Tweeting for Business

A webinar about TwitterAnnmarie Hanlon, Evonomie

http://twitter.com/annmariehanlon

Agenda

• Who uses Twitter and why?• What can Twitter do for my business?• How can I use Twitter for research?• What can I Tweet about? • How do I get people to follow me?• What is ‘Tagging tweets’ and ‘Retweeting’• How do I get traffic to my site?• What software can manage Twitter?

Who uses Twitter and why?

Celebrities & Politicians Recruiters

Journalists & PR people Some big brandsSmall businesses Local councils

People working from home

Marketing people Sports clubsAnd some very strange people

What can Twitter do for my business?

• Direct access to journalists• Access to customers who may not take your call• Opportunity to meet clients on the doorstep• Drive traffic to your blog or website• Get your message across to a wider audience• Provide customer service• Test new products• Build mailing lists• Be ‘re-tweeted’ to thousands of people

How can I use Twitter for research?

• Research your Company and Competition• Ask questions to your followers – ask them to RT

to get more potential responders• http://hashtags.org shows the latest topics• http://nearbytweets.com find customers nearby• http://www.twibes.com groups• http://tweetzi.com search engine

What can I tweet about?

• New products or services (not hard sell)• Adding pics of products or services• New blog posts• Something useful to share• When you get compliments• To make compliments• Repeat someone else’s tweet (re-tweet)

How do I get people to follow me?

• It’s not a business card competition!• Quality rather than quantity• Use Twitter advanced search to find people• Look at the followers of relevant people• http://wefollow.com and get listed• http://www.whoshouldifollow.com• Retweet and thank retweeters

What is ‘Tagging tweets’ and ‘Retweeting’

• A tag is like an electronic highlighter pen, it makes it easier to spot on a page when you’re searching later

• Hashtags # are used to #tag tweets– #interior design news or #marketing update

• Retweeting is like forwarding an email to all– RT @annmariehanlon this is a retweet example

How do I get traffic to my site?

• Tweet when you have blogged (include link)

• Respond to other questions, using your blog or website as an example

• Add Twitter address to website, email address, business cards

What software can manage Twitter?

• We use Tweetdeck– Retweet (RT), shrink

URLs, also monitor and add to our Facebook page and easily Direct Message (DM)

• http://tweetdeck.com

• And Hootsuite– To post Tweets later

• http://hootsuite.com

What not to do?

• Once the toothpaste is out of the tube you really can’t get it back in

• It’s there forever• Don’t rant; searches include negative and

positive• If someone upsets you, simply ‘unfollow’

Quick wins

• Decide what you want from Twitter– Customer service– Raise profile– Build customer base– Increase contacts– Drive traffic to website

or blog– Promote time limited

offers

• Agree identity – Corporate or personal,

or two accounts?– Biography (160

characters)– Background

• Decide how to manage– Hootsuite– Tweetdeck

Twitter shorthand

• @username + messageThis sends a tweet to another person which can be seen by their followers – e.g. @annmariehanlon

we’re at the NEC today

• D username + messageA D or DM sends a person a direct (private) message– e.g. D joannaakins running

late, delays in Brum

• WHOIS username Type whois into your Twitter box and it shows the short biography of the person – e.g. whois joannaakins

• GET usernameFind the latest Twitter update posted by the person, but if they have not tweeted for a while it can take sometime – e.g. get elfordhomes

Useful links

• http://twittonary.com• http://business.twitter.com/twitter101/learning• http://tweetmeme.com/about/retweet_button• http://twitpic.com• http://wefollow.com• http://tweetdeck.com• http://hootsuite.com

Follow us & stay up to date

• http://business2businessmarketing.blogspot.com• http://www.evonomie.net/• http://www.linkedin.com/in/annmariehanlon• http://twitter.com/annmariehanlon• http://twitter.com/joannaakins