Are you thinking of hosting a Twitter party or chat for your business or organization? Hosting a chat on Twitter can be a lively way to engage your followers and help spread the word about your business or organization. However, not all products and services are a good fit for a chat.

So what are some questions to ask before you dive into the Twitter party scene? Here are some ideas:

Where are your followers on social media? If you have very few Twitter followers, having a Twitter party might work as a way to gain more. However, if your customer base consists of a demographic that has little interest in tweeting (perhaps Baby Boomer males?), you might want to hold off on organizing a chat. Often, we advise companies that followings on a larger scale work best for Twitter parties (for example, a business people can find online or a nationwide chain). Occasionally, we have seen a Twitter party work well for a small, local business or brand. If you are a small company with a group of hardcore, loyal Twitter followers, having a Twitter party might go a long way in reaching out to this group, engaging them, and perhaps creating brand awareness amongst their followers and friends.

What is your business? Some Twitter chats that have been very successful include: chats during televised programs or events, parties sponsored by mom-favored brands or products, chats for a non-profit organization that included helpful information to increase awareness about an important subject or a chat that included a well-known celebrity participant. Controversial brands often do not fare well during live events. If you are a company that recently faced negative publicity, then having a Twitter event might backfire. For example, a well-known maker of cleaning products held a ‘Healthy Child’ Twitter party with the intent of teaching parents how to keep their homes cleaner and thus, their kids healthier. Many parents joined the chat and questioned the toxicity of their products and how they could be considered healthy for kids. If you think your product might create discord in your chat, it’s best to find another promotional venue.

What are your objectives? What do you hope to achieve in having a Twitter party? Do you want to interact with your followers or get them to tweet about you with the hope that their followers will become aware of your business and follow you too? Do you hope your hashtag will become a trending topic and bring a lot more attention to your brand or organization? Or is your goal simply to interact with people in real-time and generate some good PR? In all of these scenarios, having a Twitter party can be a great idea. However, if you are hoping for immediate sales as a result of the party, you might be disappointed. Like any form of advertising, repetition is the key. We’ve even found some brands who have multiple, regular chats and parties to really benefit from this form of advertising. If you believe having one party will work miracles when it comes to sales, you had better look elsewhere.

What is your timing? Why do you want to have a Twitter chat at this point in time? Are you launching a new company, product, service or website? Will your chat coincide with a live event, such as a conference, grand opening or t.v. show? Twitter parties often are celebrations of newsworthy events: a product launch, an industry gathering, an announcement or contest. Twitter parties are newsworthy; the promotional goal is to make that news known even more throughout the Twittersphere. Twitter parties work best when there is reason to celebrate. Find an angle that is newsworthy about your business, and the party will be easier to promote and sell to others to attend.

Twitter parties and chats can be great ways to communicate with people in a fun, festive atmosphere. Not only will your interaction with followers increase during the chat, but also before an after. There are some additional aspects of having a chat that are beneficial for businesses and organizations: if someone engages in a conversation once, they might be more willing to do so in the future, or more willing to listen to your future messages. Also, Twitter party sponsors have discovered that live chats can be great ways to get feedback from those who use their products and services. If you feel that a Twitter party or chat might be right for your company but you’re not sure where to begin, contact us on Twitter or email us at [email protected]. 

Tags: twitter chat, Twitter party guide, twitter party tips

Often we are asked what the difference is between a Twitter party and a Twitter chat. It seems that some distinctions between the two have been clearly-defined over the past few years:

• A Twitter chat usually involves the exchange of ideas and the dissemination of information between participants. There is the goal of everyone gaining something: knowledge, ideas, inspiration or a new connection.
• A Twitter party can be (and should be) worthwhile, leaving participants with the feeling that they have gained knowledge or insight about a particular topic or simply made a new friend and had a good time while participating. An important difference is the brand involvement in a party, whether that brand is for- or non-profit. The purpose of the party is not only to make people aware of a topic, but also to help people to learn about the specific brand that is sponsoring the event and leave people with a positive opinion of the organization.

