Archive for the ‘fort wayne’ Category

I’ll admit it, I love twitter.  I look at my twitter feed many times every day.  But, I’ll also admit it – it can be hard to find any real value in twitter!

When people find out I’m “into” twitter, some common questions come up:

• Why would anyone care what I had for breakfast? – Assuming that the only thing posted on twitter is useless information
• Is there any real value in twitter?

For me and for my business, the answer is a resounding YES to the second question.  I believe that there is indeed real value in twitter.

Today, I wanted to share just two very simple uses for twitter that I think you and your business use.

1.  Use Twitter To Drive Traffic To Your Site

Here is a graph of some of the recent traffic to my blog (as recorded by the FREE stats program: Google Analytics):

Notice the ups and downs on the graph?  Of course, they are impossible to miss.  The obvious question, when looking at this graph is “What caused the spikes”?

The answer: TWITTER!

Each of the spikes in traffic represent a day (or some times a couple of days) where I sent out just one tweet about a new blog post I had.  As a result of the single tweet (and a few kind re-tweet), my traffic for that day made a significant increase.

That’s a GREAT use for twitter!

Of course, any business or person has to be careful about always being self-serving.  If all you ever do on twitter is send out tweets hoping to lure people back to your own web site, then people will stop listening (following you).  But, if you tweet other useful information AND you tweet links to your own site, then people will visit.  If the content is interesting – they will come back!

I would suggest that this use makes it absolutely essential that your business has a blog.  Your business blog needs to be updated regularly (I’m shooting for once a week on my own – a new goal).  And, your business blog needs to have interesting content.  If you have a blog, and if you post regularly, and if you post about interesting content… then sending out regular tweets that link back to your blog WILL increase your traffic (and have some good effect on your Search Engine placement as well).

This alone should make twitter worth looking into.

2.  Use Twitter to Find People Talking About Your Business In Your Area

Wether or not you are on twitter, others are.  And, they are talking about all kinds of things.  Chances are they are talking about your business.  Wouldn’t  it be nice if there was a simple way to know every time someone within a 50 mile radius (or whatever area you work in) was asking questions about your business?  You could jump in, offer answers, offer resources, even offer a sale! Wouldn’t that be a great tool?

Of course, the tool absolutely does exist and it is called… twitter.  It’s a simple little feature built into twitter called TWITTER SEARCH.  Visit search.twitter.com and click on the “ADVANCED SEARCH” link on the right side of the search box.

In the Advanced Search area you can do some amazing things!  The thing we are focused on right now is search by PLACES.

Let’s make up a company.  Suppose you own ANTIQUES R US, located in Atlanta, GA.  And, you would like more people to know about your business.  So, what do you do?  Well, one great option is to use the Advanced Twitter Search to look for anyone talking about Antiques within 50 miles of Atlanta, GA.  Here’s what the Advanced Search might look like:

You can see here that ANTIQUES R US is update to search twitter for the word “Antiques” within a 50 mile radius of Atlanta, GA.  What would ANTIQUES R US find?  A lot.  Below are just two tweets form the last couple of days that may have been interesting to ANTIQUES R US:

Here is some who had the day to herself and visited one of ANTIQUES R US competitors – the Lakewood Antiques Market.  What if ANTIQUES R US had responded to her and said something like: “Glad you loved Lakewood.  If you liked them, you might enjoy us as well – mention this tweet for 10% off”.  Who knows, maybe the person would have showed up

Here’s another:

This person is looking for an Antiques place to visit in the Savannah area.  What is ANTIQUES R US had responded with a couple of excellent restaurants (close to the store, of course) and a personal invitation to visit the store?

Again, the conversation is already happening.  I promise – people are really talking about your business.  The question is whether or not you are going to join the conversation!

Advanced Twitter Search – by location – my second favorite use for  twitter.

Want to know more?  Have your own favorite uses for twitter?  Leave a comment and share your thought.  Or, contact EH Design & Consulting today, and we can talk about all the ways  Social Media can help your business!