Each day, Twitter and Facebook gain thousands of more users. However, many businesses are reluctant to dive in and test the social media waters. Here are ten reasons why every business should consider having a social media presence:

1. It’s Free. Businesses can set up Twitter accounts and Facebook pages for no cost other than the time it takes for them to do it. If you’re looking for a low-cost way to connect with current customers or prospective ones, this is it.
2. It’s Easy. Rome wasn’t built in a day, but a custom Twitter or Facebook page can be. The learning curve for both is small. If you’re not at all technically inclined, chances are there’s someone in your company who is already familiar with using one or both social networks.
3. Everybody’s Doing It. Well, maybe not everybody, but many are—in fact, thousands more are each day. You might think your business and social media aren’t a good match, but most likely there are potential followers out there—clients, colleagues, friends—who would be interested in hearing from you. If you have a niche in your industry, you can probably seek out that niche on Twitter.
4. Social Media is Here to Stay. Will Twitter be here in 50 years? Maybe, maybe not—but the need for people to connect with each other through social media isn’t going anywhere.
5. It’s Fun. People gravitate toward Twitter and Facebook because they have fun interacting with others in those environments. And what better way to reach potential clients than in a place where people go to enjoy themselves?
6. It’s a Conversation Starter. Literally. Unlike traditional advertising methods where it might be difficult to judge just whose listening, if you send out a message on Twitter and Facebook, you’re likely to hear about your post from someone. Social media isn’t just a place to send out one-way sales communiques, it’s a great way to get feedback from users, engage them in a dialogue and learn about their likes and dislikes. It just might help you fine-tune a new product, redesign a web page to make it more user-friendly or change course with a marketing strategy.
7. It’s a News Source. More and more people get their news from users found on Twitter and Facebook. You can add to the mix by giving updates and links about news items related to your industry. The more you help people get quality information, the more willing they will be to listen to your own messages when you tweet them.
8. It’s a Virtual Customer Service Center. Many users are reaching out to companies for customer service issues on Twitter and Facebook. It’s quick and easy for them to send a tweet, and many companies respond more quickly on Twitter than through e-mail.
9. You’re Not Alone. If keeping up with a Twitter account seems like a never-ending, overwhelming task (log off and the tweets keep coming!), don’t sweat it: there are many free or low-cost, third party applications to help you manage your account. We recently fell in love with Social Oomph as a way to pre-program tweets and Facebook page updates. We still log on at least once a day to check for replies and comments to our posts (and to reply/comment back, of course!) but in case we get tied up in a meeting (or, as is typical in Chicagoland—traffic), we know our updates can still get out, even if we can’t.
10. The Possibilities are Endless. Uses for social networking sites are still emerging and changing every day. The exciting part is that they are only bound by the limits of your imagination. Have fun and come up with creative concepts to engage your followers (such as Twitter parties by TweeParties). In doing so, you just might find a new one who turns out to be your next client.

Tags: business, Facebook, social media marketing, Twitter

Yesterday I came across an old blog post someone had written about a year ago that questioned the use of Twitter parties as a social media marketing tool. The writer argued that the events tied up the Twitter stream for non-partying users. Also at issue was the effectiveness for companies. The blogger wondered if a party host could give a company tangible stats to prove that a party held gave some sort of results.

That was then and this is now. And fortunately, Twitter parties have evolved somewhat from a year ago. And they’ll keep evolving and becoming more and more useful for both the companies sponsoring them and the users attending them. Here’s why:

Cost effectiveness: I’ve spoken with many small business owners who have wanted to place ads in magazines only to discover that it would cost them thousands to do so and wasn’t in their budget. Broadcast media can be just as expensive. Pay-per-click advertising is more reasonable, but when someone clicks, are they really absorbing your company’s message or simply clicking? Maybe, maybe not. The great thing about Twitter parties is that they are low cost. You can learn to do them yourself, or have an organization like TweeParties help you for not thousands, but rather hundreds of dollars. And instead of simply posting an advertisement for someone to read or hear (or not read or hear, as they case may be), you’ll have a group of people engaged and interacting with you. People who are listening to your message might tweet about your party to their friends, and so on. How many magazine readers clip ads and pass them on to their friends?

