10 Reasons to use Twitter for Business

Twitter is one of the most used social media and it is, alongside Linkedin and Facebook, one of the most important social media platform for boosting your marketing strategy.

However many people do not get on very well with Twitter especially because many of us have subscribed under pressure from peers and colleagues to be on the platform without actually knowing what is all about other than sending "messages" in no more of 140 characters of....what?

Your "what" is the most important reason on being on Twitter. And since most of us now use other ways to text, for instance the latest platform "Whatsup", being on Twitter at the same time can be a little of wasting time if you don't know what Twitter is for or don't find a valid reason to be there.

I have personally stopped using Twitter for a long time simply because I didn't find a real connection with my followers and people I follow but I am now trying to use it in very different way.

If you are a business owner eager to expand your company far afield in terms of new customers and potential products, Twitter will be instrumental to your cause. There are many different reasons to open up an account on Twitter and use it wisely for your business. In this article we will examine why is certainly worth it to bother with this social platform which is used from Lady Gaga to Virgin Atlantic spreading all over the world.

1.Connect to Like- Minded people.

It is very important to stay in touch with people that share your same interests especially in your chosen sector. In Twitter there are always certain people that are known for being leaders in what they do and you will find someone in your niche that is considered an “expert”. Start to follow people that are considered an authority and tweet them when you have something important to say. Twitter can be used to know who is who and to be known and promote your area of expertise. Stay in touch with them and try to engage not just upload links, try to have real conversation with them. Try also to stay focus on your business, don't follow too many different people without any connection whatever on what you do or what you want to do even if they sounds interesting. You want to connect with people which normally you cannot have access to. Pop up a question or say something interesting and see what happens.

2. Stay Updated and Read the Last Minute News.

One of the most important feature in Twitter is the news that circulate instantly across the entire network. Twitter is a real time platform and it is really very simple to know what is going on. Stay updated and comment the news and information that really matter to you. This is very important to show that you are at the edge of what is going on in your respective niche. You can follow your competitors and what they do but also have a better understanding of what is going on in that particular sector.

3. Find Target customers/Clients.

Twitter is a social network like Facebook with a big difference: you do not need to ask for permission to follow the users; you just decide to follow anyone you are interested in. And this for a small business in searching of promotion it is a big benefit. Twitter strongly promotes informal conversations among people who do not know each other. It is therefore, an ideal platform for starting and consolidate relationships where ideas, feedbacks and questions circulate free among groups that otherwise would never have the chance to do it.

Try to follow conversations and understand what people's needs are. For instance if you sell a particular software you might come across conversations where people are asking specific questions on how to use the software and maybe you might also get people interested in buying the software but waiting to have answers and clear out doubts. You will have feedbacks of what is going on in your chosen sector in real time. in answering questions and clear out doubts you might find a good way to gain new customers!

4. Enhance Your Customer Service

How often people complain about an impersonal and distant customer service that does not pay attention to their needs. Twitter can be an excellent platform to stay in contact with your customers and to show that you care of them. Ask for feedbacks, stay in contact with them in real time without delays and build up relationships that are based on a genuine, attentive customer service.

5. Conduct Researches.

Twitter is undoubtedly more than just a social network. It is a marvellous platform to research your competitors and potential users. Associated with Twitter there are many more applications that allows you to find lot of information. For instance you can find instantly who is on twitter by using Twitter search a sort of yellow page that will track down anyone who is using Twitter. However is not as sophisticated as Tweepz that allows to make research based on specific information given by the user in his bio. You can find the users by locations and following or followers numbers too. Twitpz does a great job as a filtering tool. Test a service or a product or find the most popular trends by researching keywords in Twitterfall, a platform that gives you a real time results of people that are using that particular keyword. And if you think that you are far too busy to spend time twittering, here the solution: with Hootsuite you can program your messages across many social networks, included Twitter, so that they will be published at the time you have scheduled. Use Twitterfeed to submit your RSS to the entire platform of Twitter users and, being Twitter one of the most popular social network, the audience that potentially you can have it is one of the biggest on the entire internet.Twitter search and others search applications associated with Twitter can be used to track down your competitors in your specific sector. Finding people and businesses in your industry would also give you important information about how your industry is perceived, what it is said about your sector. This can be used prior to set up an account to evaluate if Twitter is the right social network for your business/company.

6. Hire People.

The latest recruitment tool used by many employers and people alike is Twitter. You can launch your recruitment campaign by Twitter and you can also get in contact with your target employee/ consultant/ professional by screening profiles or people that are on it.

7. Drive Traffic to your Blog/website.

Twitter it is an ideal platform for backlinks and to drive traffic to your website. In Twitter backlinks works fast and you can use strategies to make sure that people will re-tweet your messages. Use Twitterfeed to submit your RSS like we have talked before.

8. Increase your Google indexing.

Using Twitter to do backlinks and a brief but compelling message to invite people to click on your link and hopefully you will increase your audience which will bring more people on your website.This should speed up your indexing in Google

9.Increase your brand awareness

If you work as a manager for a large company where employees are using Tweeter, you can increase your brand awareness by working together with your colleagues to present a strong and unified image that makes an impact externally.

10. Inform About a Conference or Event.

Use Twitter as an amplifier of your recent conference or event. Report the event on Twitter by uploading photos, video, material and comments of the participants.

These are just some of the reasons that will give you some suggestions on how to use Twitter to implement your business. There are many other apps and platforms associates with Twitter. So if you are tempted to go deeper into the subject I would suggest this excellent site http://mashable.com/guidebook/twitter/ that will give you a comprehensive guide of everything you need to know about Twitter. A lot of people are not aware how this apparently simple system of brief messages is so useful. Twitter is more than just a social media network. It is a resource that can unlock unexpected doors for many businesses as well as individuals.