Twitter Tactics 201
Twitter accounts for roughly 9% of all social media shares, about a tenth of the amount of activity on Facebook, according to analysis by BuzzSumo and Frac.tl .
YET Twitter’s contribution to lead generation and sales—marketers’ key metrics—ranks last in terms of being the initial, final or only social media platform touched, because its content and interaction occur in the middle of the purchase funnel, based on AOL Platform research (Chart).
This makes Twitter’s contribution difficult to track. Many marketers just set up a Twitter strategy and leave it on autopilot. Unfortunately, this becomes a vicious circle for marketers because their efforts are insufficient to drive business.
As you begin your 2015 social media marketing plans, it’s a good time to take your Twitter marketing up a notch to yield results aligned with your business objectives.
Since you’ve already got the basics down, these Twitter tactics 201 will help you improve your strategy and make your time more effective.
27 Super easy tactics to boost your Twitter strategy
Given the dynamic nature of Twitter and the social media ecosystem here are 27 tactics you can incorporate into your Twitter strategy.
1. Determine your Twitter goals.
Develop your Twitter objectives as they relate to your overarching social media, content marketing and business objectives to support your organization’s social media engagement and distribution.
The top 3 Twitter business goals are:
- Interact with customers.
- Distribute content to support lead generation and sales.
- Engage with influencers.
Actionable Twitter Tactics 201:
- Use your Twitter objectives to guide the audience you build, the content you share, and your interactions. This includes the people who represent your organization on Twitter.
2. Enhance your Twitter presence with a strong bio.
Ensure that your Twitter bio represents your business appropriately to attract your target followers.
4 questions to improve your profile:
- Does your photograph continue your branding and position your business?
- Are you utilizing your 160 characters appropriately?
- Is there a link to your website or blog?
- Are there any appropriate hashtags you should include?
Actionable Twitter Tactics 201:
- Know whom you want to find and who you want to follow you on Twitter. At a minimum, this includes your employees, customers and influencers. Create a targeted Twitter social media persona to help you solidify your understand of your target audiences.
3. Strategically select the people you want to follow.
To use Twitter as a marketing channel, choose the people you follow with care to achieve your Twitter goals.
Actionable Twitter Tactics 201:
- Create Twitter lists. These are Twitter users you want to follow. While Twitter lists can be as large as you want, keep the number of people manageable so you’re not overwhelmed with the stream. You don’t have to create lists from scratch. Use other people’s lists as a shortcut. (Note: Lists can be public or private.)
- Find the influencers in your niche. Select the people, companies and brands that are important for staying abreast of your market. A good tool for this is FollowerWonk.
- Take advantage of hashtags. Hashtags are a shorthand way of capturing information and conversations. 3 of my favorite hashtags are #CMWorld, #BlogChat and #UsGuys.
4. Build your Twitter audience.
Getting people to follow you on Twitter doesn’t just happen. Like any other marketing effort, it takes continual planning and work. It’s not a once and done campaign.
Actionable Twitter Tactics 201:
- Engage with people on Twitter. Interacting with others on Twitter encourages them to follow you.
- Participate in TwitterChats. This is a great way to get to know people on Twitter. One of the best places to engage is #UsGuys, a 24/7 Twitter conversation. Chats can lead to real life interactions.
- Promote your Twitter handle on your owned media. Ask people to follow you on your website, blog, emailings, in your store, and on other social media profiles. Have your employees include your Twitter handle on their email communications.
- Include your Twitter handle (and relevant hashtags) in your paid advertising. Add this point to your advertising checklist.
- Clean up your following. Unfollow people to remove bots and inactive followers. This may cause some people to unfollow you but it should result in more effective Twitter reach. ManageFlitter is a tool to help with this process.
5. Determine your Twitter content strategy.
Integrate your Twitter content strategy into your editorial calendar. Provide useful information for your followers, not promotion. Curate other people’s content and yours on Twitter. Show personality through your voice and topics.
