10 Ways to Grow Your Business With Twitter

That little blue bird icon you’ve been seeing everywhere is a gateway button to the World’s fastest growing social network- Twitter. And if you’re not on it, you’re missing out on a direct line to over five million users who all like to talk about the new, notable and just plain cool. Use these tips to get started on Twitter and get the tweeple talking.

1. Make it Personal

Use your real name. Put up a picture – preferably one that isn’t stiff and formal. Your followers need to be able to connect to you and feel like their communicating with a person instead of a spam bot. The more human and personable you can be, the better!

2. Tweet Often. But Not Too Much…

The hardest part of being on Twitter is finding the balance between tweeting enough that your followers are noticing you and tweeting so much that they find you annoying. It’s a fine line, and you need to learn how to ride it. Tweeting anywhere from 1-10 times a day is usually acceptable, depending on your following. Keep an eye on them; if you’re losing followers, you’re probably tweeting too much.

3. Grow Your Network

With Twitter, growing your network is as easy as following people. Why? Because they’ll follow you back. And if they don’t, un-follow them using a tool such as FlashTweet. To find people to begin building your network, start looking within your industry. Use a keyword search to find people talking about your product or service. Scope out the follower lists of industry leaders and make connections through them. Use directories to find appropriate followers.

4. Re-Tweet

Be a good neighbour and re-tweet posts that you find interesting, valuable or funny. You’re doing your followers a favour by sharing, and the person who made the original tweet is likely to notice. Maybe even return the favour.

5. Track Your Products, Brand and Business

One of the coolest, and most dangerous, features of Twitter is that it is a real-time application with real people constantly sharing and networking. Shape your message based on this. Getting great feedback when you search your business through the search feature? Pump it up! Re-tweet it! Negative comments? Do damage control. Start a conversation and try to fix it before the disgruntled customer moves it somewhere more public. Like their award-winning blog. Plus, all their followers will see that you care when you go out of your way to correct the issue and consider you in the future. Don’t like the search function? Try TweetBleep.

6. Run Contests and Promotions Exclusively for your Followers

One of the best ways to grow your follower base is to give them incentive to pay attention. If you’re offering great contests, free stuff, coupons or other promotions that are exclusively for your Tweeple, they’ll remain your loyal and constantly reading follower.

7. Respond to your Audience

Again, Facebook is a real-time application being used by real people. And a lot of them use it to ask questions and gain feedback. Be active on your Twitter page and respond to your customers promptly. They’ll respect and thank you for the interest you’re taking in what matters to them.

8. Join the Conversation

Not only should you be active on your page, you should be active on pages you’re following. See something you like? Tell them! Have a question? Ask it! Have a burning opinion in the lively debate going on over a competitor’s comment? Voice it! This is what Twitter is about at its core.

9. Don’t Make your Competitor’s Mistakes

Just like you can search around to see what people are saying about you, you should be checking out what they’re saying about your competitors. If people hate something they are doing, take note and make sure you don’t do the same thing next week. Conversely, if they’re doing something well, consider how you can make it work for you.

10. Tell Success Stories

You have 10 tweets to fill a day. What better way to fill at least a few of them than with success stories of your business? Tell them about your happy customers and your innovative new products. It goes a long way in building trust and establishing yourself as an expert.