Twitter is one of the most popular social media apps for small and big businesses – it’s an easy way to connect with your customers with just one tweet. Twitter is often misunderstood because unlike most social media apps available, its focus is on public conversation and exposure. As a business, Twitter can really help you drive traffic to your website, build your brand and increase your sales. Want to find out more?

Here are the 13 tips you need to know when using Twitter:

1. Understand Your Objectives and Goals

Just like any other social media platform, make sure you are being clear about your objective with Twitter. First decide if Twitter is the right tool for your business and what you want to achieve through it and have a clear plan on what types of tweets you will be sharing, as well as tailoring your profile (so making sure your Twitter handle relates to your business, or adding a brief summary and any website links in your bio).

2. Follow Those Who Matter

Twitter is a great tool to use to connect with the top people in your industry. Do your research and follow them on Twitter – and who knows, they may just follow you back.

Follow as many people in your industry as possible – it’s also important to engage with them; this shows you are involved in your industry and it allows you to connect with relevant people and build a following.

3. Engage with Your Audience

Twitter is another social media app where it allows you to easily connect and engage with your audience. If you are just constantly posting content without engaging, you will not make good use out of your Twitter account. It’s important to get personal and invite your followers into your life too.

A great way to do this is by asking questions or sharing content that you think your audience may be interested in. You can also engage with your audience by sharing other people’s tweets and comment on other conversations and threads.

4. Don’t Overuse Hashtags

Hashtags are a great way to get your tweets in front of like-minded people – but don’t make the mistake of using too many. With the use of too many hashtags, it may make your tweets harder to read, which can be off-putting for your audience. Studies have shown that the optimal number of hashtags is two per tweet – any more than that and engagement has been shown, in general, to decline. It’s important to do some extra research to find out what the most relevant tags you should be using for your business.

5. Repeat Your Tweets Multiple Times

If you think about it; not everyone is online all the time so you need to make sure your best Tweets are seen by as many of your followers as possible. You can easily find out what the best times are by using helpful social media tools such as Buffer, Google Analytics, and HubSpot.

6. Don’t Make It Only About Sales

Twitter can be a helpful tool for your business in sales – however, don’t make the mistake to try and sell your products and services all the time. Trust us, your audience will get sick of seeing your tweets and possibly unfollow you.

It’s important to realize that Twitter is a platform to generate engagement with your customers and/or targeting new audiences. If you continue to force customers to buy your products, it will sound very generic and not genuine – which is what you want to avoid.

7. Always be Visual

In the social media realm, you should always be visual. Visuals can attract a customer more than anything else – so when you are posting any content, make sure you are also attaching photos too. Using rich media related to your products and images helps to provide additional opportunity to boost your audience appeal and stand out from your competitors.

8. Utilize Twitter Video

Video marketing is booming everywhere – if you haven’t noticed by now; Twitter users love the video too. In fact, videos on Twitter receive more engagement than third-party video players. One of the best uses of Twitter Video involves one-to-one conversations. Twitter users can record their short responses to the follower to create a more personal experience. You can also use video as a way to promote other pieces of content as well.

9. Be Very Consistent

It’s important to keep a good rhythm going and to be active on your Twitter page. How much is too much, you ask? Sending a Tweet every 10 minutes telling people to check out a specific product or your website would be a bit too much. But tweeting on a subject that is getting your audience engaged is a different story. It’s important to strategize what exactly you plan on posting – if you have something awesome to say every hour, go for it. Your audience will tell you if it’s working or not. You can easily monitor your Twitter analytics to see if your strategy is helping or hurting your profile.

10. Create a Twitter Profile that Reflects Your Visual Branding

Twitter allows users to customize their entire page look – for instance, it’s not just about updating your bio, but you can now alter your Twitter background page and adjust the background and link colors so they coordinate with your new background image, etc. Create a page that best reflects your visual branding.

11. Avoid Automation

Sure, you might not have all the time in the world to keep tweeting on your own. It’s okay to have automated tweets about your latest blog post but don’t automate every tweet you post. It’s essential to take some time each day to post content yourself at regular intervals and to always be engaging with your audience as much as possible.

12. Get Personal and Add Personality to Your Tweets

Like said, social media is a way to connect with your audience – so the more genuine and real you may seem, the more successful you and your business will be. People now are looking for brands who are transparent and relatable – and not ones that are generic and sound too much like robots. Use your voice in your Tweets; it’s okay to add a bit of humor now and then, getting personal with your followers will open up doors to new relationships and possibly more sales.

13. Always Stay Up-to-Date

Social media is quickly evolving every single day; so it’s crucial you are always on top of your game. Tailor the trends according to your region and include the emerging hashtags in your Tweets to get more visibility. Stay up-to-date by researching your industry hashtags to know what the current trends are that could potentially boost your Twitter visibility.

 

Use these 13 quick tips to jumpstart your Twitter account. Once you build a more established account, you will no doubt have an increase in sales, traffic, and a growth in new followers.

Author: Usman Raza is the co-founder of Christian Marketing Experts and marketing strategist working with various brands online, and the content marketing manager of Los Angeles Digital Agency, PSD to WordPress, and RoyAlens. He is devoted to helping small businesses bridge success gaps by providing in-depth, actionable advice on digital marketing, SEO, and small business growth. Follow him on Twitter @usmanintrotech.