# are you using twitter to market your brand? Is it worth it?



## funkymunky (Dec 8, 2007)

Are you using Twitter in any way to market your brand?
How big is it and how big is it going to be?

Phil


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## DMS (Jan 28, 2007)

It's new, shares a lot of features with outher sites, like MySpace our FaceBook. The futur will show what it will become... I'm watching it and still building up my mind.


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## funkymunky (Dec 8, 2007)

Thanks for your fast reply on this thread Pedro, this one is going to get interesting

Phil


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## Robin (Aug 28, 2006)

yup, we've been using twitter quite a bit. It's working pretty good for us.


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## auggieboy (Mar 22, 2008)

Robin said:


> yup, we've been using twitter quite a bit. It's working pretty good for us.


Robin,
could you elaborate on how it's working for you. I have been trying it and I just don't get how it could help with my business. My wife is using it and thinks it is helping with her brand (totally different business).
My sister also uses it to promote her etsy business and she swears it works.
I just dont get who would follow us. (custom apparel)
Is it helping you locally or for net sales?


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## Robin (Aug 28, 2006)

auggieboy said:


> Robin,
> could you elaborate on how it's working for you. I have been trying it and I just don't get how it could help with my business. My wife is using it and thinks it is helping with her brand (totally different business).
> My sister also uses it to promote her etsy business and she swears it works.
> I just dont get who would follow us. (custom apparel)
> Is it helping you locally or for net sales?


It is helping locally and bringing quite a bit more traffic to our blogs and website.

There are several here already using twitter, and we are following each other. Its nice to see what everyone is up to.

We landed on particularly big job via twitter. We held a networking event, and several folks came because of twitter. We even had some vendors find us because of twitter, which also meant sales for banners. Im pleased with it.


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## Seek (Mar 26, 2009)

It depends how you use it really. Just make sure your posting content that's relevant and written by an actual human. Posts on Twitter from a company can look 'spam-ish' very easily. 

Good luck.


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## beedee02 (Jan 25, 2009)

I think alot of it depends on if your target market is a big user of twitter. I have been reading a book entitled Twitter Power by Joel Comm to learn how to effectively harness the power of this social median. Who knew there was actually something called twitter etiquette.


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## Rodney (Nov 3, 2004)

> How big is it and how big is it going to be?


It's pretty darn big right now, and growing very fast in main stream media.



> Are you using Twitter in any way to market your brand?


There are a LOT of ways to use twitter to promote your brand, find new customers, interact with existing customers, etc.

I've used it to market my t-shirts and I can safely say that I've had at least one t-shirt sale directly from one of my "tweets" 

I wouldn't view twitter as simply a "self promotional" tool though. It can be that of course, but if all you do is talk about your stuff, people may not find that interesting very long (unless you or your brand is big like @zappos or @jetblue or @starbucks) and even they don't do promotional only tweets


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## n.signia (Nov 21, 2007)

We use it and it is a great tool to keep your business on peoples mind, extend brand recognition, and add a personal touch to your business. It can be used to announce upcoming events or sales, etc. there are alot of ways to utilize twitter for your business.


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## Rodney (Nov 3, 2004)

Here's a good article I recently read about how to market correctly on "social" type websites:

Pirate Moves- Promoting Without Being That Guy | chrisbrogan.com


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## Solmu (Aug 15, 2005)

Rodney said:


> Here's a good article I recently read about how to market correctly on "social" type websites:
> 
> Pirate Moves- Promoting Without Being That Guy | chrisbrogan.com


Love the title. The metaphor gets pretty stretched, but it addresses some of the things that make me cringe when that certain type of trendy internet marketer starts shouting "Social media is our new pot of gold!"

Particularly love this bit:



> Things To Remember About Being That Guy
> "That guy" tends to blurt a lot. They talk all about their thing. They re-talk about it all over Twitter, Facebook, and everywhere they can find. They make every second or third blog post a pointer to that thing. They try to find clever ways to weave their thing into your thing.


One of the problems with social media as a marketing tool is that some of those who use it to market only have one message that they want to blast ad nauseum.


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## auggieboy (Mar 22, 2008)

I can see how it would help with marketing, but where do you get the followers from? Do you tell existing customers about it? Is it all form facebook/myspace.

I guess I can't see to many people logging onto there Twitter account and doing a search for screen printers. It just seems that you would mostly find other screen printers.

My wife has a great handmade soap business, she also belly dances. she has other belly dancers follow her tweets and then she can then parley some of those followers in to soap sales.
I guess I need a more interesting hobby!


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## EnMartian (Feb 14, 2008)

We use Twitter to get the word out about what's happening at EnMart. I agree with those who say that you can't always be pushing your latest product or service. I've unfollowed a few people who were only there to push themselves. If you can't be part of the community than you probably won't get far. 