Results tracking: In the past, it might have been difficult to track results, but not anymore. There are a number of web sites and applications that track the frequency of hashtags. Simply register your party’s hashtag in advance, and you’ll be able to see how many times that hashtag was tweeted, when it was tweeted, and what users tweeted it the most (typically the hosts during promoting phase of the event). Many hosts also do not request the e-mails of participants upon registering. TweeParties does, usually with a disclaimer that any e-mail correspondence will be limited to communications from the party sponsor and that the attendee can unsubscribe from the list at any time. In supplying a company with e-mail data from attendees, the party sponsoring the event can send a follow up e-mail thanking the user for attending, requesting that the recipient take further action (such as complete a survey) or receive a discount, special offer or product sample.

Technical issues: With any emerging technology, you sometimes hit stumbling blocks (look at the recent antenna issue with iPhone 4). Twitter is still evolving. With approximately 600 tweets per second hitting the Twittersphere, Twitter is constantly being pushed to its limits, and sometimes fails.  The blogger I mentioned above was concerned that very large parties could bog down Twitter and disrupt service for other users. Worldwide discussions about World Cup soccer bogged down Twitter; I seriously doubt a party with several hundred participants could. The only concern in the case of a party would be excessive tweeting by those several hundred participants, which thanks to Twitter’s policy of temporarily freezing accounts that tweet close to 100 tweets per hour (Twitter Jail), would be difficult to achieve. Besides, Twitter is constantly looking for ways to free up traffic. They recently announced they will expand to a large facility in Salt Lake City, Utah, in an effort to better keep up with demand and avoid outages caused by bugs. No emerging technolgy is perfect and most users understand that. Growing pains are common, but they have to be endured to grow into something even better.

I do not believe that a company should have one Twitter party and be done with interacting with its customers. It is just one piece of the puzzle, but one that I truly believe in. Social media does just that: it helps people socialize. Companies with a presence on social networking sites should keep finding ways to engage their clients. We at TweeParties believe that a Twitter party is a great way to open up conversations with consumers and keep them interested in your brand. Have Twitter parties, talk to your followers, answer their questions, come up with other contests & events to hold on Twitter and Facebook (or Foursquare). When it comes to social media, it’s all about engagement. Otherwise, you might as well drop $25K on a glossy magazine ad and be one with it.

Tags: Facebook, Having Twitter parties, interactive advertising, social media marketing, Twitter

So much talk these days about social media and how it applies to businesses.

Companies large and small are scrambling to incorporate Twitter and Facebook accounts into their marketing plans—if they haven’t already done so. Some have succeeded in converting tweets into more business, while others are struggling, wondering if the buzz is worth the fuss.

A study released this week by digital marketing agency 360i examines this Twitter business/consumer dynamic. One of the results from 360i: “Only 12% of all marketer tweets demonstrate active dialogue with consumers, signifying that most of them aren’t tapping Twitter’s full potential.”

People use Twitter and Facebook to connect with other people. To have conversations. Advertisements or “hard sells” are a turn off. If you are a company that tweets one-way messages and does not engage in a dialogue with your followers, you’re missing the boat, and potentially the revenue. Your followers might keep following you, but they might not pay  much attention to what you have to say.

In a recent article in a marketing magazine that I read religiously each month, one columnist recommended using an automated tweet service and taking a few hours each month to pre-program a month’s worth of tweets, as a time-saving measure. That’s fine. I use auto-tweet service Twuffer to spread out my tweets and reach different people at different times of the day. But I still sign in to Twitter frequently to see who’s responded to my tweets and I try to reply to as many as possible. I have conversations, not advertisements. Besides, the conversations are much more fun than ads, aren’t they?

Social media is exciting and fun to use because it’s comprised of people conversing in real time. And that’s what it’s all about. Not not one-way messages, but dialogue. Engage your followers in one and they’ll be more likely to listen to your company’s message when you tweet it.

Erin

Tags: business, social media marketing, tweets, Twitter