Twitter and marketing your business...

I'd be interested to know if anyone here is using twitter for their business, or has set up an account for their business on there and found it tangibly useful - eg business leads / useful contacts made?

Also I've noticed some business networks integrating content from twitter lately - if anyone has any ideas for these forums do please post them here.

Thanks

Dan
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Web Design

Re : Twitter and marketing your business

No I don't use twitter, though I see a lot of people well twittering on about it!

Re : Twitter and marketing your business

One thing Twitter certainly has done well is got millions of people talking about it everywhere.

I find it quite funny when you hear politicians and the like dropping in some mention of twitter to try and sound 'cool' when it is pretty clear they don't really have much understanding of what it is.

Re : Twitter and marketing your business

Just noticed the Twitter integration on the status updates!

Re : Twitter and marketing your business

I found this very useful one - http://webworkerdaily.com/2009/08/03/62-ways-to-use-twitter-for-business/ - 62 ways to use Twitter for business.
Still learning from it, though
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Re : Twitter and marketing your business

I think it varies massively depending on the type of product or service that you are offering.

My business is about promoting other people's businesses and Twitter forms an essential part of my armoury, but whilst some customers will rapidly build up a network of keen followers others will attract almost no interest at all.

Even within a specific industry some accounts will take off and some won't. It's all a bit hit and miss really.

But it's free, so why not give it a try?
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Re : Twitter and marketing your business

If you build relationships with people you meet on twitter over time, through DM and mentioning and re-tweeting their content you will find that they are very open for offering free advice, checking out your website and products once you ask them at some point down the line.
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Re : Twitter and marketing your business

Does anyone actually have examples of people that have made money out of having a good twitter presence though?

There's lots of stuff about how good it is to have lots of people following you but I've never read anything concrete about a business that has definitively made money through a twitter presence.

Re : Twitter and marketing your business

I am fed up readig articles about twitter in magazines and newspapers by authors who clearly know nothing about it but have just read that it must be the next big thing and therefore recommend you use it.

Then you search for the jouranlists on there and they either have no profile or have like one follower and set it up clearly the day that they wrote the article!

To my mind there is no value in twitter whatsoever and infact it will be the next big flop. As soon as thy try to make money from it and intrude into how people use it or restrict it etc without payment or something like that I think it will be dead in the water. They may prove me wrong but I doubt it.

What I find most interesting is how all these companies get apparently bottomless funding with no idea of how they are going to make money but there seems no urgency to make it.

Re : Twitter and marketing your business

Twitter, along with all social media, has opened up opportunities for us to really interact with and engage our target audience.

The secret to a really good Twitter campaign is to be engaging. Say things that are relevant, get involved with conversations and don't be afraid to show the personality behind the brand.

I think that the problem a lot of businesses have is that they simply don't have the time to be spending on social media marketing. It needs more than a half hearted attempt to see any real return or engagement, but it can be difficult to fit in.

I would recommend the service of http://www.scrapyourwebsite.com (I handle online marketing for this service). We basically work on your behalf on your online presence, creating you a website according to who your end user is, and driving traffic to that site via social media marketing, SEO, online PR etc.

I currently use Hootsuite to handle various account (including Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn) and have found it to be a great tool. It shows you a clear dashboard of everything you're working on, whilst allowing you to post to multiple networks at the same time where relevant.

Hope this helps.
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Re : Twitter and marketing your business

Useful post there welcome to the site!

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Re : Twitter and marketing your business

I think Twitter is a great way of marketing your business. At SMEketing we've had enquiries and sales generated by Twitter - and that's from people making contact with us directly (rather than us looking for opportunities and going after them).

Twitter is great - but you'll get out of it what you put in. You need to become a useful, trusted resource. Don't go on and on about your own services or products. Instead give advice, link to useful articles, engage with people, comment on what they're talking about. Basically get involved in a natural way.

We always promote our offers and blog posts on Twitter and that's how we've used it to generate sales - using it as a way to drive traffic to our website.
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SMEketing is a digital marketing agency based in Southampton, Hampshire. We work with small and medium sized companies, helping them to grow and achieve their business goals. Read marketing hints and tips on our marketing blog: http://www.SMEketing.com/blog/

Re : Twitter and marketing your business

Well in the end that's what twitter has been originally made for, so it SHOULD be useful in that matter..right?!
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Re : Twitter and marketing your business

I think there is so much publicity around Twitter that it makes sense for businesses to at least try and use it now, though not being a business I have no idea how useful it will be - as with most things I suppose it will vary from company to company and based on product set.

This site has Twitter now from an email members get:

http://twitter.com/businessforumuk

Re : Twitter and marketing your business

Thanks Sasha - yes, there is a twitter account and currentl press releases and some other information is automatically posted there. It may be that in future more details get posted there - for instance a summary of recent posts on the site etc.
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Web Design

Re : Twitter and marketing your business

We use twitter on a regular basis to advertise any offers on our business cards and other products. Its a great mechanism to make short sharp announcements/press releases. For example we frequently have prize draws that we like to advertise on twitter.

If you have a twitter account its important to be quite active on it not only on your twitter account but also on other twitter pages. This will ensure that if you have useful advice to give then they will follow you. This will help build up a great customer contact list.

You should also try facebook too, you will need to set up a fan page for this.

Hope this helps.
Regards
Jenny
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