With all the social media platforms available, it can be difficult to know which platform is the best place to invest your time. This is especially true if you’re using social media as a marketing tool for your business and not just for personal use.
From Twitter to TikTok or LinkedIn to Meta, there are so many options to choose from. If you’re considering Twitter at all, you may be wondering, “Is Twitter good for business as a potential marketing tool?”
The answer is…it depends. No two businesses are alike. While Twitter may be an excellent platform for some businesses, others may see no merit to using it as part of their marketing arsenal.
I encourage you to read this guide about Twitter’s potential as a marketing tool to determine whether it will work for your own business. In this post, you’ll learn what marketing strategies work best on the platform and how other successful businesses are using Twitter to their advantage.
Ready to learn the specifics about marketing on Twitter? Jump to one of the following sections:
- How is Twitter good for business?
- How to market on Twitter effectively
- Twitter strategies and tools to consider for your business
- Podcast episodes with Twitter guest experts
- Predictions for Twitter in 2023 and beyond
How is Twitter good for business?
The answer is simple: Businesses and brands can use Twitter to build connections with their leads, customers, and audience overall. Twitter allows them to share content, promote their products or services, provide customer support, and even monitor their competitors and industry trends.
But there are other potential reasons to use Twitter for business besides simply managing clients and competition. And one of those reasons is voice of customer research. Twitter is a great place to gather information about your audience and your competition. What are they struggling with? How do they phrase things? What do they believe? The answers to these questions can help you write sales pages, create social media content, send emails to your list, and so much more.
The research isn’t limited to people, either. You can use Twitter to perform market research before creating or launching a new product, offer, or service. This information can help to plan a pre-launch marketing campaign and know exactly what to say in product descriptions, sales copy, and more.
Executive coach Cristin Downs agrees and says, “I use Twitter in my business for research purchases. People really let it fly there, and it’s a great place to do market, customer, competitor, and collaborator research.”
How to market on Twitter effectively
Let’s start with the most obvious, easiest, and least expensive option for using Twitter as a marketing tool. Businesses can engage with their followers just by communicating with them on the platform. For a personal approach, businesses can respond directly when individuals reach out to them, or even better, they can encourage and initiate conversations. It could be done by creating and then sharing quality content that interests or informs their audience.
And let’s talk quickly about sharing content on the platform. According to Hubspot, there are over 500 million tweets sent every day. Let me break it down for you a bit further: approximately 6,000 tweets are sent every second. So what does this mean for you as a business owner?
It means you can’t post every once in a while if you’d like to see growth on Twitter. Content marketer Angie Tague says, “The best advice I have for other business owners about using Twitter is to be consistent. The platform moves fast. It seems like you have to have a presence a few times each day to stay in readers’ feeds.”
Of course, you’ll need to determine the cadence to what you post, but know that consistency, quality content is key to Twitter growth and success.
Okay, so we’ve talked about how we show up on the platform, but let’s not forget about building relationships with other businesses, either. Marketing strategist Suzanne Brown says, “I use Twitter for my business to connect with peers. While the platform hasn’t been ideal for building community with my audience, it has been a great way to share and get ideas from other entrepreneurs. I feel like I’m part of a community.”
Is Twitter good for business visibility? 7 Twitter tools to try
Twitter Chats
A Twitter chat is a scheduled and often recurring conversation on Twitter where people use a specific hashtag to participate in a real-time discussion about a particular topic. Twitter chats are typically led by a consistent (or one-time) moderator who poses questions related to the topic. The users who participate in the chat then respond with their answers to the posed questions.
To join a Twitter chat, simply search for the designated chat hashtag, and you’ll see all the recent tweets associated with that hashtag. Then, answer the questions they pose and connect with other chat participants. Just remember to use the chat-specific hashtag every time you tweet during the chat, or your posts won’t be easily found by the other participants.
Twitter chats are a great way to grow your network and get to know like-minded individuals interested in the same topics that you are.
Tague says, “Use Twitter strategically by going onto the platform itself (not your social media scheduling tools) and engaging in conversations on posts and in Twitter chats. This builds genuine connections and makes you more memorable.”
Brown agrees and says, “The best advice I have for other business owners is to join Twitter chats. My favorite is the WinnieSun chat on Wednesdays at 1pm CST. Look for #winniesun to join the fun each week.”
My personal favorite happens on Thursdays at 12pm EST, and don’t let the fact that I keep forgetting to attend until hours after it’s over dissuade you from checking it out. #Freelancechat is hosted by Michelle Garrett, one of the Twitter guest experts in our social media series, and it covers everything related to freelance-based businesses and solopreneurs.
Communities
Now that I’ve mentioned Garrett, I’m reminded of Twitter Communities, something we talked about during her interview on the Talk Copy to Me podcast. Twitter’s 2021 addition to the platform was meant to rival Facebook groups or Reddit, though I don’t think it has gained the traction that Twitter originally hoped. From a basic level, Twitter communities are groups of Twitter users who share a common interest and create a “community” where they can share information, network, and talk about their shared interest in a contained group.
Communities are not formed by the people who work at Twitter. They are created by individual users who then become the admins (or moderators) of that community. The other users who later join the community are called members. And yes, community admins can remove members from the group (so behave!).
Now, I’m glad that I did a lot of research when writing this article, because I had originally assumed that what happens within a community stays within a community. And yes, I realize people can screenshot anything posted online. What I mean is that I thought the conversations stay within the community, like what happens within most private Facebook groups.
Not the case. According to Twitter’s own Help Center, “Tweets in Communities can be seen by anyone on Twitter, but only others within the Community itself can engage and participate in the discussion.” So, know that if you participate in Communities, what you share will be visible in your public feed as well.
