Social Media: Tweeting Effectively for Your Business

BE PROFESSIONAL
It’s all in the set-up!
When you set up your Twitter account, use a professional photo or logo, a professional user name, a professional description, and a background that reflects your business. Be personable yet professional looking and sounding. Just what that looks like will depends on the nature of your business.

Start tweeting usable information related to your business.
For example, tweet stock information if you are stockbroker, tips on choosing produce if you are a farmer, or tips to make money onlineif you are an online marketer.

Share articles that you are reading relative to the field you are promoting.
Stay in your industry of your site or business. Become a valuable resource by filtering articles others would be interested in. If others like them they will retweet them to others. Retweeting is taking someone else's tweet and re-broadcasting it to your followers.

Sound like an expert.
Provide a regular tip and point followers to your blog or E-zine article. Shorter than 140 characters so that regular followers can use and retweet. Figure you start with 140 characters minus your tweet name and minus 5 more characters. The @ sign in front of your name makes up for the 5, and the space after your name when it is retweeted.

EFFECTIVE TWEETS
Use Hash tags.
What are hash tags? Hash tags are a simple way to organize topics. For example if you are tweeting or twittering about knitting, you would create a hash tag by adding the # symbol in front of the word knitting. You hash tag would look like this: #knitting. Now that you have created a hash tag, how do they benefit you? A hash tag is clickable and searchable. For example if someone is searching for tweets relating to knitting they will do a search for #knitting. Also if a person encounters a tweet with the #knitting hash tag, they can click on the hash tag to find other results with the #knitting hash tags. Essentially, you are making your tweet easier to find and viewed by more people.

Retweet often.
Why would you want to advertise other people's tweets? There are several benefits to the practice of retweeting. One of the benefits of retweeting is that it helps to add followers. Another great benefit of retweeting is that you will probably be retweeted back by the person you RT'ed (retweeted). Retweeting works on the idea of, scratch my back and I will scratch your back. If you are retweeted you should do your best to retweet back. When I retweet I try to think about my followers. Will my followers benefit from this information? Will this retweet bring me more followers?

Set up a list of retweeters.
This will make it easier for you to retweet those who retweet you.

Send a Direct Message.
Thank followers that retweet and that you retweet back, sort of like a if you scratch my back I will scratch your back. Then make sure to retweet something of theirs.

Schedule your tweets ahead of time.
Some people have the luxury of spending all day in front of the computer. Most do not have such a luxury. Get a program such as Twaitter or Hootsuite. These programs will allow you to schedule your tweets ahead of time and they are free.

Announce things about your business periodically.
Gradually begin adding the occasional marketing message to your tweets. Let people know what you can do for them. If you are selling a product or service, people like "free," "contests," "discounts" and other relevant information.

ATTRACT FOLLOWERS BY BEING A FOLLOWER, TOO!
Follow people in your industry.
You can keep up with the latest news in your industry and respond to tweets that enable you to showcase your expertise. Retweet relevant information to your followers, too!

Follow people who may be interested in your products or services.
Many people new to Twitter will randomly follow anyone, but just as you target customers in offline marketing, you are likely to see more results from Twitter if you work on getting a targeted following. Use # and keyword(s) in the search function to find prospective customers.

Grow your list of followers.
As more people follow you, more people will see your tweets. Start by adding those who follow you. Add those who retweet you. You can do a search by location and add those people who live near you. Most tweeters will follow you back.

Cultivate relationships with your followers.
Make sure you are engaged and act human when writing in Twitter. Read and comment on other Twitters. Retweet their posts. Respond to someone who writes you. @sign is when someone is writing to you.

Source: e-How.com