Twitter Tools – The first tool you must have in your toolbox

When it comes to Twitter tools there are literally thousands, I am certain I don’t know even half of them, but out of the ones I do know, there are some I absolutely love (and you will too!).

Twitter tools have played a huge part in Twitter’s success over the past few years since it launched in March of 2006 (yes, it’s barely 4 and a half and it has over 145 million active users). Instead of overwhelming you with a list of Twitter tools to go check out, I’ll do one at a time and give you a bit more detail, and some breathing room to try it out for yourself.

The first Twitter tool that is essential to everyone’s repertoire when they are working on building successful marketing on Twitter is a great Twitter client. A Twitter client is an outside software or website that lets you run Twitter in a more effective way. With the release of the ‘New’ Twitter it’s possible you won’t need it as much, but from what I have seen, and what I know I can do with my favorite Twitter client, there is no way I’ll be giving it up anytime soon.

A few of the most popular Twitter clients include Hootsuite, Tweetdeck and Seismic.

It’s been a while since I used two of these particular Twitter tools, Tweetdeck and Seismic, to be exact, because once I found Hootsuite it was like love at first site. I’d been frustrated by both Tweetdeck and Seismic for a variety of reasons, and when I found out the Hootsuite ran on a web browser (the other two were (and may still be) desktop applications), and I began to understand all the things I could do with it I was hooked.

The Basics:

Just a few of the basic things that Hootsuite will let you do…

1. See everything that is going on in your account at one time: That means you can set up tabs and columns to give you all the information you need at a quick glance, which makes using Twitter much easier and so much more understandable. Until I started using these features, I didn’t really ‘get’ Twitter, once I did, the whole game changed. For each of my Twitter accounts (right now I have 3, PaysonCooper, PaysonJewelry and LearnTwtr, and I help a few people run their accounts as well) I create a tab and display 5 columns, in this order: Home Feed, @ Messages, Direct Messages, Scheduled Messages and Sent Messages. I can see everything that is going on in each account by clicking on it and quickly scanning the screen. Very powerful.
2. Track Hash tags (#) and keywords: You can set up a tab with several columns that track hash tags and keywords that are relevant to your business over time or even short term. And example: I was at a conference where people were tweeting with a particular hash tag, by adding a column to my hootsuite window I could follow along with the conversation and participate while still having access to all my other information. This is SUPER valuable.
3. Scheduling Messages: There are many Twitter tools that let you schedule messages including Social Oomph (which used to be known as TweetLater), but why use a separate website when you can do everything in one place? And, by being able to show the column, I can see what’s scheduled to go out in the next few hours or few days. Again, very powerful.

Ok, that’s just a short list of things that make marketing on Twitter with Hootsuite SO much easier that just using Twitter alone. And, as far as Twitter tools go, for me it’s the winner, hands down. I don’t have enough digits to count the number of people I’ve converted from Tweetdeck users to Hootsuite users either – and they LOVE it. So, if you are using some other Twitter tool, go check out Hootsuite, a few minutes figuring out how to use could make all the difference in your Twitter marketing success.

And, if you are interested in getting all the details on how I use Hootsuite, get free instant access to a highly-acclaimed webinar that walks you through the first steps in getting to know the tool: Twitter Selling Secrets Webinar. And, if you know you are ready to really dive in, check out the Twitter Sales in 12 Minutes a Day course – everything you could possibly want to know about using Hootsuite to build your business on Twitter and start making sales is covered in step-by-step videos, where you get to look over my shoulder and see what I did to create a 1231% increase in sales.

Marketing On Twitter-Keys to Success

As you start to explore marketing on Twitter, you need to keep a few key things in mind…

Here are a few keys to creating success as you begin marketing on Twitter:

1. Be Social: Twitter, despite the way some people treat it, is a Social Network, so you will need to be social. That means you will want to converse with people, comment on things they share and generally build real relationships. It takes an investment, but it doesn’t need to be an exorbitant amount of time… in fact, when done right, marketing on Twitter can take only a few minutes a day.
2. Retweet: It gets mentioned a lot, but I want to mention it again here… retweeting is an essential part of your twitter strategy. You need to actively retweet things that will be interesting to your followers and help you build key relationships. You also need to make sure you thank EVERY SINGLE PERSON who retweets you. There is a great way to do this too – you can’t use the new Twitter retweet function, but if you change the settings in a Twitter tool like Hootsuite, you can click the button to retweet and the whole tweet will be placed in your text box, allowing you to edit it as you see fit – and send your links out again when you thank someone for retweeting them.
3. Be a Regular: You must participate on a regular basis to make Twitter work for you. If you get on 1 time per day and send out 1 tweet you will get almost nothing in return. You must spend a little time a couple of times a day responding to people, retweeting and posting some information that is good to share. Make it a part of your daily routine.
4. Be Personal: Again, it’s a ‘social network’ so people want to interact with people. Don’t be shy, share some things about your life – share a photo, a thought, an inspiration – whatever strikes you. A really easy way to do this is with a cell phone that has a camera. As you go through your day, watch for opportunities to snap an interesting shot and then share it with your Twitter followers.
5. Get More Out of Twitter: Link your Twitter account to other social networks like Facebook, but you need to do it the right way – the wrong way can get you shut down on Facebook, and even kicked off permanently. Look up the right ways to share between your accounts, or you can use a tool like Hootsuite to select which updates you want to send to Facebook and other social networks message by message.