Sometime the terms Twitter chat and Twitter party are used interchangeably. However, one nearly universal aspect of the Twitter party is the giveaway.

Giveaways during a Twitter party help lend a ‘party atmosphere’ to the discussion. They draw people to the discussion and in some cases, help spur conversation about the brand involved. Mentioning a prize can lead to a discussion about the product, a segue to talking more about the brand and what it has to offer.

So what to give and how much? Generally speaking, we suggest to our clients the more the better, or better put: the most they are comfortable with. It has been our experience that large prize offerings can lead to lots of RTs and sharing the party details. The promotional buzz generated from big prizes can be worth the extra expense. Often, sponsor gives away one grand prize and a few smaller ones. However, we have had parties where the sponsor gives away a lot of product within the hour: such as 20 pairs of shoes, or 30 spa kits. If you’re sticking to gift cards, often a handful will do.

Big Prizes = Big Trends? Many Twitter parties offer gift cards (think Visa, Walmart, Target cards, etc.) as a way to attract participants. It often works; parties that give away several gift cards during the hour usually get decent attendance. The upside? The more people you have at your Twitter party actively tweeting during that hour, the greater chance you have of having your hashtag become a trending topic. For some sponsors, this means everything. Becoming a trending topic nationally means possibly having thousands upon thousands of eyes seeing your hashtag. It means gaining that wide exposure without having to pay Twitter $120K to become a Promoted Trend. If trending is your goal for your Twitter party, offering big ticket items or something like a gift cards that can be used by anyone, anywhere, often helps do to trick.

Branded Gifts = Loyalty  But is trending what is really important to you? Once the hour is over and the hashtag fades away from the sidebar, many of those active participants sign off or move onto another party. Yes, trending topics can give a brand a lot of exposure. But there’s another line of thought that goes in for more of a niche following: offering your products. Your loyal fans or very interested potential fans are more likely to log in for your event. If you are giving away your product or a gift card to your store, you are more likely to attract participants who are truly interested in your brand and who want to interact with you — not just those who are there with the hope of winning a prize. Will your hashtag trend? Maybe, maybe not. It all depends on how many people tweet during the hour and how often. But if you start a conversation with a smaller group of people who are more likely to interact with you again once the party’s over, that could be more valuable than having people click on a trending topic once and never follow afterward. If a loyal customer wins one of your prizes and loves it, maybe they will tweet/post/blog their joy in finding such fabulous, gush-worthy item. That doesn’t happen with a Visa gift card prize.

Terms & Conditions  Whichever prize path you choose to follow — or perhaps you will choose to implement a blend of the two? — be advised that the larger dollar amount you attach to your prize offerings, the more eyes will be seeking out the fine print. If there is no fine print, you could be in trouble. Establishing an official Terms & Conditions for your contest is essential. A Twitter party with prizes becomes a sweepstakes. Who will be eligible to win? How do they enter? What are the terms? If you want to stay on the right side of the law, don’t forget to make the rules clear by putting them in writing for all to see, either right on the bottom of your blog post or in a link that takes people to another page to view them. The bigger the prize, the greater the risk you take if you do not have official rules. Make contest terms an essential part of your Twitter party plan, regardless of what prizes you choose to offer.

When helping people plan Twitter parties, we are often asked, “What makes a Twitter party or Twitter chat great? How do we get people to attend?”

While prizes often top the list for attracting participants — and certainly offering a big prize generates a lot of pre-party promotional buzz — attendees often need additional reasons to take time out of their busy schedules to participate in an hour-long, online chat. That’s where content comes in.

You have probably heard the phrase, “Content is King,” and when it comes to Twitter parties, it really can be just that. It’s not just about the giveaways. If you create a chat with great content, you’re likely to have greater participation. More tweets equals greater exposure; perhaps even helping your Twitter party to become a trending topic.

