Every significant social media platform out there has created a storm in the digital marketing realm at some point of its existence. But there are a few that have also managed to steal the storm from others, while making an impact of their own in the marketplace - and Twitter ranks right on top amongst them. Now, there has never been any shortage of the abundance of social media marketing platforms, but twitter has managed to dig in and crave its own identity in the highly competitive scenario.
That said, not all brands are ideally leveraging the power that this platform can vest them with. Merely having a Twitter page for your brand doesn't suffice.
Some Are Still Facebook-Smitten
And among such companies, there is still a greater focus being delivered on Facebook. And this over-dependence on FB has been one of the causes of their dwindling fortunes. I am not trying to take anything away from Facebook, it has been a goldmine for digital marketeers but, let's be honest, the recent Facebook rules and algorithms have meant it is hardly giving your marketing endeavor the velvet touch you are yearning for, unless you are spending on the Facebook ads - which may seem an economical affair for a day, but when you wish better results to pour in, you need to be at it consistently.
Running Facebook ads for multiple days requires hell of a lot of investment, and as iterated before, without this investment, Facebook isn't doing a lot for you. Try posting a status on your page that you are sure won't be liked by anyone. Now, irrespective of its lack of quality, the post should be visible to a huge number of folks because your page boasts of a great number. Ironically, you will observe that unless you get a 'Like' or a 'Share' not more than 50 of those 10,000 are seeing your post. And that surely cuts a sorry figure.
And while I don't intend to go back to the traditional ways of marketing - like through TV ads and newspapers - but if that is still on your mind, be ready to spend a bomb.
Coming back to Twitter, more and more brands are resorting to Twitter to let their social media marketing plan come in full bloom. They have realized the true potential of this amazingly resourceful platform and all they need to know is the right way to get the most out of it
Hashtags are Where all the Magic Happens
Well, Internet may be full of jokes and sarcasm over the the way hashtags are being overdone, the fact is, it hasn't really affected the prospects that this much-ignored letter on your keyboard has. The best thing about the Hashtag is that your Tweets are not just visible to your followers, but to anyone who is using the hashtag or scrolling through the posts with that specific hashtag. Keeping a tab on the current trends, you can create a post that relates to those trends or dig up something that's already there on your website and tweet it by appending the hashtag.
This strategy can go a long way in grabbing more eyeballs for you and as you can get clicks in abundance on the URLs your post - provided the text preceeding the URL intrigues the Twitter users enough. Also, the retweets you get further boost the traffic to your website and you also manage to create few followers through this method.
Maintain Interaction with the Followers
There is hardly any use of having Twitter followers if you aren't interacting with them. Particularly when you represent a brand that sells certain products and you expect your customers to give their feedback on Twitter or your prospective customers asking questions around your offerings, you have to keep a close tab. All the conversations happening around your brand have to be paid attention to and you need to respond to queries in order to come across as a brand that listens. Social media is all about setting up one-on-one interaction between you and your consumer, and you have to utilize it in that way.
Did You Just Let "Feedback" Pass? Alright, Try and Make You NOT do it Future
Pay closer attention to the negative feedback, as it is the negativity being spread across about your brand that you should be really bothered about. Usually, businesses commit the mistake of being ignorant towards the negative discussions happening around their brand, which proves to be fatal for their prospects.
Those Who Let Feedbacks Dictate their Line of Action
And then, there are brands that indeed have paid close attention to such discussions. Only a few weeks ago the bourbon whisky brand, Maker's Mark, made an announcement that they would be lowering the level of alcohol in their product. The explanation given out was that the remarkably high demand meant that they were really scrambling to keep up with the increase in demand and thus were not able to produce the particular product in a rate that was required to meet the demands. However, as soon as the announcement was made, the buyers took over on Twitter and posted their grievances regarding how not so happy they are with the decision of Maker's Mark to dilute alcohol.
The management of Maker's Mark did pay close attention to all the discussions happening out there and were wise enough to reverse their decision.
They took a decision, without wasting a lot of time, that they would not dilute the alcohol levels and announced the same on social media as well. As their product got back to being Ninety Proof, the sales were never hit.
Twitter isn't a kind of platform you can afford to ignore or, for that matter, undermine. So, be absolutely sure that you do not miss out on any specifics and remain agile and proactive. Tweet more often in a day with hashtags so as to be sure that those Tweets are noticed and keep a close eye on every discussion - positive or negative - that has the potential of affecting your brand value.
There is much credibility and marketing effectuality to discover in Twitter. Do not skimp on it.