Why do people think marketing on twitter is a good idea?

Twitter is a real-time information network where people can discover what’s happening in the world right now, share information instantly and connect with people and businesses around the globe.

Twitter is a global social networking platform that allows its users to send and read 140-character messages known as “tweets”.

However, the limitation of 140 characters has now been removed for the private conversations. Twitter enables registered users to read and post their tweets through the web, short message service (SMS), and mobile applications.

If you check your Direct Messages today, you may notice that something’s missing: the limitation of 140 characters. You can now chat on (and on) in a single Direct Message, and likely still have some characters left over.

While Twitter is largely a public experience, Direct Messages let you have private conversations about the memes, news, movements, and events that unfold on Twitter.

Each of the hundreds of millions of Tweets sent across Twitter every day is an opportunity for you to spark a conversation about what’s happening in your world.

This change in the limitation of characters for Direct Messages is another big step towards making the private side of Twitter even more powerful and fun.

You may be wondering what this means for the public side of Twitter. Well, it means nothing for the public side. Tweets will continue to have the limitation of 140 characters, but rich with commentary as well as photos, videos, links, Vines, gif’s, and emoji. However, sending and receiving Direct Messages via SMS will still be limited.

Twitter for business and marketing:

Twitter had more than 232 million active monthly users at the time of its SEC filing in early November 2013. About 53 million out of the 232 million were in the United States.

Since then the user base of Twitter has kept on increasing till date. This large user base makes Twitter potentially powerful marketing tool if you know how to use it.

With over 300 million monthly active users and 500 million Tweets sent every day, Twitter offers your business an opportunity to reach potential customers interested in what you have to offer.

What’s more, 80% of users on Twitter are accessing it via a mobile device. There is a real opportunity for businesses to reach potential customers no matter where they are or what they’re doing.

How your business can use Twitter?

Twitter has turned out to be much valuable to the various businesses across the Globe. The use of the Twitter for business marketing varies with different organizations. Here are a few suggestions for different ways your business could get value from Twitter:

1. Listen and learn.

You can find out what’s going on in your industry and what your customers are interested in. Then you can develop strategies based on the collected data to market your product/services that your business has got to offer. Use Twitter searches to listen to the relevant conversations that are happening and jump in where you can add value.

2. Drive awareness.

Raise the profile of your business and increase the impact of your marketing by using Twitter to regularly communicate with your followers. You can use the Twitter Ads feature provided by Twitter to advertise your business. Such advertising can help you extend your reach to the users worldwide.

3. Provide customer service.

73% of SMB Twitter users said Twitter provides them with a quick way to reply to customer service issues. Use it to quickly and easily respond to support queries and to develop a good reputation for your business and strong relationships with customers.

4. Connect with influencers.

Twitter breaks down the barriers and enables you to connect with anyone. It’s a great way of joining or even starting discussions with influencers and industry experts to raise the profile of your business and build valuable connections.

Different ways to market your business on Twitter

Optimize your Twitter bio:

Depicting your business and yourself positively on Twitter is very important. It attracts many users from across the globe. Make sure that you brand your company well on Twitter by creating a bio that provides clear information to the people about the identity of you and your company.

Include a link to your company’s website or a landing page and have a consistent tone that gives people a clear image of you and your company.

Find the influencers and experts in your target area(s) and interact with them on a regular basis:

Use Twitter search tool to find the like-minded prospects, customers, and influencers /media by searching keywords that relate to your industry.

Then follow and interact with them on a regular basis. Make a list of influential individuals in your space that includes journalists, potential customers, thought leaders, bloggers, and writers, etc and add them to a private Twitter list and engage with them daily.

Also, be casual and helpful while interacting with them. Do not be promotional. Build a relationship and then look for opportunities to collaborate.

Get your colleagues involved:

Make sure that your co-workers that help you build your brand are involved and are following you on Twitter and tweeting, re-tweeting and engaging in advertising your business.

Tweet regularly:

Regular tweeting shows that you are active and put your profile in a healthy position. Tweeting regularly keeps your business in the limelight. Your profile gets more public attention through regular tweeting. If you tweet only once a week or a month, then people will easily forget you and your brand.

Therefore, regular tweeting is recommended in order to successfully market your business. Also, make sure that you are tweeting relevant and useful information or content that your followers will read, retweet.

Ask for some Twitter love:

Ask followers to retweet, mention or favorite your tweets or to share content with a fresh tweet.