Here are a few elements to include when creating content for a Twitter party or chat:

Participants: Let’s face it-it would be fun to tweet with Justin Timberlake, wouldn’t it? If you’re just not into him, imagine tweeting with someone you admire: a writer, musician, scientist, or athlete. Having a well-known person participate in your chat gets people excited and helps create a lot of buzz about your event, especially if the celeb tweets about it herself. If your company has a spokesperson with a large following, having him or her join in the chat can be essential in drawing a huge crowd. But the guest contributor does not necessarily have to have star power to be a draw. Including an expert on a particular subject to weigh in and answer questions during your chat also can be an important addition to your event. Having someone other than the brand itself as part of the chat adds an authoritative element to the Twitter party that will attract not only more followers but also those followers who are truly interested in the subject being discussed.

Special Offers: Many people follow brands on social media with the hope of receiving a special offer, coupon, freebie or discount. Often tweets mentioning a special offer code or discount get a lot of attention and retweets. A Twitter party host might give a special offer to those who attend and/or sign up to be added to their mailing list. Either way, mentioning that the Twitter party might include a special offer to be announced during the chat can go a long way in helping to get more buzz when promoting your event.

Education: Some of our best Twitter parties have been ones where people walk away with new information or knowledge gained about a subject. How do you add an educational element to your chat? Pick a topic that complements your company’s product or service and use the chat as a way to teach people about it. For example, a stroller company might have a chat about traveling with kids, in which a travel expert offers helpful tips and suggestions on how to make traveling with little ones go more smoothly. Having an expert on-hand to answer questions and give advice helps lend some authority to the chat and also can help create more awareness about your chat’s value for attendees. If you have a blog post or article that describes a suggestion in detail, include a shortened link to it in your tweets. One of the best parties we ever helped with for an organic food company  included product giveaways, a  guest expert about nutrition, helpful tips and links to detailed information about healthy eating.

Conversation: Twitter parties should not be one-way sales pitches by companies. This shouldn’t be an infomercial. Like any ‘real-life’ party, part of the party fun is chatting with other people and making new connections. So how do you get the party started on Twitter? Plan in advance a list of questions or topics (think: icebreaker) to get people talking with you and with each other. However, use this list as a starting point only. While it’s great to have a script of sorts in hand, don’t stick solely to scripted responses. You’re not a robot. Engage in the conversation by answering questions and coming up with new questions in response to participant comments. While it might not be possible to respond to every question during the hour, try to find a way to continue the conversation after the chat, whether it’s on Twitter, Facebook, or to answer lingering questions via email. Whatever you do, make sure to keep an eye on the number of tweets you’re sending. Don’t get too caught up in the moment and respond to every tweet during the hour. A good rule of thumb is to stick to a tweet per minute — that way you’ll be able to carry on the conversation without having your Twitter account locked up and landing in “Twitter jail.” (What exactly is Twitter jail? It’s when you tweet too much and your account is frozen for a while by Twitter. The word on the street is that if you exceed 100 tweets per hour, you’re headed to the virtual slammer…)

Web-based Twitter Aggregator, Twubs.com

A few months ago, Twitter upgraded its API to Version 1.1. Normally, that techie-lingo doesn’t mean too much to us non-developers, but for those of us who regularly attend Twitter parties and chats, it has had a huge effect on how we attend Twitter parties.

The most noticeable change is the disappearance of one of the most popular Twitter aggregator programs: TweetGrid. As of now, TweetGrid has not completed an upgrade to v. 1.1, making it unusable. The program’s creator has left open the possibility that it might upgrade down the road, perhaps even for a small user fee. Many are waiting with fingers crossed.

So what are Twitter party and chat attendees to do? Fortunately, there are options out there that do work with the new API.

