5.3 : Twitter
Dr. Gordon Fletcher, Senior Lecturer, Salford Business School, UK
Twitter is a different type of platform and most notable for the fact that it has a limited number of characters that can be used. For business, this encourages creativity because you have to get around that limitation.
You may consider using imagery, which can be attached to that post, you may look at other different innovations around the use of creative text or multiple posts of the same message again and again over a period of time, or you may look at a continuous post which builds over time. All of these are possibilities.
But perhaps the most important aspect of Twitter is it’s use of hashtags – its in fact, arguably, invention of hash tags.
Twitter has a limit of 140 characters per message, which promotes creativity –
Key features: integration of images, videos, links and most importantly hashtags
Hashtags are found in all of these platforms that we are discussing, but Twitter is the place to start your hashtag and build that following and build that interest across other platforms and via your blog on your website. The use of a hashtag is entirely in your control and the creation of a hashtag that you use is entirely in your control.
Asta Cepulyte, Chief Executive Officer, Sharecruit, Lithuania
We as well work with email marketing, remarketing, and we try also other channels, and our main focus will be later Twitter, which is more globally used and even in the USA and in Europe, but it’s not a priority at the moment, and we’re going to work with content marketing, creating the blog and the content for our audience.
Twitter is not a popular network in some countries such as Lithuania – however, Sharecruit plan to embrace Twitter in the future due to its global reach
Colin Telford, Managing Partner, The Candidate Ltd, UK
We use Twitter to speak to a very large candidate pool on a regular basis. We release so much information on Twitter. We try and categorize that so that it’s based on jobs, based on ad hoc activity, based on research activity ‘cause people want to see a range of information coming through from Twitter.
Twitter is used by The Candidate Ltd to speak to a large number of individuals on a range of topics
To manage Twitter, a tool such as TweetDeck is used to filter discussions by hashtags and allow multi-user account management
Obviously, you can release information on there, you can share and retweet and comment and favour different comments on there. You can build networks based on who’s important to your business, you can observe what your competitors are up to by using Twitter, and you can perhaps follow hashtags on there as well. The par and the information that you can get from Twitter is quite staggering.
We use TweetDeck that sits on top of Twitter and that allows you to create columns and segment the different areas which you use Twitter for. And by getting an understanding of how that works can be very beneficial for your business and your digital marketing activities.
Alex Charalambidis, Digital Marketing Strategist, MONKS, Greece
Sometimes we are using Twitter for customer service but it’s not the same penetration with Facebook. We can see an increase in Twitter lately, in the USA and in some countries in Europe, but again the leader is Facebook.
Twitter is often used for customer service and although the penetration of Twitter in Greece is slow compared to countries such as the UK and the US, although it is growing.
Exercise
Using Twitter for business
Have a look at the Twitter Business Guide: https://business.twitter.com/basics
Find a Twitter Case Study that is most relevant for you https://marketing.twitter.com/emea/en_gb/success-stories.html – what are the key lessons that you can take away from these?
Share your main lesson
Share your main lesson with others below. Mention the specific story in your post, if relevant.
Before posting your comments below, see if the same point has been made by others and if so reply to their comment. Once you have posted your contribution, comment on at least three contributions of your peers.
Additional Materials
How to use Twitter
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CVY3pp91Dc
Login verification
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IsdvJI0AK5M
How to use Twitter
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cqtvWzUW9GM
How to use TweetDeck?
See TweetDeck: https://tweetdeck.twitter.com/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SykSn95WBhk
How to use Twitter in business?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7LIlTMq8AxA
References
Buying fake accounts won’t get you anywhere on Twitter
https://theconversation.com/buying…
Marketing hints on Twitter
http://www.socialbro.com/shhhh-12-…
The Complete Guide to Twitter Marketing
http://sproutsocial.com/insights/t…
Twitter: a viable marketing tool for SMEs
http://www.gbmr.ioksp.com/pdf/Bule…
For chapter 5 related sections, follow:
5.0 Choosing the right digital profiles for the right audience
5.1 Facebook
5.2 YouTube
5.4 LinkedIn
5.5 PPC optimisation
5.6 What makes content to go Viral?
5.7 How to create content viral?