Wednesday, November 2, 2011

[Online Marketing] Twitter Tips from User Perpective


With every other organization jumping on the twitter band-wagon, it becomes intimidating for an organization to join on twitter.  Many of them simply don’t join in as it is a new medium and they want to keep things as is. However, once the competition start leveraging the power of twitter, the reality dawns and then it is just too late. So given here are few of tips that can help in reducing some of the initial jitters:

  1. Twitter is a medium of communication. That is the most important concept that needs to be understood for any organization. Whatever the organization tweets, it becomes a press statement. As just as for any other medium of communication (digital, print, etc), you need to ensure the communication remains consistent with your values and mission.
  2. The initial set of users is the set with whom you are very closely associated with. You need to nurture them as they become your voice moving forward and they become the cause for the newer set of users.
  3. The depth of all relationships depends on the extent of mutual respect. Honestly appreciate your suppliers or customers on any improvement in process or any implementation of good strategy. Even a slightly better product from them should not go unappreciated.
  4. It is a communication medium. So you need to engage your followers. Some of the organizations that I have observed tend to only promote their brand and only post promotional news. This turns off your followers. Occasional branding is fine though. Your users are reading your tweets in their timeline. That is a sacred space. They want something useful for them in their timeline. It also shows your respect for their timeline. Spamming with tweets is an absolutely no-no. For example, if you are mobile manufacturer having Android as the OS you can post the tips and tricks of using the phone to the users. Users will like these kinds of update and they will do Re-Tweet (RT). The tweet and your brand spread.
  5. @<Your Handle> is the only way users can send their feedback. This is the simplest form of getting feedback about your product / service. Monitor this. A prompt response to the feedback makes the user feel valued and will post more such feedback and thus helping you improve your product / service as per customer needs.
  6. Get the twitter stream mentioning your organization’s name on to your website. This will help your future customers know the kind of chatting happening on the twitter about your organization. You future customers will get a sense of security when they can see what people are saying about you on the net. Do this only if you are managing each of the feedback actively. Also getting this done will require some development effort, although very minimal.
  7. Twitter gives “Follow” button and “Tweet” button. Follow button helps the new customers read about your new posts. If properly managed, this helps in building trust. If you are publishing any insightful articles about your product or the industry in general, the tweet button will help you increase your reach substantially. There are others from Google (g+), Facebook. But none can compare with the reach Twitter has.
  8. Do Re-Tweet the posts where you have been appreciated. These appreciations are more valuable as they come from your customers or industry peers and thus resonate with your current and future customers.
  9. If it is a small organization, you can give your employees the freedom to tweet about you. Good and happy feedback from them shows the culture that you have as an organization. Transparency will be the first and most important quality will be show-cased which will help in building trust. This on the other hand challenges you to listen to both your customer as well as your employees. If taken positively, it can transform your organizational culture and thus increase your brand-value among your customers. However, caution must be exercised as this can act as a double-edged sword and can backfire. Start-ups where people are dedicated for the success of it can implement this strategy easily.
  10. Ensure you have only one twitter handle. People have short memories. They cannot remember different handles for each of your different product line. They want to give feedback and quick. Having a single handle helps them in remembering your twitter and in turn will help you in getting timely feedback. 

To summarize, tweeting is a form of communication with your customers, employees, and stakeholders all at once. So all the principles of communication apply and you need to be sure what you want to communicate to them. If managed well, it can become the most powerful tool to increase your business.
To get more information on twitter please refer the link here. For a detail on twitter words, please refer the twitter glossary

This post was first published here.

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