Track mentions and respond if appropriate:

Track the brand mentions and keywords to make sure you know what’s being said about you. And be sure to respond in a polite, professional manner if appropriate. “After all, customer service is the new marketing!” And many customers now post their product queries and complaints on Twitter.

Set up Twitter searches for terms relevant to your brand. Monitor the conversations in that search and jump into the conversations when appropriate.

Retweet:

Don’t be afraid to retweet as this will help link you with and cement your own thought leadership within your industry.

Follow trends/hashtags:

Look at the trending topics and hashtags and find a way to make a relevant connection to your brand. By putting your business among the trending topics, your handle will be seen when people search tweets regarding that particular hashtag. However, hashtags should be used sparingly, as they can be seen as ‘Twitter spam’ when overused or attached to irrelevant content.

Offer discounts or special deals to Twitter followers:

Run Twitter contests such as The next 50 people that retweet me will receive a coupon for 50 percent off or have people post pictures of themselves in the store or using the product and do a random drawing.

Integrate Twitter with your marketing efforts:

Twitter, like other social media platforms, is much more effective when integrated with your other marketing activities. For example, if you’re running a promotion or contest on Twitter, let your email subscribers know about it, as they are another customer base who have already let you know that they want to receive messages from you. Inversely, by occasionally tweeting out the link to your mailing list, you can also tap your Twitter base into your email content.

Pros and cons of Twitter marketing

Twitter Pros

Twitter is massive like other social media:

One of the main advantages Twitter is its large user base. Traditional marketing only caters to a fixed audience (e.g. regular magazine readers; TV viewers) while Twitter has the potential of reaching out to a very big audience that is totally unlimited in scope and reach – from around the globe.

Even if you are a small business with a unique niche, Twitter is big enough that you can find an audience. This big audience is the main reason why 92% of digital marketers highlighted generating more exposure for their brands or business with their use of Twitter and other social media.

Low cost of Twitter marketing:

Twitter marketing is cost-effective for the companies. One of the main advantages of Twitter Ads over traditional media advertising is the considerably lower cost that makes it very appealing for businesses.

Every tweet goes to your followers:

On Facebook, each post you make only goes out to some of your fans because of Facebook’s algorithm. On Twitter, unless you tweet directly to someone, each and every tweet goes to all of your followers.

Tweets are easy to create:

While many brands share links to longer content, a simple tweet takes less than a minute to write and send, but can still be very effective.

You can get to the point:

Since you are limited to 140 characters, you need to get to the point. On Twitter, you should still be polite, but you can be more direct than on other platforms.

Twitter marketing is fast:

If you have something to promote or have some news or fresh information that you would like to share or inform to your target markets, you can rely on Twitter Marketing for fast action and fast results in the form of tweets.

You can even synchronize your company’s website with your Twitter accounts, so automatic or fresh updates are immediately disseminated once you have something new available.

Good for customer Service:

Like most other social media, Twitter also helps in providing fast and effective customer service. Many customers spend time on social media channels and if they have something to say to a brand or a company, they would go through their social media page.

They would voice out their praises, suggestions and complaints through these channels, providing you with a highly interactive and very personal means of providing good customer services by listening and responding to what they have to say.

Twitter cons

Twitter is busy:

Twitter users generate 340 million tweets per day, and most users follow several hundred profiles. Because there is no Edge rank, if you only tweet once or twice a day, your tweets are quickly buried in your followers’ feeds.

Twitter marketing is Time consuming:

You need to spend a lot of time monitoring the Twitter handle of your company to know the trending topics and what the people have to say about your products/services. Also, you need to respond to the various queries that the customers may have tweeted. On an average about 6-7 Hrs. have to be spent monitoring your Twitter page.

Less control:

While you advertise your business online through Twitter, your publications can go viral in few minutes. It will be beneficial for you if that generates positive results. But some wrongs publications can pose a great threat in declining your companies image and spread negatives against your brand.

Twitter is not ideal for visual content:

Twitter is mostly text based. If you want to share a lot of photos, Pinterest or Instagram may be a better fit. (Even so, tweets that include a link to a photo have twice the engagement of tweets without a photo.)

You are limited to 140 characters: If you have trouble expressing your thoughts in just a few words, Twitter will be a challenge.

Not everyone can advertise:

While Twitter does allow for promoted tweets and profiles, you need to be approved by Twitter before you can use its promotion features.

Conclusion

Twitter is a great way to market your business online, If used correctly it can prove to be the most lethal weapons against your competition.