i can’t say that this statement was always true, but after spending a lot of time on the site, i can proudly say that i love twitter. here at magoosh, we use twitter to connect with students and partners, and to show the world what we’re all about.
if your business isn’t on twitter these days, you’re missing out. there are roughly 231 million monthly active users on the site and 33% of those users follow a brand. what does that mean? your customers (and potential customers!) are likely already using twitter, and just waiting for you to show up.
and using twitter doesn’t require that much effort. really! below are some quick and easy tips to help you get started. tweet on!
step 1: follow industry leaders and customers…and things you like!
sounds pretty obvious, right? in order to engage with the right people on twitter, you’re going to need to build up your ‘following’ and not just your ‘follower’ count. there are 3 categories of users you should follow on twitter:
1. industry leaders: these are the ‘big shots’ in your space. as an education company, we follow users like @ucberkeley, @berkstartups, @khanacademy, @udemy, etc. these people will help keep you ‘in the know,’ and provide you with interesting info to retweet to your followers (easy content!). pro-tip: you can also follow the people who follow thought leaders, since these people are more like your peers (ie, you’ll be able to more easily engage with them and put yourself on the map!).
2. your current and potential customers: this is a no-brainer. seek out those who are interested in what you’ve got. you can do this by searching relevant hashtags (for us, an example is #gre) and following those who are tweeting about this hashtag. more to come on this later.
3. things you (as a company) are interested in: this is what gives your company personality! for example, we love playing bananagrams, and so we show that love to the world:
step 2: make tweeting easy.
tweeting does not have to take a lot of time, trust me! here’s how to spend only about 20 minutes (or less) on twitter a day:
1. i’m guessing (and hoping!) that you are already on top of the news for your particular industry. great! this makes it easy to find cool stuff to tweet. if you’re not, here are some other places to find tweet-able content:
- google alerts (ex, “gre,” “education,” etc)
- retweet content from those you follow
- retweet when someone mentions you (and says something positive, of course!)
- industry blogs (an example for us: edsurge)
- quora
- your blog, of course!
2. automate, automate, automate. i like to schedule out tweets a month in advance. two great tools for doing so: buffer and hootsuite.
step 3: direct existing customers to twitter
considering how many people use twitter, a lot of your customers might already be active there. the easiest way to build up your follower count in the beginning is to lead your current customers, en masse, to your twitter account. this, too, is easy to do. here’s what we’ve done to spread awareness within our user base:
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cross promote on other social media channels (ie, facebook) – let your fans know you’re on twitter
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write a blog post about it
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include your handle as a ps in your email campaigns (ps. love magoosh? follow us on twitter!).
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for that matter, send an entire email that lets people know about your twitter. we send an email to users who use twitter (and find this out via our messaging system intercom- link), since they will be more likely to follow.
step 4: engage new customers
now that you have tweets and followers, it’s time to find potential new customers. our favorite way to do this? read on.
search relevant hashtags and engage with those people. for example, when i search #gre, this is what i get:
bam. people i can talk with. i like to jump right into the conversation–as a company with a lot of gre know-how, we’re able to offer advice, resources, etc to students who are discussing the gre on twitter. and besides that, even just a “good luck!” tweeted at someone who mentions that their test is tomorrow goes a long way.
step 5: start small.
this is a less of a ‘tip’ and more of an ‘anti-tip.’ in the beginning, it’s most important to build a targeted following and engage with those followers. running contests, ads, and huge campaigns are great, but it’s necessary to first get a handle on your voice and your positioning in the ‘twitterverse.’ 🙂
more tips to come!
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