If, on the other hand, you work to be part of the community, you will find people who will be interested in what you have to say and what you have to sell. You have to look at it as building relationships, not making sales.


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## n.signia (Nov 21, 2007)

auggieboy said:


> I can see how it would help with marketing, but where do you get the followers from?


the best way to say it, is it just happens. People check out who other people are following and follow them too, then its just a snowball of following. 

To get the ball rolling, just tell some freinds about it, put it in your forum signature, maybe have a link on your site, before long your have a nice little following.


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## Rodney (Nov 3, 2004)

> I can see how it would help with marketing, but where do you get the followers from? Do you tell existing customers about it?


Yes, you could let existing customers know by way of your newsletter. You could also add a link from your existing website to let your website visitors that they can connect with you, stay updated on your company via twitter. It's basically like an easier to update (tiny) blog.

Another big way that people follow you is if you follow them first. While it's not written in stone that people you follow will follow you back, it does seem to happen more often than not. 

So if you find people that are interesting, funny, relevant to your interests (or your "company's interests"), then they could be worth following.


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## tat2ts (Aug 11, 2007)

Rodney said:


> Another big way that people follow you is if you follow them first. While it's not written in stone that people you follow will follow you back, it does seem to happen more often than not.


 If you do go with this method make sure and do a little maintinence once in a while and delete people who haven't reciprocated after 2-3 weeks. Following a huge number (2000) and only having a small number of followers (100) looks like your fishing for followers and can actually scare away quality contacts.


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## Rodney (Nov 3, 2004)

tat2ts said:


> If you do go with this method make sure and do a little maintinence once in a while and delete people who haven't reciprocated after 2-3 weeks. Following a huge number (2000) and only having a small number of followers (100) looks like your fishing for followers and can actually scare away quality contacts.


I don't necessarily agree with that approach. I don't need everyone I follow to follow me back 

In theory, I am following them because I found what _they_ had to say interesting/relevant/funny/etc. 

They may or may find what_ I_ have to say interesting/relevant/funny to them. If they don't follow me back, it doesn't mean that I found what _they_ had to say any less interesting.

Personally, I think you should only follow people you find interesting/relevant/funny/whatever criteria. 

If you're following people just to increase your numbers, then culling the people who aren't reciprocating may make more sense, but to me that makes things too complicated


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## MiNGLED (Aug 22, 2007)

Just started to use Twitter as a way of marketing my brand but as it's only been 2 days it's a bit hard to make a judgement call. I guess there is a fair bit of trial and error as to what makes someone want to follow you for a genuine reason. Also I'd much rather build up followers organically rather than simply try and follow hundreds of people just in the hope that they follow me back.


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## Relik Apparel (Jul 10, 2009)

I ve said before that I am very new both in this line of t-shirt business as on tweeter. But man, I ve been trying to find its use and I m just overwhelmed with so much spam.

It feels like there's hardly any people out there, but companies promoting something and everything. Every time i update, i have like 7-10 commercials and 1 or 2 actual people.


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## tat2ts (Aug 11, 2007)

Try using the search function to find people in your niche or that have similar interests.


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## Sports4Less (Jun 15, 2009)

I am trying to use it for my business, but I know sometimes a week goes by and I forget to look at it or even post anything. I do occasionally delete the spammers. I think you need to keep it real but not tell people the same thing over and over. It is about making relationships with people and not about selling them. I wish more people would realize that. I have made a few new contacts and I do think it helps. BTW, I think I followed about everyone who posted in this thread. I like you guys.


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## tat2ts (Aug 11, 2007)

Sports4Less said:


> I am trying to use it for my business, but I know sometimes a week goes by and I forget to look at it or even post anything. I do occasionally delete the spammers. I think you need to keep it real but not tell people the same thing over and over. It is about making relationships with people and not about selling them. I wish more people would realize that. I have made a few new contacts and I do think it helps. BTW, I think I followed about everyone who posted in this thread. I like you guys.


 Exactly, word of mouth is a great thing.


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## SHIROINEKO (Mar 31, 2010)

I like it as much as facebook. Coz I can contact group of future customers easily.


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## EnMartian (Feb 14, 2008)

Rodney said:


> I don't necessarily agree with that approach. I don't need everyone I follow to follow me back
> 
> In theory, I am following them because I found what _they_ had to say interesting/relevant/funny/etc.
> 
> ...


I have to agree with you on this one Rodney. I'm very careful about who EnMart follows and I don't expect that everyone I follow will follow me back. I also don't follow back everyone who follows EnMart. 

My goal has always been to build up a group of followers who were interested in our products and our company, not to be able to say I have thousands of followers. I'd rather have a smaller quantity who were relevant, than a large group who didn't have any interest in EnMart. 

