Archive for October, 2009
14 Insane Twitter Tips For Business
-by Kim Redd
Recently, I have found myself passionately sharing Twitter advice with not only clients, but with friends, colleagues, neighbors, and even strangers. Some think I am iNSaNe over this “twitter thing”. What better reason to write a post!
As a business, you have three main goals when it comes to Social Media: Monitor your brand, build your brand, and increase sales of your brand. Twitter is just one facet of Social Media. Here is what I share with my clients…and strangers…and now you!
14 Insane Twitter Tips For Business: What I Tell My Clients
1. Follow everyone back…yes even the porn stars! Unless someone offends you, spams you, or uses foul language, follow them back. It’s courteous and will win you more followers (i.e. customers/prospects) organically. Do you care about what your customers are saying? Then show it by following them back.
2. Change the avatar to your head shot. Yes, YOU! Choose a picture where you have a big smile. People buy from people they like, not companies. Humanize your business. It’s the only way to succeed on Twitter. IMPORTANT: Once you select your avatar, do not change it. It becomes your personal brand.
3. Put YOUR name in the Profile. It’s okay to keep the Company or Brand name as the name that shows up next to the Avatar. This will help you build your personal brand as well as your company brand. If you are worried about stalkers, don’t use your last name.
4. Engage your followers. Talk to them. Cultivate them. First rule of Social Media is “be interested, not interesting”. Have you reached out directly to any of them yet? This is a huge opportunity to interact with your customers/prospects. Don’t blow it.
5. Find more followers. A following of 28 is not going to increase traffic in your stores or on your website. Run searches to see who is chatting about your brand and your industry. Start following them. Begin following the competition, other marketers, and Twitter superstars. As you interact with each of these segments you will see your following grow naturally.
6. Listen. Have ongoing searches running for your brand, company, industry, and pertinent topics. Stay on the pulse. Nip issues in the bud. Offer advice when questions are asked. Great opportunity to make a good impression.
7. Be Active. Tweet at least once a day but not more than 10/day (unless you are having a conversation: then it’s okay to go over the threshold of 10). You need to commit time each day to actively listen and tweet.
8. Be thankful. Thank those that Retweet (RT) your tweets. Always give RT credit if you RT another tweep. Thank those that recommend you on #FollowFriday.
9. DO NOT USE AUTO DIRECT MESSAGES. Nothing bothers tweeps more than auto DM’s filling up their inbox. It’s okay to auto-follow for complete coverage, but please don’t send impersonal automated messages. You will be unfollowed and/or blocked. That won’t help your brand.
10. DO NOT use DMs for pitching products or special offers! Do I really need to expand on this concept?
11. Tweet conservatively. The internet is permanent. Don’t say anything you wouldn’t want posted on a billboard in front of your home and/or office.
12. Compliment others, generously. If you see a great tweet with interesting articles about your industry, marketing, etc give the tweep kudos by retweeting their tweet. This will help build your following and your credibility. Great way to make new Twitter friends and build your brand.
13. Schedule a Tweet Up in your area or attend one. By meeting other tweeps, marketers, prospects you can gain insight, advice, and/or possibly new drinking buddies. Look for local folks to follow. Same applies when you are traveling for business.
14. INSTALL TWEETDECK! If you haven’t already done so download it now. http://tweetdeck.com It’s a fantastic way to organize your followers and conversations. Use it in addition to twitter.com
WARNING: These tips are MY opinions and there are other schools of thought out there.
FEEDBACK: Let me know which tips are your favorites, how many you found helpful, and which ones suck. It’s okay to disagree with me too… just tell my why. Send me an @reply or leave a comment here.
Watching out for you, one tweet at a time -TwitterWatchDog
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Paid To Tweet: The Good, The Bad, And The Iffy
Paid To Tweet
-by Nile Flores
Paid to tweet or sponsored tweets have been something that has popped up majorly in the past year, especially since Twitter (Twitter) has really exploded onto the mainstream. Basically paid to tweet is as it says. Usually you will get the final say on what goes through your own social network stream and all these sites require full disclosures, which is great since the laws on endorsements have changed for both bloggers and social network users. Below I have listed a few sites that offer these services for user looking to make a little cash. Although I may have an account with each, none of them contain my referral. If you plan to join, and like to use my referral, please ask me via my contact form and I will send my referral link.