First, there are a couple of easy-to-use programs that operate in a single-column format. One is Twubs.com. Visit the Twubs website and plug in the hashtag you wish to follow. You can sign in either with Twitter authentication or by signing up for a free Twubs.com account. If the host of the party you are attending has set up a custom Twubs page (and many of them are now doing this), you not only get the benefit of being able to follow a chat and tweet from the same page, but also the host’s tweets will appear separately from the other tweets and will remain at the top of the page — so you can keep an eye specifically on the host’s tweets while following the entire conversation as it unfolds below. Once logged in, the hashtag automatically will be added for you to each tweet you send, so you won’t need to worry about retyping it in each tweet.

A similar program that  hit the Twitter chat scene this year is tchat.io (http://www.tchat.io). This program has a sleek interface that makes it easy to tweet, retweet, favorite and follow a chat all from the same page. Like Twubs, tchat.io is also web-based; you can log in with your Twitter account and tweet directly from your hashtag’s page and the hashtag you enter once will automatically be added to each tweet you send  thereafter. We’ve tested it out and tchat.io updates all tweets very quickly — sometimes more quickly than Twitter. The downside? The single-column format doesn’t allow any highlighting of the host’s tweets. (However, tchat.io’s developer is considering adding a multi-column function down the road).

Web-based Twitter aggregator, tchat.io

TweetChat.com has also made a comeback by switching to v1.1 after a brief haitus. Like Twubs and tchat.io, the long-running, web-based aggregator TweetChat also lets you log in with your Twitter account and auto-populates your tweet with the hashtag you input at login. It also has a User Control area to help you block spammers, as well as ‘Smart Pausing’ that allows you to stop the tweets from pouring in, which makes it easy for users to scroll down, catch up and reply to specific tweets.

If you love the multi-column format that TweetGrid used to offer, we suggest logging into TweetDeck via your Chrome browser. In TweetDeck, you can create as many columns as you want, follow a specific user or hashtag, and see replies to you and DM’s. It takes a little work to set it up to get it just the way you want it, but if you loved TweetGrid, this might be the application for you. To add a column, just click on the “+” sign in the left sidebar. It will then ask you what type of column you want: to follow a user, your messages, or your timeline. To create a column for a hashtag, you have to select “Search,” then type in the hashtag with the “#” sign in front (such as: #Hashtag). Then click “add column” at the bottom of the column, and away you go! Want to follow two hosts? Create a new column by selecting “Search.” Then, type something like the following, the way TweetGrid used to set it up: From:Host1 OR From:Host2 — that way you’ll capture tweets in a single column from both hosts of a party. The downside of using TweetDeck? You have to type in the hashtag each time, if you want to send a tweet directly from the TweetDeck interface.

TweetDeck for Google Chrome

Finally, you can always search for a hashtag from Twitter itself, by inputting the tag into the Twitter ‘search’ bar. Whenever new tweets are ready to load, you will be prompted by a gray bar that appears with a message such as “20 new tweets” that you will then have to click on. The constant clicking/updating can be cumbersome. Another downside is that you have to keep remembering to type in the hashtag in each tweet you send-something that might be hard to do, if you are a rapid, prolific tweeter.

Do you have a favorite way to attend a Twitter party? If you’re up for sharing, we’d love to hear them, and share them via Twitter and Facebook! Just tweet us @TweeParties or visit us on Facebook!

Tags: Aggregator, twitter chat

You might have heard the term ‘Twitter Party’ tweeted about here & there on Twitter. But what are they and why should you consider having one?

Twitter parties are live, online events held on Twitter that are usually hosted by a company or organization that wants to introduce its products, services or cause to a social media-savvy audience. Twitter parties occur at a specific date and time, and people ‘attend’ the event by tweeting the party’s designated hashtag in each tweet they send. They also search for that specific tag to find others who are participating in the same conversation.

The terms Twitter ‘party’ and Twitter ‘chat’ are often used interchangeably. However, Twitter chats are typically seen as recurring events (weekly or monthly) that focus on a specific topic of interest to a special interest group, niche or industry (for example: #smallbizchat or #sewingchat). On the other hand, a Twitter party is usually a one-time event sponsored by a company or organization with the intent to market their products, services or as in the case of a non-profit-its mission.