I will add this caveat, I do tend to go through about every six months and unfollow people who don't update their accounts on a regular basis. Again, that's more a personal preference thing, but I don't see any reason to follow people who don't update their accounts.


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## EnMartian (Feb 14, 2008)

Rodney said:


> Yes, you could let existing customers know by way of your newsletter. You could also add a link from your existing website to let your website visitors that they can connect with you, stay updated on your company via twitter. It's basically like an easier to update (tiny) blog.


We have a small sheet that get included with our catalog which details ways to keep up with EnMart and includes our blogs, Twitter and Facebook pages. That seems to work pretty well.


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## lincolnapparel (Nov 21, 2009)

I'd read this thread first:

Social Networking or Social Notworking?

I've had a few sales from Twitter. It does take time, though (though Twitter takes less time than Facebook or Myspace). I try to follow other people who tweet about things I'm interested in, and I use the search feature to find people who tweet about, say, Lincoln. Often, they follow me back eventually. Another way to find followers is to look through the followers list of people who tweet things interesting to you.

There are a lot of bots and marketing-type people who blast spammy links all the time on Twitter - I tend not to follow these people.

Make sure your posts are interesting and informative. One of the things that bothers me about all social networks is the excessive amount of noise - e.g. "my cat is so cute", "I just had pizza - yum", etc. I post mainly about Lincoln and other things I find interesting. I also post links to new blog posts and the occasional link to my site or one of my designs.


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## ProperGnar (Dec 19, 2010)

definitely. about half of our online sales come from twitter. it takes a lot of following and un-following to grow but it's easy to find people who are in your target market by looking at companies that are similar to yours and checking their followers.


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## edsaav (Apr 7, 2011)

Hey Latosha, you say there is a lot of following and un-following. I understand the following part, but what would be the reason for un-following?


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## banga (Jul 1, 2010)

edsaav said:


> Hey Latosha, you say there is a lot of following and un-following. I understand the following part, but what would be the reason for un-following?


Unfollowing spam accounts I would guess.


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## EnMartian (Feb 14, 2008)

edsaav said:


> Hey Latosha, you say there is a lot of following and un-following. I understand the following part, but what would be the reason for un-following?


Unfollowing can happen for a lot of reasons. I tend to unfollow people who constantly tweet sales posts all the time. I unfollow people who don't update their accounts on a regular basis. Sometimes I unfollow people who just Tweet nonsense or don't Tweet things that are interesting to me or relevant to our company. Your reasons for unfollowing someone might be different than mine, as it's kind of a personal preference thing.


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## edsaav (Apr 7, 2011)

I just signed up for twitter yesterday, after my last post, and now that I'm seeing what some people tweet I'm starting to understand the necessity of un-following. I also read some advice on another thread saying that if you follow a potential customer and they don't follow you back within a few days it's best to drop them. I guess if you have to high of a following to followed by ratio then people will assume that you're desperate, or just fishing for followers.


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## outrageoustees (Feb 25, 2010)

I do not UnFollow someone who hasn't Followed me back. I don't really spend much time with that aspect of "the Twitter game," but I HAVE had people Follow me that I Followed MONTHS previously. For whatever reason, they were just now getting around to it. 


What I DO do, is put the Twits I Follow into Lists. Not all are publicly viewable. I generally keep my Twitter feed open to all, but I can narrow down whose tweets I see simply by clicking a list. For ClimbAddict, that is often the Rock Climbers/Mountaineers" List. I have listed for Climbing Gyms, Guide Services, Media Outlets, etc... So far I have not targeted those lists, but lets say I was about to launch a program for climbing gyms of some sort. I might then narrow my feed to the Gyms section, and focus on replying to the various gyms posts, in order to gain a little attention to my own profile.


I see no harm in Following anyone, unless the post drivel, incessantly, or spam. I have also sent DM's to people before I UnFollow them(a few times) explaining the reason I am doing the UnFollow! hahahah


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## Relik Apparel (Jul 10, 2009)

"Friend or Follow" is a very useful site once you get into larger numbers of follow and followers. The page breaks down your account into 3 tabs. a) ppl who follow you and you follow them back b) ppl that follow you and you are not following them back (in marketing terms, start following these) and c) ppl you follow but do not follow you back (you may choose to periodically unfollow ppl in this category) I am not sure if thats the order, but those are the 3 criterias.

Here's the link: Who Doesn't Follow You on Twitter | Friend or Follow

If you link your profile to the page, you can actually follow or unfollow directly from the "friend or follow" site

.


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## edsaav (Apr 7, 2011)

I haven't had a chance to use it much yet, but I found another similar service that looks like it could be useful. 
ManageFlitter


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