May 04, 2012 admin
On Monday, InkHouse tuned into PR News’ webinar “How to (Really) Use Twitter to Advance Your PR & Marketing Efforts.” We learned that as Twitter turns six years old and the site is averaging 230 million tweets per day, the main obstacle users face is how to make their voice heard.
The speakers in the webinar visualized the Twitter community as a cocktail party, but I saw it as more of an opportunity to grow a friendship.
Similar to maintaining a friendship, on Twitter you want to show your personality and be engaging, so the other person will enjoy your company. You also need to feel out what your audience would like to talk about and how you can build off of their interests.
So, how do you continue to build a lasting friendship? The answer is quite simple: communicate effectively. A few ways to improve your Twitter relationships include:
- Offering exclusives: You tell your best friend everything, right? Well, don’t hold out on your Twitter followers—give them the inside scoop too.
- Be an expert: Rely on certain friends for news, gossip, diet tips? If you have strong knowledge of a topic, interact with that Twitter community and add value to their conversations.
- Stay relevant and organized: The best stories are told in detail and don’t jump around. When it comes to managing your Twitter content, you can create an editorial calendar to stay on topic, relevant, and give followers a sense of continuity.
- Post photos and videos: There is a reason why we take pictures with our friends. To humanize and visually improve your Twitter account, post photos and videos to create eye-catching content.
- Correct use of hashtags: It’s hard to follow a story when your friend keeps switching topics. The same goes for Twitter; the correct use of hashtags can help organize your conversation so it can be found by those looking for that subject on Twitter.
Unlike with a friendship, on Twitter you can’t read the person’s face to see if they are interested in what you are communicating. Ways to measure the success of your content on Twitter include your number of followers, mentions, and retweets.
So, next time you find yourself on Twitter, be it for your personal use or the development of a client’s social media strategy, picture yourself standing next to one of your friends. Odds are that you will want to be remembered as the friend with the best stories who had an audience hanging on your every word.
