Simplify Edition 7: Twitter for Business

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How to use Twitter for Business

At Simplicity (@SimplicityTweet), we started using Twitter a while ago (our Twitter birthday is on 26 April 2008). Over time we gained a friendly flock of followers who take an interest in what we do, share, think or write about. This article discusses how Twitter can be used for Business.

Tweet. Tweet. What is Twitter?

Twitter is an information network. Millions of people and businesses use it to discover and share new information. Twitter was born in March 2006 and launched in July. Twitter's founders are Evan Williams, Biz Stone and Jack Dorsey. Jack Dorsey sent the first tweet on March 21 2006, “just setting up my twttr”. It then only took 3 years, 2 months and 1 day from the first Tweet to get to the billionth Tweet!

With everybody from Jonathan Ross, Stephen Fry or Barack Obama on Twitter, it is safe to say the social networking platform has gone mainstream. Twitter is all about real-time person-to-person communication. It is a 'micro blogging' platform which allows you to publish short messages called 'Tweets' of less than 140 characters. Twitter users can ‘subscribe’ to your messages by following your account.

33% of Twitter users share opinions about companies or products at least once per week (Performics/ROI Research). Just how can you use Twitter as a business? You can quickly share information, gather market intelligence and insights, and build relationships with people who are interested in your tweets, your brand, products and services. Interestingly, active Twitter users who follow at least one brand are more likely to recommend a brand they follow (59%), (ROI Research).

Twitter for Business. What’s in it for you?

Humanise your brand. Make your brand more 'personal'.

Get feedback, give feedback and engage in conversations.

Build trust, loyalty and engagement. Establish yourself as an expert in your field.

Business collaboration. Connect employees to one another, engage with suppliers and partners.

Meet new contacts, prospects and suppliers. Connect with people outside of your usual circle.

Offer real-time customer service.

Promote an event or inform event participants about real-time event happenings.

Direct traffic. There is a viral nature to Twitter to get traffic to your website, blog, or a landing page.

Quick tips how to focus your Twitter marketing

Clearly define your business goals. Create objectives that guide your online behaviour. Create a clear conversation strategy. Twitter is not about simply following people. Instead, create a ‘community’, a flock of followers who are interested in your tweets. Engage in conversation, keep your tweets interesting, timely and informative. Give people a reason to follow you back. Focus your conversation and organise your conversation topics. Look into setting up Twitter lists to manage conversation streams.

When using Twitter for business, remember, it needs to be integrated in the rest of your marketing strategy, both online and offline (website, other social networks, marketing collateral, etc.).

Social media is an effective way to reach potential customers and promote your business. 40% of companies using social media have acquired a customer through that channel (Hubspot survey 2011). Find out about our social media training sessions, from beginner level to more advanced workshops.

How to measure your Twitter influence

Twitter lists indicate the topics you have influence in and how people ‘classify’ you.

Retweets tell you how willing people are to amplify your messages and spread the word.

@Replies are a good signal about your social interactions.

The quality of connections can indicate relevance, focus areas of interest, audience and trust.

Furthermore, the follow/follower ratio indicates a number of things: if a user follows a disproportionate number of users than follow them, it signals their desire to accumulate followers; not always, but often. A 50/50 ratio indicates someone is following back anyone who follows them, which can include spammers. Twitter users who follow significantly less than are followed indicate some selection process.

There are various tools available to measure your online influence. Tweet Grader allows you to check the power of your twitter profile. Klout Score is the measurement of your overall online influence, measuring True Reach, Amplification Probability, and Network Score. PeerIndex is a reputation and authority rating platform. Or, The Sunday Times Social List calculates your 'online worth'.

Twitter best practices

Share interesting information about what you do, your business or give behind the scenes insight.

Listen, ask questions and respond to messages. Monitor what others say about your brand.

Reward. Offer special offers, discounts, or run a Twitter competition.

Expertise. Share relevant and timely information, articles, establish yourself as an expert in your field.

Find our voice. Adopt the right tone of voice in line with your brand. Be professional.

Are you making the most of your social media efforts? How does your social media plan interact with your online presence? Find out, get your Free Social Media Audit.

Some interesting facts

The Twitter.com domain cost $7,500 In 2006.

48% of Twitter users check their account at least once a day. (Exact Target)

Twitter users now send 140 million Tweets on average per day! (Twitter)

The hashtag (#) feature on Twitter debuted in August 2007 was proposed by a user.

Find out about our social media training sessions, follow Simplicity on Twitter, or simply get in touch.

About the author

Elke Bretz is the founder and creative director at Simplicity. She strongly believes in simplifying complex matters, and is passionate about web design, website usability, ux, user-interface design and social media. You can follow her on Twitter to keep up to date on anything that's happening in the creative space. More info about Elke on