Twitter for Business: Myths Busted

Who would have thought only a few years back that we would all be sitting here broadcasting to the world and its mother what we ate for lunch? Who would have thought we would have the outlet to do so and who would have thought anyone would care? Flash forward and we are obsessed with Twitter. We use it to publicise ourselves and our work, we use it to get information (whether that be actual worthy information or, perhaps, what someone else deems worthy), and sometimes we use it merely to kill some time. Whatever our reasons, Twitter can no longer be ignored, but certain myths about the best way to use it for your business can.

Myth 1 – The longer you are on Twitter, the more influence you have

FALSE! No one cares if you joined three years ago or three weeks, so long as what you are saying is interesting and valuable. Businesses joining Twitter now are not late if they are engaging with their followers and showing them 140 characters that no one else in the industry can. People will take notice and will follow – regardless of if you joined in 2009 or just this month.

Myth 2 – The more you say, the better

FALSE! In terms of the workplace, as exciting as it may be to you to talk about what your office ate for lunch, the truth is, your followers are probably more interested in what your office thinks about its industry. Your followers want to know what events you will be attending and what you are doing to stand out from your competition. They do not want to know if you all need a coffee as it’s been “one of those days”. The truth is you need to think about what you yourself would want to read with your precious time. We live in a world where self promotion is easy and self indulgence is even easier, but if you are using a social network to get ahead, promotion should beat indulgence at all times. This means 3,000 tweets a day are not necessary and, if anything, a hindrance that could result in people clicking “unfollow” just to stop hearing about how your coffee machine is broken.

Myth 3 – Following celebrities will make you a celebrity

FALSE! Okay, this should go without saying, but if you are a business, it’s probably unlikely that following a celebrity is really going to bring in a large amount of interest for you (unless the celebrity is part of the cast of The Only Way is Essex and your business is in fake tans). On the whole, you would be better spending your time finding relevant people to follow. This can include important members of your industry, thought leaders, companies, and, most importantly, potential customers. It’s all fine and good to follow people that you find amusing or tell the best Twitter jokes, but if they aren’t going to buy your product, they aren’t the people you really want to engage with.

FACT!
At the end of the day, as with everything in business, Twitter should be about adding value. You would not call up a potential customer and spend half an hour telling nonsensical jokes. Fine, put the odd joke. Afterall, it’s important to show some personality (just as it would be on the phone). But just like you would on the phone, you should use your time on Twitter effectively – talk to the right people, promote yourself in a professional capacity, and tell your customers what the benefits are to them. People are busy – even 140 characters can be too much to read if time does not allow, so make sure that your 140 characters are saying something useful and it will be irrelevant how long you have been on Twitter or whether you have Stephen Fry following you – you will have customers who are interested. And we all know, the right interest leads to sales. Which is why you are on Twitter in the first place, right?