Lists
I really like Twitter Lists. They’re a feature on Twitter that allow users to create their own organizational system of Twitter accounts. They’re different from Communities in that when a person adds users to their List, it doesn’t form a community-like group. It’s basically just a listing of other Twitter users according to whatever theme or categories you set up.
For example, I have a list of local restaurants, one for contributors of Spry, my online literary journal, and another one for colleagues from my MFA program, among others. When I want to catch up with the literary community, I can click on the list of people I’ve published at Spry.
Anita Kirkbride, one of the guests I interviewed about Twitter for Talk Copy to Me’s social media series says, “There’s a lot of ways you can filter that firehose of content that’s coming at you…I have a list for my local city restaurants. If I’m in the downtown area and looking for somewhere to go eat, I will pull up that list and look at the recent posts from the restaurants I follow so that I can see ‘Okay, who’s got something cool on special or on tap or in music that I can plan to do?’ That will show me everything from that really niche group [of accounts I’ve added to the list].”
And lists don’t have to be self-created. Users can follow other people’s lists, which is helpful when you find a really well curated list.
Twitter Circle
Twitter Circle is a relatively new feature that allows users to create and join private groups to have more intimate conversations. It’s important to note that users can only have one Twitter Circle and the max number of people available to be added into the circle is 150.
Unlike Lists and Communities, which are both quite public facing, Circle does have a tiny bit more privacy.
According to Twitter’s Help Center documentation, “Only you can see the full list of people in your Twitter Circle. Although people won’t see a list of circle members, when someone likes or replies to a Twitter Circle Tweet you share, members see your interaction, unless your account is protected.
The document continues on to share more privacy features, “People in your Twitter Circle can’t use the Retweet icon to share your Twitter Circle Tweets on Twitter, or in their own Twitter Circle.” But remember that anyone could screenshot anything at any time. So be cautious of what you post.
Overall, Twitter Circle is a useful feature for users who want to connect with a smaller group of people on the platform for more private and focused conversations.
Twitter Topics
Twitter Topics is a feature that allows users to follow specific subjects or topics that they’re interested in. Within Topics, users can see tweets from accounts they don’t follow that are relevant to those subjects they’ve decided to follow.
For example, a user interested in tech can follow the “Technology” topic to see tweets from leading tech companies, journalists, and other users discussing the latest advancements in the industry.
When a user follows Topics, their Twitter feed shows posts algorithmically pulled in from their Topic preferences. Some tweets will occasionally show a “See More About this Topic’” option that—when clicked— helps to “train” Twitter on the content you do want to see more of.
Unlike Lists, where users can see the posts from user-generated lists, topics are curated by Twitter’s internal team. Some of the most popular topics include news, sports, entertainment, politics, and business.
Twitter Bookmarks
Twitter Bookmarks is a feature that allows users to save tweets they plan to access later. Bookmarks are private, so only the individual user sees the tweets they saved in their bookmarks.
I use Twitter Bookmarks frequently and I treat it just like I would the bookmarks feature in my web browser. If I find a work opportunity that I’d like to learn more about, I’ll have it to my bookmarks. If someone says something interesting that I might like to share at a later date, I’ll save it to bookmarks. I also use bookmarks to save posts from people who may have appeared in my feed because they’re connected with someone I’m also connected with (but we aren’t connected yet). This gives me a chance to go back and do a deep dive on their profile so I can determine whether I want to connect with them further.
Not sure how to use Twitter Bookmarks? Well when you come across a tweet you want to save, simply tap or click the icon that looks like an arrow pointing up with a horizontal line below it. You can find this right underneath the tweet.
On a desktop, a pop up will appear. Select the line that says “Bookmark” and it will automatically save that post to your bookmarks section for you.
If you’re accessing Twitter using a mobile device, look for the same icon directly underneath the tweet. When that pop up appears, it will showcase an icon (that looks like a flag with a plus sign on top) inside of a circle with the word “Bookmark” underneath it. Click that circle for the same end result.
Want to learn more about how to market on Twitter effectively?
Is Twitter a good marketing tool for your business? Is Twitter good for business in general?
These are the main questions we’ve been discussing on the Talk Copy to Me podcast recently. Listen in to hear how the guest experts’ utilize Twitter in their own businesses and what they recommend to other brands and businesses who are considering Twitter as a potential marketing tool.
How to Increase Twitter Engagement with Anita Kirkbride
How to Twitter Chat and Join Twitter Communities with Michelle Garrett
Predictions for Twitter in 2023 and beyond
I’ll admit: The very reason I decided to make Twitter the first social media platform we covered on the Talk Copy to Me podcast was because I wasn’t sure Twitter would survive 2023.
Had you asked me just one year ago whether I thought Twitter would disappear as one of the top social media outlets, I would have laughed. There’s no platform like Twitter; the idea of it not existing in the future seemed impossible.
But then it was sold. Following that sale NBC News reported that half the payroll of Twitter was laid off (as well as its CEO and policy executives). Later scores of engineers were let go or resigned and Twitter began charging its users for account verification. However, this model proved faulty as anyone could elect the pay-to-play option, creating even more distrust in the company’s ability to enforce misinformation.
Additionally as engineers left, users began to notice massive problems while accessing the platform. MIT Technology Review reports that parts of Twitter began to temporarily break down, such as the ability to login via two-factor authentication, retweets returning to their outdated manual retweet option, and even the Twitter rules page went offline with millions of users watching.
So, if you’re asking me if Twitter has a future, I’ll answer honestly — I really don’t know. I have a special fondness for the platform, and the optimist in me hopes that it will continue into the future in the same fashion as it’s always been used. The realist in me feels a bit apprehensive.
Tell me, what do you predict for Twitter in 2023? Do you think it will keep consistently working as it does right now, or do you think there will be some massive changes happening in the near future?
