Twitter tips for SMEs

Image via 123RF

It is important to understand how your customers want to be engaged with and what will convince them to make a purchase from your company. Engaging with prospective customers is an everyday function that every business needs to be involved in. Time and effort needs to be spent in understanding your target audience and in today's world marketing efforts need to more targeted.

Twitter is much more than a social platform; it is a place where you can engage directly with your customers, making it a perfect platform for conversations that count. Before you jump onto Twitter, it is important to put a plan in place to ensure you are engaging with the right customers in the right way.

Putting plans into practice

The first step is to set up a Twitter account for your business. This is a statement of commitment to engage with your customers and needs to be done professionally. Your profile is the place where you can introduce your company to a community of 316 million users. Start with a bio and a photo of your company. Ideally use a photograph of yourself along with a company logo - by making use of images with people your business is positioned as welcoming and with people at the heart of the business. Learn how to get your profile page right here.

Once your business account is set up, you will need to develop a plan around what you want to say to your customers and how best to highlight the services and products that your business offers. Ensure that you are engaging and sharing content regularly. It is important to find the right balance between too much and too little content so that the engagement is manageable within the business and your customers have enough time to process each Tweet. Your content should strive to stimulate engagement rather than to announce packages and deals. Remember that great content is shared, so aim for content that others can Retweet, Favourite or Reply to so you can increase your level of engagement.

Timing is critical

Engagement can be affected by the timing. According to the Small Business Customer Insights Study, conducted by Twitter in 2014, looking at how South Africans engage with brands on Twitter, users generally access their Twitter accounts at work during weekdays. Of these Twitter users, 85% use their mobile devices to access their accounts. It is important to make sure that the posts are well timed to optimise exposure and interest.

From the same study, it was found that Twitter followers could help you to achieve reach, spread your message and drive sales with 60% of the respondents confirming that they made purchases after seeing something on Twitter. Moreover, like any marketing plan, incentivise those followers for following you and spreading your message by Retweeting.

Twitter provides a perfect platform through which you can reach a wide audience. So, get started and give your business the exposure it deserves. For more information, go to https://blog.twitter.com/small-business.