Mixing Twitter In Your Business.. How?

Twitter may have become to be one of the best modern marketing tool that an entrepreneur can use nowadays to market almost anything in any niche, but ironically Twitter is also one of the lesser-known technological tools in marketing. However, its potential as an instrument of direct marketing can be enormous if we exploit the most resources out of it.
Chris Bogan, one of the U.S. online marketing gurus has published a guide on how companies of all sizes can improve their customer relationships and increase sales, thanks to Twitter, a loaded marketing tool for the future.
Before explaining how to use Twitter in your company, it is worth clarifying some basic concepts. Twitter, in its "stupid" online application look that many describe as "nonsense" is being used by more and more companies to do business. Obviously, not all sectors lend themselves to use this microblogging tool as a marketing tool, which offers excellent results in the oriented world of communications, advertising, design and art. 

Getting Started 

The first thing to do is to open an account with this service, but you should have in mind the following aspects:
    Check for the usernames that your competitors are already using and advertising, also do your homework and search terms or keywords by which a user could find your company or business. As in other online services is essential to have a good list of tags.
Then choose the photo you will illustrate in your account. At this point, it is worth remembering that the image should be illustrative of what you represent as a company. Sometimes people use their corporate logo. Other times, it is more appropriate to perform a unique design just for Twitter, to be more attractive.
Have lots of caution sending out 'Tweets' with no valuable information and don't become a spammer sending out sales tweets and personal interest tweets. People quickly get tired of users with such behavior so whenever you send out a 'Tweet' think on your followers interests, think in what they like and go through their tweets to know them better. Twitter is interacting with whom we read, we must think about who we read, what their interests are, what they care about, in short, be very clear about the profile of our potential readers / customers= Followers.
In this sense, a Twitter account gives you a lot of freedom to discuss aspects of your industry, your competitors (always refer to them in Twitter in friendly terms), the market overview and other points of interest created. It is also an effective tool in managing claims and complaints. That is, if you perceive that a complaint is repeated with some insistence, your company can use this channel, either for an apology or to provide an effective solution.
An important trend that many U.S.A companies are using and it really makes a lot of difference is to promote the work of their employees and congratulate them through this service. This makes the reader perceive that 'x' or 'y' company really cares about their employees and that they are not just numbers but real people. In this case the human factor is really enhanced.  

  What should we "tweet"? 

 When you first start using Twitter for the first time you will often ask yourself, "What I'm I doing now?". Answering this question may be very valid for personal accounts, but has little value in the business perspective. Instead, it is much more effective to respond to another question: "What is it that's capturing my attention now?"
You can put in charge a person to be responsible for the Twitter account of your company, but I'd be more ideal if this task is shared among several trustful employees. That way you information will be much more dynamic, updated and varied. Again, we stress the importance of human factors in this type of communication.
 In Twitter one should not only be able to inform but also to ask. Asking questions to your followers = (Leads) is an excellent way to see what their concerns are and how you can improve your customer service in your company, attracting this way even more organic followers on the way.
Like a good "tweetizen", we also have the "duty" to follow other "tweetizens" back. At first it may be difficult to determine who should you follow but, as in everything else, just do a good predetermination job. Start following people who have interesting things to say about your company or business, follow those on topics that interest you as the head of your company, regardless of your sales or market share. In this sense, you can enrich yourself about what other people say, proving once again to your followers the great human being that there's behind your company.
If you tweet about your products, do so but do it in a very constructive way. That is, provide information that is actually useful, not pure advertising. This is a very important aspect that you should take care of very carefully. Furthermore, it is much less useful if you promote your products in excess like a spammer. Remember that Twitter is a wide open communication channel, It's not a Sales Channel.

Notice to Twitter Users
 

  Twitter can be very stressful if you want to follow in "real time". So, here are some tips for working with this modern marketing tool without investing too much time:

• You don't have to read all the messages published in the accounts you follow. 
• No need to respond to all the tweets that you read.
• Use Twitter tools like to find out what followers are talking about your business. 
• Applications such as Tweetdeck and Twhirl allow the use of Twitter to be more simpler.
• Do not use Twitter while all your co-workers are stressed out doing more important things. 
• Learn to use tools that shorten the length of links, like TinyURL.
• Discussing the tweets of other followers is a great way to build a community.

Some (few) downsides of using Twitter in business

• Mastering and properly managing Twitter takes more time than you think, that's why lots of people buy Twitter followers. 
• Spending much time on this tool takes away time from other tasks that can be more productive. 
• If you do not have a clear strategy on what you want: tweet / get, using Twitter is useless. 
• Twitter does not replace your company's customer service, merely complements it. 
• It is a tool that has bugs, and is not designed specifically for the business world. 
• Our potential followers will be largely, geeks or people who are really excited on new technologies. 
• With Twitter you can open your company to be an easier target of direct criticism and complaints.

Really positive aspects of Twitter

• It is a very useful tool for customer loyalty. 
• You will almost instantly know the generalized state & opinion about your company / products.  
• You can direct the attention of your followers towards the strength of your company. 
• It is a very effective tool in resolving complaints, claims and incidents. 
• It's a great direct marketing tool, if used with knowledge. 
• The information you provide on this channel always comes faster than using other means. 
• Great tool to learn what other people are doing & saying so you as a company can improve.

    Empower and develop your business online presence mixing Twitter in your business. 

Have something to say about Twitter? Go ahead and give us your sincere feedback and thanks for stopping by... 
@addfollowers_us