With Dell’s recent announcement of making $3,000,000 using Twitter your business should be considering it as a viable sales option.
However, if that kind of money isn’t enough to convince you to start using the micro blogging service for your business, here’s 10 more reasons to get on board.
#1 Gain Exposure
Twitter is a great way to gain exposure for your business, product, or service.
You’ll be interacting with thousands of people who have yet to discover you, and what you do.
Imagine being able to tell 1000, 5000, 20000 people or more what you do, and all at one time…with Twitter you can.
#2 Build Trust
The more people interact with you, see what your character is made of, the more they will trust you.
Getting to know the human side of your business is a great way to build trust in yourself, your brand, and your business.
#3 Generate Leads
There are literally millions of people using Twitter day in and day out…some of them are bound to be interested in what you do.
Twitter offers an opportunity to expose them to your business, and generate interest in what it is you sell.
#4 Drive Traffic
As you build trust and community, you can occasionally send your followers links back to your site, promotion, or offer.
If done correctly, Twitter can drive hundreds of hits a day to your website. Now that’s a good thing!
#5 Provide Stellar Customer Service
Some of the biggest brands in the world have figured out a very powerful aspect of Twitter, and that is in providing stellar customer service through the medium.
Since you have access to real time communications you can do immediate service recovery, and turn someone’s frown upside down.
#6 Expand Your Network
You’ll be interacting with a diverse group of people on Twitter, more diverse than you could possibly hope to interact with in the offline world. This is an advantage to growing your network, and getting many different perspectives.
#7 Get Feedback
Twitter is a real time conversation and as such it provides a real time mechanism for getting feedback. Bouncing questions off your followers asking for their ideas and suggestions is a gold mine worth tapping into.
#8 Market Research
Using the search functions within Twitter there is an unprecedented opportunity to do market research as it’s unfolding.
You’ll be able to key in on what people are looking for, what they think of certain products and services, and what they would consider buying.
#9 Testimonial Tool
Twitter is a great way to get testimonials about what it is you do.
The viral nature of Twitter makes the best of these testimonials spread like wild fire, and reinforce the idea that you don’t suck – instant social proof!
#10 Build Authority
As you become a trusted friend to your community you will undoubtedly build authority.
The benefits to being the authority on a subject are vast, not the least of which higher conversions, more pricing power, and higher customer satisfaction
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Good article. I have personally experienced most all of these factors in my usage of Twitter for my company Great America Networks Conferencing. In my opinion, it is the ultimate form of Inbound Marketing, and building a real presence for your company.
As for Inbound Marketing, having a good Twitter client such as TweetDeck (http://tweetdeck.com/beta) is a must. you can set certain terms relevant to your industry and then reply to people that use them. Often I am able to find people looking for conferencing services very easily this way, and engage them directly in real time, while the thought is still in their mind.
As for creating a presence for your company, this is more difficult, and time consuming. It involves using Twitter for anything but business. Tweeting items that are relevant to the happenings of your business is a must, as is letting insight into the happenings of your own life, within reason. Showing people that you are a real person, and that your company is made of real people, goes a long way in building a relationship and trust. This is something that takes time and cannot just be done right away, but the effort it worth it.
Anthony Russo
Conferencing Consultant
Great America Networks Conferencing
arusso@ganconference.com
http://www.ganconference.com
http://blog.ganconference.com/
Skype: anth.russo
Twitter: @AnthonyRusso
Fantastic tips! These all are uncontroversial and should be rather obvious. It’s nice to see them consolidated into one short article. Thanks!
Matt,
My slo-growth/interactive Twitter strategy is starting to pay off. One, possibly two big writing projects as a direct result of using Twitter.
George
@Stephen
You’re right, these are the easy ones. Not as complicated as one may originally think, and a lot of bang for your buck here.
Matt
@Tumblemoose
You’re a great example of what building trust, authority, and relationships can do for you on Twitter.
Matt
We’re trying different approaches even though we’re a small wine shop, but we’re doing a lot on Facebook & Twitter – we just launched a promotion for someone to win a B&B Dream Vacation along the Blue Ridge Parkway yesterday to see how very small “mom & pops” can use social media to get the sort of results that the big guys like Queensland and Goode are doing. We’ll see if people are as competitive to get a vacation as they are to get a job. More info here: http://whyineedabreak.ning.com
Yes the twitter craze continues! So many business are able to capitalize on this growing social outlet. It’s a great way to put yourself out there amongst the millions of users, yes getting exposure is an obvious benefit! Along with that you are able to generate leads and traffic, talk about expanding the network. Yes you’ll be putting yourself out there amongst thousands of people you wouldn’t be able to reach otherwise. Diversity, YES! Why wouldn’t you want to profit from joining such a large-scale community!