Actionable Twitter Tactic 201:
- Incorporate Twitter’s 4 types of moments into your content sharing. Specifically: planned, everyday, big events and spontaneous. (Hat tip to Amanda Farrell at #CvHNY)
- Plan your tweets in advance. Use a scheduling tool such as Hootsuite or Buffer to support your efforts.
- Handcraft your Twitter shares. Don’t rely on sharing widgets. Add your personal spin by highlighting a special point or commenting on the piece. This allows you to retweet the same piece multiple times without sounding repetitive. For help check these viral tips.
- Create multiple tweets from each piece of your own content. For example, stretch a post like this one by tweeting each point separately over a longer period of time.
- Time your tweets to reach your key audience. Use an app like Tweriod to determine the peak times your followers are on Twitter.
6. Extend the life of your tweets.
Tweets are notorious for their short lifespan. Therefore, where possible maximize your reach. (Check out Dan Zarrella inspired tips for tweets and retweets.)
Actionable Twitter Tactic 201:
- Add visuals to your tweet. Images should have a 2:1 ratio. Analysis of over 2 million tweets revealed that photos increase retweets by 35% and videos increase retweets by 28% (Chart).
- Retweet your own content more than once. Guy Kawaski is known for tweeting his own content 4 times, once every 8 hours to attract a broader reach with limited overlap.
- Include a call–to-action. Ask your audience to do something, even if it’s only to retweet. Where appropriate include a targeted landing page to your content or product.
7. Expand your Twitter content distribution.
Leverage the power of Twitter to broaden your communications.
Actionable Twitter Tactics 201:
- Include 1-3 hashtags in your tweets. Broaden your reach through a combination of broader words such as #travel or #NYC. Also use hashtags for your name where appropriate such as #CMWorld.
- Broaden your Twitter responses. Don’t start your tweets with an “@”if you want others to see your tweet. Scott Levy author of Tweet Naked suggests putting a period at the beginning of your tweet.
- Ask people you mention in your content to tweet it. Send them an email or direct message to let them know that you mentioned them and ask them to share it on Twitter. (It helps if you’ve linked to their site or blog.) Think of it as “egobait”.
- Include “ClickToTweet” links in your content. Make it easy for readers to share your content. It allows you to craft each of the tweets so that they’re different from your social sharing buttons.
8. Make a date to tweet.
Twitter isn’t a set it and go social media platform. It yields the best results when you actively participate.
Actionable Twitter Tactics 201:
- Set aside time twice a day to check in on Twitter to see what’s happening. It can be as short as 2 visits of 15 minutes each. Set a timer if you tend to get sucked into social media for hours. This enables you to engage with people directly and in real time. This has the added benefit of showing that you’re a real person, not a bot.
- Participate regularly in TwitterChats. Chats provide a great opportunity to mingle. This is particularly useful for chats where there are guest speakers. This gives you an opportunity to interact with influencers.
- Share information for live events. Leverage the power of hashtags and live events to broaden your engagement and reach.
9. Clean up behind your Twitter scene.
It’s easy to forget the administrative stuff involved in Twitter use.
Actionable Twitter Tactics 201:
- Monitor apps where you’re signed on using Twitter. While it’s easy to sign into apps with Twitter, stop the access if you no longer use them. It’s a good practice for security reasons.
- Modify your email communications from Twitter. If email overload is an issue, here’s an area to check. (Alternatively, set up your email client to send your Twitter emailings to a special mailbox.)
Use these actionable Twitter tactics 201 to boost your Twitter strategy. Together they’ll make your content distribution and engagement more effective.
As a result, your Twitter strategy will yield benefits better aligned with your business objectives, namely improved customer interactions, lead generation and sales, and influencer relations.
What other Twitter tactics 201 would you add to this list and why?
Happy Marketing,
Heidi Cohen
Related articles:
Blogging Tactics 201
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