RevTwt (RevTwt): I have really never been paid by RevTwt, though I do not doubt their services. The problem is that their opportunities come in increments below $1 per tweet. Even their cost per followers is quite low, which makes it almost impossible to make anything with this service.
Twittad (Twittad): Twittad has both paid to tweet services and also replacing twitter backgrounds with full ads. The user can submit and search topics that are relevant to their Twitter stream conversations and choose ads which best fit. The payout is okay, but nothing to impress. Opportunities for those who stay true to their interests may not be lucky as those who do not give a care.
Post Videos to Twitter Using Screenr
Screenr
-by James Roughton
I just found this nice on-line video recording software called screenr (Screenr). There are no downloads required and you can record on your PC or Mac. You can also play your videos anywhere on the web and also on your iPhone.
You can record a 5 min video and then post it directly to Twitter. No editing required. Basically, you can record anything that you see on the screen.
There is a 1 min tutorial on the front page of the site that will provide you a great overview. The nice thing about it is that the site will store your videos and when someone clicks on your Twitter posting, they will be linked to screenr and will be able to see your posted video.
You can follow me on Twitter @ jamesroughton or safeday
Watching out for you, one tweet at a time.. -TwitterWatchDog
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What’s the Scoop on Twitter?
What’s the Scoop on Twitter?
- by Timothy Caron
While doing a search on Google for “what’s the latest scoop on twitter” i found a website called Twitscoop (twitscoop) which keeps you up to date on the latest trends on Twitter.
Twitscoop boasts, that you can
Receive, send tweets, and find new friends instantly, without ever reloading your page. Search and follow what’s buzzing on twitter in real-time. Benefit from useful features you’ll find nowhere else.
1) Watch the trends live on the cloud, tweet from your account
2) Multi-tab search and graphs
3) Twitpic images on the fly
4) Never reload your page
5) Track bit.ly Stats
6) Follow Stocks
I did do a brief search for “website design help” through it’s search feature and was amazed at the amount of people that need help in that area.
If you’re an online business owner looking for work in this down economy, this might be a good tool for you to try out.
Watching out for you, one tweet at a time.
Follow Timothy Caron (Timothy Caron) on Twitter.
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Tweet Alarm
Tweet Alarm
- by James Roughton
Did you know that you can get an alert in your email when someone tweets about your company, your product, or anything that interests you? Did I mention that it is FREE?
Tweet Alarm (Tweet Alarm) is a simple system. Once you sign up, you can create your alerts. Note that I have set alerts for Social Media and Social Networking. At the bottom of the page you can decide on the frequency that you want to see the emails:
- Daily
- Weekly
- Twice per day
- As often as you find tweets
You can follow me on Twitter @ jamesroughton or safeday .
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Breaking: Twitter makes Deal with Google and Bing
Tweets, Updates and Search, Oh My!
Just a little over 1 week ago TwitterWatchDog reported
“Do Twitter and Google have a deal? Well the deal didn’t take long and it includes Bing too~.
Here’s the skinny:
It’s official: Microsoft has inked deals with Facebook and Twitter.
Twitter integration is coming first, it’s live and in beta.
You can access it at Bing.com/Twitter. Facebook will come later.
From the Google blog:
Given this new type of information and its value to search, we are very excited to announce that we have reached an agreement with Twitter to include their updates in our search results. We believe that our search results and user experience will greatly benefit from the inclusion of this up-to-the-minute data, and we look forward to having a product that showcases how tweets can make search better in the coming months. That way, the next time you search for something that can be aided by a real-time observation, say, snow conditions at your favorite ski resort, you’ll find tweets from other users who are there and sharing the latest and greatest information.
Please leave us your comments~
(Do you think Twitter is taking over online? What does this
mean for the future of search? Likes/dislikes?)
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