Marketing on Twitter can be an extremely valuable part of your overall online marketing and social media marketing strategy – follow these steps and you’ll be headed down the right path. For more Twitter strategy, click here to see the rest of the Twitter and marketing blog.

And, if you are ready to make marketing on Twitter explode your sales, then check out the Twitter Sales in 12 Minutes a Day course.

Twitter For Marketing Your Business – Is It All It’s Cracked Up To Be?

When you start to think about using Twitter for marketing your business there are a few things to be aware of…

First, Twitter is growing at an incredible rate, so for almost every business using Twitter for marketing is going to be a smart move. There are a few exceptions… if your target market is say, people over the age of 70, then you might be missing the mark with marketing on Twitter. You would be better off spending some time looking at marketing in the AARP magazine (which has one of the largest circulations in the world… but I digress…). Relative to the internet as a whole, Twitter has a lower demographic of people over the age of 55, actually, so before you dive in if you are going after baby-boomers, you may want to do some more research.

But if you plan on using Twitter for marketing your business to people under the age of 55, male or female, Twitter will likely be very fertile ground. And, Twitter’s built in search capabilities let you do a lot to find those ‘targeted’ prospects and follow them (if you aren’t familiar with Twitter, one of the best ways to build targeted followers is by following them – when they read your great Twitter bio and they see you have something they are interested in, they will often follow back). So, if you do a little bit of keyword research, you can start to find and follow people who are talking about the keyword phrases that are most important to your product or service.

Second, you need a good plan to be effective marketing with Twitter. Without one you can get sucked into the black-hole of wasting time on Twitter FAST. So, make sure you take some time to find out how to use Twitter in the best possible ways. If you think about it this way… lets say you regularly charge your clients $100/hour for your time. If you spend even just an half an hour a day trying to figure out how to use Twitter and you don’t see any results start to come in, each week that goes by, you will have wasted $50/day! If you only work 5 days a week (which most entrepreneurs don’t do – tell me your not at your computer on Saturday morning and Sunday night? Right, I thought so…), that would be $250/week of wasted time. When you start to think about it that way, investing a little bit of money into learning the right and wrong ways to marketing with Twitter right from the get-go can save you a ton of money – not to mention help you actually MAKE SALES so that money starts coming in from those efforts.

If you have decided it’s time to stop pussy-footing around and you really want to learn, click here for a free webinar on Twitter for marketing. It will give you the key details you need to get going in the right direction. And, if you want to read more of the blog posts about Twitter for marketing your business, click here.

Want your favorite celebrity to follow you on Twitter?

Ever wished you could get your favorite celebrity to follow you on Twitter?

Well, now you can – and with a charity donation to boot! It might cost you a pretty penny, but you could have any from Demi Moore to Zachary Levi (from the NBC show ‘Chuck’) following you! There are over 180 celebrities participating and the fund they are raising through the Ebay auction will go to aHomeInHaiti.org, and particularly to rebuilding the Miriam Center, which is a Haiti based home that serves special-needs children.

You’ll be the envy of your friends when you get your favorite celebrity to ‘chat’ with you on Twitter, and you’ll feel good about yourself too!

Check out the article for more details here: http://bit.ly/dhViC3

Why do you need Twitter for marketing your business?

The reason you need Twitter for marketing your business is really quite simple…

As of Sept 2010, it has, officially, over 145 Million users! And, to top it off, the growth in the last 4 months prior to this announcement was nearly 300,000 people PER DAY!

When something is growing that rapidly in popularity, you can’t afford to miss the boat.

But, what if you’re just not sure how to use it EFFECTIVELY to help market your business?

Well, the answer to that question actually requires another question… what is your time worth to you? You could experiment, spend time figuring things out, learning the ropes, hoping for the best… and possibly stumbling onto a successful marketing strategy.

OR

You could invest in learning the RIGHT way from the very beginning… saving yourself untold hours of time, possible missing clumps of hair (yes, we entrepreneurs sometimes pull out a few strands when we can’t figure things out…) and the intense frustration and overwhelmed feelings that come along with knowing something should work, but not quite knowing how to make it work for you.

If you want to cut to the chase and really get clear on how to use twitter for marketing your business, here’s the best way.

The Twitter Sales in 12 Minutes A Day course. It comes with the ‘lazy business owners’ Daily Play for Twitter Sales Domination and breaks everything down so that you can become a Twitter Master in no time, leaving everyone else in the dust. Check it out here.

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