Social Media Tools Week: Twitter | Social Media Prospecting Tool
November 17, 2009 – Thanks for attending today’s webinar. My goal was to help you understand the unique value that Twitter brings in terms of being able to prospect for new customers. In the spirit of “Social Media Tools Week” I wanted to keep this presentation light on theory but heavy on how-to actually build a quality group of followers.
Presentation – Twitter: Social Media Prospecting Tool
There are a lot of tools out there but I selected those that I felt got the job done best. I don’t know exactly what works for the rest of you, but I like a step-by-step guide on how to get started. Once you learn the ropes, then swapping out one tool for another one that you like better or enhancing your own follower strategy with lessons you have learned is great. However, I think that everyone needs some guidance to get in the game. Please use this blog to ask questions or share your advice / best practices with the rest of us.
Some additional thoughts about the Twitter List function…
I have recently started to use the List function that Twitter just released as a way to segment my Twitter feeds. Once I had more than a few dozen followers, I realized that a lot of good stuff was getting lost in the volume of tweets that I received. There were some natural buckets for me to put followers in – social media practitioners, politics (I can be a bit of a political junkie), product companies (I like to check out the good deals) and a “wait and see” group of new followers that I want to learn more about.
However, I didn’t talk about list in the presentation today – and there is a reason for that. As an individual – even one with an independent business – my Twitter followers reflect the diversity of my interests. When a company creates a Twitter account, the focus should be on a group of people who are similar by virtue of the fact that they are customers or prospective customers of that company. You can use a Twitter alert service to find when “tweeple” are talking about your brand or product line, creating Lists does not do that job. There is a good post that reviews three Twitter monitoring products, if you want to learn more about this topic.
If you genuinely find that you have followers that fall into two or more distinct buckets based on what their interests are and what they want to hear from you, then it is best to set up two distinct Twitter accounts. However, this situation should really be the exception, not the rule. If a company has some very distinct product lines, then definitely create accounts based on product. For example, Mars has M&Ms, Dove, Snickers and Mars Bars, and these all deserve their own Twitter identity.