-Randy
I was just in a LinkedIn discussion about IF people should be using Twitter or FaceBook. First, I’m amazed that people can take the attitude of “I don’t understand it, so it can’t work” and second people only want to use a social networking site to instantly make money. Instantly make money is a sales page, no social networking site is really intended to do that.
People proposed FaceBook, LinkedIn and MySpace as better solutions than Twitter. Funny, to me each has a target audience and if your target uses one and not the other, then use that one.
Here is part of the text I posted:
Here is an interesting post written by a gent that I know on the 10 Reasons Why Your Business Should be Using Twitter ( http://smallbizbee.com/index/2009/06/13/10-reasons-business-twitter ) that explains what (most) people should be using Twitter for. Please note that this does not mean that using Twitter is a vote against FaceBook or any other site.
I think the 10 reasons Gain Exposure, Build Trust, Generate Leads, Drive Traffic and so on are essentially pre-sales. If you reach the point where you are making money right off the bat from Twitter, LinkedIn or FaceBook I’d love to see the marketing plan you used.
None of the 10 directly put cash in your pocket and I don’t really think that any social media/networking site is intended to line your pockets.
@Scott
I think there is a lot of advantage to being “small”…you can provide that attention to detail, customer service, and relationship that some of the “big guys” have a hard time with. Sounds like you are on to something!
Thanks for coming by,
Matt
@Gas Cards
You got it. Lots of expsosure among other benefits to using Twitter.
Matt
@McLaughlin
Me and you see eye to eye on this one. First off, social media isn’t an “either or” proposition. If you use Facebook, it doesn’t mean Twitter isn’t necessary. If you’re on LinkedIn it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be on Myspace. Each have their own audience, and usefulness as part of a Social Media Strategy (I’d bold and underline that if I could). And I’d argue you should be using more than one of the above. Also, social media is the begining of a long conversation with your “target audience”, it’s not a sales page like you say. It will not immediately put money in your pocket, but if you take the time to have the conversation with your target customers – when it comes time to buy do you think they are coming to you, or some faceless/nameless outlet? My bet is they come to you because they know you, have a relationship with you, and trust you won’t rip them off.
When you take time to build that you have customers that are happier, more loyal, and will pay a premium for your personalized service (thus you’re no longer competing on price with the Wal Marts and Costco’s of the world). It’s the same reason I shop at Farmer’s Markets…yeah I pay a little more for my tomatoes, but I get to talk to the guy who grew them, I feel like I know him so I don’t mind paying a bit more for it. He talks to me every week whether I buy or not…if I don’t buy, he doesn’t stop asking me how it’s going. He’s selling to me over the long run, using personalization and customer service to do it.
The same holds true with social media. You use social media as part of a larger strategy that revolves around more than just “making the sale”, you build the relationships and familiarity and sales will follow.
Matt
ow does big business use services like twitter successfully? How do they measure success and what mistakes have been made along the way?
@Elly
Good questions. Here’s an example of big businesses using Twitter:
http://smallbizbee.com/index/2009/06/12/making-2000000-on-twitter-look-easy/
And to get you started using it for your biz:
http://smallbizbee.com/index/maximize-twitter-business-free/
Hope this helps,
Matt
Twitter is great for boosting our business exposure and if will be use the proper way, will also drive us traffic and potential customers. There is only one thing I wish for Twitter, it should maintain and preserve its integrity. That is to have a powerful feature that will get rid of abusive users.
@Vic
Yes, it’s a great tool to drive traffic and connect with potential customers. Regarding the abusive users, we always have the choice not to follow them…which is what makes it great. Everything we see we are opting in for, if we don’t like what they do *click* unfollow.
Thanks for coming by,
Matt
Good tips – thanks – always interested in reading what others are summarizing for benefits. The one that I focus on as well that isn’t directly listed here, but fits nicely, is LOYALTY.
At the end of the day, building trust and relationships with people has to end up somewhere that is of benefit to both parties – that end state is Loyalty. With loyalty, all the benefits of WOM, referrals, references, etc. kick into high gear. Social Media, and especially Twitter, give you the ability to build great loyalty through your interactions.
Just a thought to add – maybe its the “Top 11 List”?? Thanks.
Blaine
@Blaine
Loyalty would be a great addition to the list and is certainly a benefit. Maybe I’ll do “Another 10 Reason’s Your Business Should be Using Twitter” post in the near future!
Thanks for the input,
Matt
Great article, thanks. We are just beginning to use Twitter as a company and this post really shows both the reasons we should be using it as well as additional aspects we can utilize that we haven’t thought of. Thanks again.