Using the search and hashtag functions can help you easily locate people in your community regarding your business, allowing you to easily network with strangers in a way that is accessible and easy. You can easily reach out to market influencers who may be able to promote your brand, and prove as valuable assets to your business.
Defining Your Brand
Twitter can be a useful tool to communicate and define your brand. The content you put out and the look and feel of the media you put out determines what people associate with your brand message. You can easily convey your brand message in the intuitive features of Twitter, through the language of your tweets and pictures you post on your profile, as well as your bio and cover image. The character limitation and fast-moving platform Twitter boasts allows for you to share your branded content frequently and rapidly. Engaging with your followers actively, and making sure you adhere to your brand message will help you stand out in the crowd.
For example, Arby’s Twitter page has adhered to a hilarious, referential sense of humor that has garnered the fast food company thousands of retweets and memes. Arby’s used to post more traditional, run-of-the-mill ad-based content, but as of recent, it has shifted its marketing strategy to post more creative images and animated GIFs referencing popular culture in movies, TV, anime, and video games through clever stop motion videos crafted through Arby’s food. Their switch from basic ads and almost cringe-worthy puns to a more unique, stop-motion marketing strategy struck a chord with their audience and helped them stand out among their fast-food competitors.
