How to Create and Manage a Twitter Account for your Business

Although many SMBs are aware of social media sites such as Twitter, they’re not necessarily using them for business purposes, according to the Optus Social Media Index for SMBs report.

While 91 per cent of survey respondents are aware of Twitter, only 27 per cent use it for business. Why is this? Could understanding how the tool works be a barrier to implementing it as part of a SMBs marketing plan?

Let’s review what Twitter is about and how it can help your business.

Like Facebook, Twitter is another social media tool to consider in your marketing mix, to help you expand your reach, advertise your business and create brand advocacy.

Twitter is about conversations. It’s about finding the people talking about you or items related to your business and what you sell or have to offer, and forming relationships with them – all in messages, called ‘tweets’, that are limited to 140 characters each. Tweets are publicly visible by default on the author’s profile. Users may subscribe to other authors’ tweets¬ – this is known as following and subscribers are known as followers.

To tweet or not to tweet

Should you be tweeting and what are you going to tweet about? This is where some strategic planning comes into place before even starting a Twitter account. What are you trying to achieve by tweeting? Will it:

• Increase sales?
• Develop deeper relationships with existing customers?
• Get you on the radar of potential new customers?
• Provide information on your service or new promotions or sales?
• Give you credibility as a trusted advisor in an online community?

Thinking about your objectives will help you better understand the type of information you should be tweeting, and whether tweeting is going to help you achieve your business goals.
Another key consideration is how your Twitter profile will integrate with your existing marketing and other social media activities.

Large organisations have dedicated staff focusing solely on customer care and community management in social media, particularly Twitter. As a SMB owner, your time is precious and your employees already have multiple responsibilities. So you need to ensure that you keep your social media plan on track without derailing other responsibilities; your plan needs to be tight and customised.

Getting started on Twitter

Twitter has a great step by step guide on how to create an account. First off:

1. Sign up – head over to the signup page, and fill out the four fields and click on ‘Create my account’.
2. You will then be at your accounts page – next click on Settings to fill out more information on your company. Don’t forget to check out the Picture tab and upload your logo or business image. On the Design tab, you can upload a background image for your Twitter home page and tweak the page colors.
3. Find relevant people and businesses to follow – use the search box on your Twitter page to look for your target audience or other organisations/individuals you would like to network with or follow. The Advanced Search feature in Twitter allows SMBs to search for specific keywords located near a particular locale. This tool will allow you to narrow down and find your target audience in your area, and position yourself as an expert with your local community.
4. Post a message! As you type, the counter on the upper-right corner of the box guides you down from 140 characters. When you’ve got a message ready to go, hit Update to post it (pressing Enter won’t do the trick). Make sure your message is relevant to your target audience. Don’t forget to interact with your followers and other conversations happening on Twitter, jump into conversations to bring relevant insights, to answer to open questions and to offer help.

Tips and tricks

When you have a moment, it really pays off to spend some time reviewing the user information on the Twitter website. There are some great tips and tricks to help you make the most of your Twitter business experience, such as:

• Twitter 1010 – A special guide to the world of Twitter
• Learn the lingo – Retweets (RT), hashtags (#), @username messages and others explained
• Best practices – Tips on improving your Twitter experience
• Case studies – See how other organisations are using Twitter successfully for their business

Spread the word and market yourself!

Research shows that consumers trust the opinions of people they know more than anyone else, and word of mouth marketing is a common and important tool that many SMBs rely on to grow their business.

A very powerful tool within Twitter to help you promote your business is Retweeting. Retweets are Twitter’s word of mouth marketing. A retweet is when one individual copies a tweet from someone in their network and shares it with their network. It is a stamp of approval for your content. A person within your network thought it was important enough to share it with their followers – causing it to spread from one network to the next – instant word of mouth marketing!

Also, don’t forget to link to your Twitter page from your website, other social media tools (such as YouTube or Facebook) and email campaigns. Make sure you include your Twitter profile (along with other social media tools) in your email signature and on your website to let people know where you are in the social media space. Your Twitter account is now part of your overall marketing activities and should be given attention and maintained as appropriate.

Remember, social media is all about conversations and interacting with your audience. Twitter is not just a one way information channel. So don’t treat it as a broadcast mechanism, engage and converse with your audience.

Tracking and measuring your business account

As with any marketing plan, it is important to regularly review and see what is working well and what isn’t. The Measure the value of Twitter section on the Twitter site gives you some tips on how to measure your campaigns and account.

There are many online tools, free and paid resources that will help you measure the success of your Twitter account, such as:

• twInfluence: This tool helps you to monitor how many of your followers are actually listening to your messages. It helps to track the rate at which your campaign is growing among other metrics.
• Twitalyzer: Analyses your Twitter account’s popularity and how many times your messages are being referred to. This tool also lets you tie into Google analytics. Logging into your Analytics account, you can track all the information about the traffic that is redirected from Twitter.
• TweetEffect: Allows you to find out how many people are responding and reacting to your posts. This helps you identify what is and what isn’t resonating with your followers.

Pick what works best for you

Social media presents a powerful opportunity for SMBs to connect more closely with existing customers and build relationships with prospects. As a busy SMB owner, it is important for you to understand the most popular tools and see if one or two of them are appropriate to incorporate into your marketing mix. You do not have to engage every single tool. The trick is to navigate through the clutter and find the ones that will help you engage new customers and work best for you (without letting it take over your life).

Find out how Optus can help you build your business with a great range of solutions designed for business builtforbusiness.com.au .

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