Making a Business Case for Twitter

I’m at the Social Media Strategies Conference in San Francisco. Yesterday Twitter was mentioned often so I offered to present some business cases for using it. You can watch the conference being live streamed.

Twitter has become a valuable tool for business use. There are so many opportunities to leverage it’s capabilities in a  way that is relevant & provides value.

  • Customer Relations
  • Crisis Communications
    • opportunity to respond immediately before it escalates to blogs & other channels
  • Crowd Sourcing
    • product development,
    • survey customer satisfaction
  • Build Brand & Communications
    • offer assistance – How can we help you? @ChrisBrogan style
    • brand presence
  • Lead Generation
    • new markets
  • Customer references – star items – refer people to the URL of favorites
    • I made one for Techrigy SM2
    • how to create it
      • use search.twitter.com to search for pertinent tweets
      • open tweet & star them which will propogate the favorites
  • Announce new services, coupons & information
    • @digitalscrap
    • no push marketing please
  • Professional Networking

Laura Fitton @pistachio has a comparison chart for the various microblogging platforms.

This has replaced my Google Reader for RSS feeds. By monitoring the tweets in my topic area (ex: social media monitoring and my own name including misspellings) they gather the latest URL’s pertinent to my area of interest

If you’re just getting started with Twitter I have a post, Twitter 101, with links to resources for getting started. I also provide consulting in the areas of social networking & branding. Feel free to email me at conniebensen @ gmail.com

And definitely follow me on Twitter!  @cbensen

What business value does Twitter provide you with? And what are your success stories?

Here’s  a book that’s soon to be published that has my endorsement – I’ve read parts of it. (It’s written by a Minnesotan, so it has to be good! @jojeda )

Twitter Means Business: How Microblogging can Help or Hurt Your Company

9 Responses to “Making a Business Case for Twitter”


  1. Connie Bensen says:

    a Direct Message offering a suggestion: have your tweeps read your media stories and if they like, send a letter to the edtor. Published letters generate more PR.


  2. Connie Bensen says:

    more from Twitter:
    jeaston1 @cbensen get your real world networking partners to join and have them talk each other up

    StephaneLeeLive @cbensen I see twitter as a front-end to customer service platforms. Ask a question on twitter @company or get response.


  3. Connie Bensen says:

    more DM’s
    Twitter for biz: in the running for an award? Have your tweeps submit testimonials on your behalf.

    promotions work for some brands: @amazonmp3, @wholefoods, @zappos examples

    @bestbuycmo uses it to: get a pulse on the market/customers directly & to demonstrate bestbuy’s commitment to social media

    I’ve used it as a pop-up to generate interest in client’s events and conferences

    last one I promise: value of research using search, looking at sentiment, what customers are thinking about your brand and competitors.

    check out @Warrenss blog with lots of ideas on Twitter

    use hash tag example #sms08
    - to have discussion out in the audience
    - gather questions
    - aggregate thoughts of attendees
    - remote attendance in the back channel
    - stimulate discussion in the twittersphere


  4. mjcarter says:

    I’m glad someone presented the business side/cases for Twitter at a conference!

    Personally Twitter has been an amazing (business) networking tool. I’ve been able to turn on TweetDeck and check in once in a while. New relationships have started when someone mentions a similiar interest.

    My best success stories are reconnecting with people I know and like because of Twitter. Tweets give people a reason to reconnect without having to email our database with “hey, what are you up to?”

    You know. And then you can connect.


  5. Peg Corwin says:

    Hi Connie,

    I’m really having a hard time getting enthusiastic about Twitter. Seems to me this is mostly relevant with national brands and companies. As I understand it, if I wanted to use Twitter in Chicago I would have to search out individuals in small business in Chicago to follow, and then hope that the follow me back?

    Every time I check my Twitter (pcorwin), I mostly see info about pizza people are eating and planes the missed. Too low a signal to noise ratio to interest me much now.

    What am I missing here?


  6. Connie Bensen says:

    Hi Peg,
    Yes, there is a lot of noise too. Next week when I get back I will write a post on some methods to use tweetbeep.com to find potential customers & likeminded people.

    I’m also getting requests for the archived presentation. Once that is available I’ll post it.


  7. marksilva says:

    Good post Connie. We call this Return On Twitter or ROT for short. :-)


  8. Jenny says:

    Thanks for such an important articles about coupon. This is a very needed info about online coupon, free coupon etc.


  9. Peg Corwin says:

    Hi Connie,

    Just stopping by to let you know that I have moved my post on Twitter to:

    http://pegcorwin.com/2008/12/52-links-on-twitter-for-business-with-brief-descriptions/

    Would you like to update your link?

    Peg

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