In the world of digital marketing, Twitter has emerged as a powerful tool that can help businesses achieve their marketing goals. With over 217 million active daily users and expected to grow to over 340 million active users by 2024, Twitter is a platform that cannot be ignored. Many brands have successfully leveraged Twitter marketing to grow their business, engage their audience, build a community, and deliver exceptional customer service.
Audit your accounts
Before diving into creating a Twitter marketing strategy, it’s important to audit your existing Twitter accounts. Take the time to document all the accounts associated with your organisation and gather information on their performance. Evaluate factors like how often the account tweets, the engagement rate, and the number of followers. Tools like Twitter Analytics or Hootsuite Analytics can provide you with these metrics. Review brand compliance for existing accounts, ensuring that the Twitter handle, bio, profile picture, and header image align with your overall brand image.
Set goals
Success on any social media platform starts with setting clear, measurable goals. Determine what you want to achieve through your Twitter marketing efforts and translate those goals into SMART goals – Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, and Time-bound. For example, if you want to drive more traffic to your website, set a goal to increase your average click-through rate from Twitter. Use your baseline click-through rate from your Twitter audit to set a specific, achievable goal over a reasonable period of time.
Check out the competition
Analysing the Twitter accounts of your industry competitors can provide valuable insights and help you refine your own strategy. Create a private Twitter List of your competitors to monitor their tweets and discussions in real time. This can reveal weaknesses or gaps in their strategy that you can capitalise on to distinguish yourself.
Create guidelines
Establishing clear guidelines for your Twitter marketing efforts is crucial for maintaining consistency and preventing mishaps. Develop a social media style guide that outlines your brand’s tone, voice, and guidelines specific to Twitter. This should include details like branded hashtags, emoji usage, and link formatting. Be prepared for any kind of conversation on Twitter, including criticism and PR crises, by planning how to respond to trolls and manage potential crises.
Make a content calendar
Planning your content in advance can save you time and ensure that you consistently deliver high-quality tweets. A social media content calendar helps you align the content you’re posting on all your channels and identify any gaps or conflicts. Consider factors like how often you want to post, the best times to post, and who should approve posts. Follow the rule of thirds – one-third of tweets should promote your business, one-third should share personal stories, and one-third should be informative insights from experts or influencers. However, remember to actively monitor your Twitter account for replies, mentions, and opportunities to join conversations.
Analyse your analytics
Regularly evaluating your Twitter marketing efforts is essential for measuring your success and making data-driven decisions. Use Twitter’s analytics and other tools to track important metrics like engagement, reach, and conversions. Focus on meaningful metrics that align with your goals and provide insights into the impact of your marketing efforts. Use this data to refine your strategy over time and demonstrate the value of your Twitter marketing to your stakeholders.
Leveraging Twitter’s features
Twitter offers a range of tools and features that can enhance your Twitter marketing campaigns. While not all features may be relevant to your strategy, it’s worth exploring the ones that can help you achieve your goals.
Twitter Trends
Twitter trends provide valuable insights into the topics and conversations that are popular on the platform. Keeping an eye on trending topics helps you understand your audience’s interests and ensures that your content remains relevant and timely.
1. Twitter Circle
Twitter Circle allows you to create a small audience of your choice and tweet exclusively to that group. This feature is useful for targeting specific brands and influencers to position your brand as a thought leader or share industry knowledge.
2. Twitter Communities
Twitter Communities enable you to join or start groups of like-minded accounts and curate content relevant to shared interests. Building a community around your brand can help strengthen your visibility and engage with interested and engaged consumers.
3. Twitter Spaces
Twitter Spaces is a live audio chat room feature that allows you to host or participate in real-time audio conversations. It’s an ideal platform for Q&As or industry-specific conversations that establish your brand as a thought leader.
4. Twitter Lists
Twitter Lists allow you to curate feeds from selected accounts, making it easier to follow conversations and discussions that matter to your business. Create lists of competitors’ accounts, influential thought leaders, and your own team members to stay informed and engage with relevant discussions.
Optimise your profile
Your Twitter profile is often the first impression you make on new followers, so it’s important to optimise it for maximum impact. Pay attention to elements like your handle, profile photo, header image, bio, URL, and location. Ensure that each element reflects your brand’s image and provides relevant information to your audience. Consider including a pinned tweet at the top of your profile to highlight important content or viral tweets.
Engage with your audience
Engagement is key to building a strong presence on Twitter. Develop an authentic and appealing brand voice that aligns with your brand values and resonates with your audience. Show personality, be human, be original, and be sincere in your interactions. Actively monitor your Twitter account, reply to direct messages and mentions, and join conversations to demonstrate that you are listening and engaging with your audience.
Run a Twitter poll
Twitter polls are a fun and engaging way to interact with your audience and gather feedback. Pose questions and provide multiple answer options to gather insights, learn about customer preferences, and tease product ideas. Twitter polls provide quick and useful insights that can inform your marketing strategy.
Schedule your tweets
Scheduling your tweets in advance can help you streamline your social media activities and ensure consistent posting. Take advantage of the best times to post by scheduling your tweets accordingly. Use tools like OneUp or Hootsuite to schedule tweets and receive recommendations on the best times to post based on your historical performance. However, remember to actively monitor your Twitter account for real-time conversations and engagement.
Let’s get visual
Visual content can significantly enhance your tweets and boost engagement. Use images, videos, and GIFs to convey your messages effectively and capture your audience’s attention. Tweets with images and videos typically receive higher engagement than text-only tweets. Additionally, leverage the power of Twitter threads to share longer-form content, provide additional context, or share updates.
Become a hashtag expert
Hashtags are a powerful tool for increasing your reach and engagement on Twitter. Research and use relevant hashtags that align with your industry and niche. Create branded hashtags to collect and organise content about your brand. Follow trending hashtags to join conversations and reach new audiences. However, avoid overusing hashtags and limit your tweets to one or two per tweet for optimal impact.
Tune in with social listening
Social listening involves paying attention to conversations on Twitter to gain insights into your customers and community. Monitor mentions, keywords, and hashtags related to your business, competitors, industry, and relevant trending topics. Use tools like Twitter’s advanced search or Hootsuite’s streams to track these conversations and gather valuable insights. Social listening helps you refine your messaging, build loyalty, and proactively address customer pain points and complaints.
Run an ad campaign
Once you have a solid organic presence on Twitter, consider running an ad campaign to further expand your reach and achieve your marketing goals. Twitter Ads allows you to target specific audiences, promote your account or individual tweets, and track campaign results. Use detailed analytics to measure the effectiveness of your campaigns and optimise your messaging for maximum impact.
Remember, creating a winning Twitter marketing strategy requires a systematic approach. By following these steps, you’ll be well on your way to achieving your marketing goals through Twitter.
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