Maybe you’ve attended a Twitter party or chat or perhaps you are a company thinking about throwing one? If so, here are ten reasons why you might want to consider setting a date and donning your Twitter party hat:

10. They’re inexpensive. Traditional advertising campaigns can cost thousands of dollars to set up and execute. By comparison, Twitter parties are inexpensive. You’ll have to pay for your time to organize the event-or for another company to set it up and run it-as well as the cost of prizes and fulfillment. But these costs are small compared with what it costs to run an ad in a magazine or other form of traditional media.

9. They’re newsworthy. A Twitter party is news: it becomes an event that you can promote by tweeting, posting, announcing via a press release, a Facebook ad, etc. It is something that people can attend from any place that has an available internet connection. It becomes something you can promote, announce or invite people to, just like an in-person event. We’ve even seen Twitter parties mentioned on news sites. Why? Because a party thrown by a company or organization — even a virtual one — that is open to everyone is, well…news!

8. You’ll build buzz for your brand. Tweets about Twitter parties get noticed, especially when prizes or guest celebrities are involved. People get excited about parties and like to tweet and retweet information about them. Sometimes companies will even have a pre-party tweeting contest to help build even more buzz for the party. When you throw a Twitter party, you will see many more tweets mentioning you and your brand. If you want to give your buzz factor a boost, try a Twitter party.

7. You just might become a trending topic. When you have many people tweeting one hasthag at the same time, you have a greater chance of trending. More and more chats and parties are becoming trending topics each day, which is valuable, since becoming a promoted tweet (the top spot in the left column) costs approximately $120K per day. People watch the left column to see what’s trending. If your hashtag trends, you’ll have a greater chance that more people will click on your topic and wonder what it’s all about (and in turn, learn more about your business).

6. You’ll open the lines of communication between you & your followers. By making yourself available for a live one-hour chat with your followers, you’ll lend some transparency to your brand and add a human element to your social media presence. People like to know they can talk to a brand — ask questions, have a conversation with the company and know that they are being heard. Once you start a conversation with those who attend, it’s likely to be one that will continue once the party is over.

5. You’ll gain followers. People who attend a Twitter party usually end up following the sponsor or hosts. Will they unfollow you afterward? Perhaps. But if you give them a great party to attend filled with helpful tips, links, and prizes, they’re more likely to stick around afterward and really listen and respond to what you have to say.

4. You just might learn something. Often companies ask for feedback about their products & services from atttendees. I’ve been surprised by how many clients have told us they really learned something about their customers or received valuable feedback during a party. The conversation might give you a fresh perspective on your business or insight into your audience’s wants and needs.

3. You’ll make friends. Why do we say ‘friends’ instead of ‘followers?’ When the party starts, you will gain new followers who follow you for the sake of following the chat. However, converse with them, answer their questions, give them helpful tips, and those followers will likely turn into friends — or people you’ve established a relationship with, who just might in turn like you enough to become advocates for your brand.

2. You’ll give your brand a boost. If you send out one tweet, how often does it get retweeted? Maybe by a few followers-if you’re lucky? As we mentioned above, a Twitter party becomes news: it’s an event anyone can participate in. There are prizes involved, which helps generate excitement on Twitter. A Twitter party is an event that often gets lots of buzz on Twitter: many retweets, mentions, posting of links with more information. If you would like to boost your brand’s social media presence, organize a Twitter party and make yourself newsworthy.

1. They’re fun. Who doesn’t like to go to a party? In-person parties are fun - - and virtual ones are no different. Sometimes there are celebrity spokespeople who drop in to chat, prizes to be won, special offers, coupons and helpful tips and advice to be learned by participants. Host a Twitter party, and you’re likely to develop a reputation as a truly fun company to follow social media.

So if you’ve thought about having a Twitter party or chat, what are you waiting for? Give it a try! And if you need some help getting started, check out our homepage at TweeParties.com.