Twitter, the microblogging site that has taken over the internet, from huge celebrities to my dad, it would seem everyone is on Twitter these days and its popularity shows no sign of abating. The potential this site has for promotion and interaction with prospective customers is huge and I wanted to share a few simple tactics to help any new or faltering Twitter profiles start booming!
(1) Run a mini competition. Ask your followers a question and the first person that answers correctly gets a retweet of their choice on your profile. A great way to engage with your followers and give people something in return for their interaction. This tactic is sure to ensure you will get some responses. This works especially well as your profile and following begins to grow; that retweet to a massive follower base will be extremely desirable.
(2) Get people to retweet a specific tweet. Out of the retweeters, randomly select a winner to receive a freebie, be it a service or product. All these retweets will get your company names out to potentially hundreds or thousands of new potential customers. Tetley Tea Folk (@tetley_teafolk) do this to great effect with their #freeteafriday, giving away a year’s supply of tea every week.
(3) Don’t just tweet about your products and services; include links to interesting blog posts, news stories, and even videos and music. Incorporate your personality into your company’s Twitter account. It always helps to have one person being the resident tweeter to give their own personality to the account or even several different people that identify themselves when they tweet. Different personalities can shine through and you will never be short of things to say!
(4) Make sure your twitter bio clearly illustrates who you are and what you do. Through your bio people will make a snap judgment as to whether to follow or engage with you so it is worth spending a bit of time working on these 140 characters to ensure they reflect your company in the best possible way.
(5) Talk to people! I know this seems self-explanatory but so frequently people forget to engage, instead just firing tweets off without listening to people and responding; if you are not interacting with anyone, how do you know they are listening?
These few really simple tactics can prove extremely effective when creating an online presence on Twitter, but another important thing to bear in mind is to tweet regularly. It is all too easy to forget to tweet for a couple of weeks and when you come back to your profile some fickle followers have abandoned you when it looks like the tweets have dried up. It may seem like a hassle at the time but in the long run, keeping up a steady trickle of tweets is essential to keep your Twitter presence alive.
So go on, give these tactics a go and see if they work for you! If you have any tips, suggestions or tried and tested techniques please leave a comment, I’m always on the hunt for new twitter tactics to try!