The power of twitter?

[stuarty]

Can we get people to post how twitter is working for them in here. If it's not working for you then maybe we can all draw inspiration from other people's experiences.

Reason I'm asking is I've got a few clients who are finding business from the most bizarre things. I'm totally amazed by the resourcefulness of it. I've even had an order from one of our public tweets. Totally amazing thing this!

I've got a really interesting one I'm working on just now (hence the late night post). A client has service engineers and operators accross shifts. They are installing new equipment but there's been unforeseen problems in the install. They are using twitter whenever they encounter a problem and it's being fed to the other engineers feeds/followers. The upshot is that it's saving them thousands every week and they are on track for an early completion bonus. It's win win situation because they've been asked to do another job on the back of this one.

 

[Scottish Business Owner]

I've been on it for a few weeks but to be honest i'm finding it difficult to see how it can be leveraged for what I am doing.

I guess it's the balance between how many chatter posts and how many business posts. I could very easily set up a feed from both the forums and the blog directly into twitter but I would think most people would very quickly work out what my motives are and stop following me

I'm starting to wonder if the time i'm spending on Twitter would be better spent developing content for myself which I think would have far more long term value but I could be totally wrong!

 

[Power Lunch Club]

I've been on it for a few weeks but to be honest i'm finding it difficult to see how it can be leveraged for what I am doing.

I guess it's the balance between how many chatter posts and how many business posts. I could very easily set up a feed from both the forums and the blog directly into twitter but I would think most people would very quickly work out what my motives are and stop following me

I'm starting to wonder if the time i'm spending on Twitter would be better spent developing content for myself which I think would have far more long term value but I could be totally wrong!

You don't do it enough!! Really need to keep a presence going....people forget very quickly if you are not pumping stuff out. Start just putting some of the links up to the threads like you do on the newsletter....generate interest.

 

[polr]

We've recently posted two blog posts about Twitter - was meant to be us arguing against each other but didn't really turn out like that! Might give you some feedback.

What the twit is this all about?

Twitter - Calums Half

I started off hating it and couldn't see the point but I'm beginning to change my tune now. Not that it's brinigng in business (yet!) but is does get us a few more hits to our site etc and hopefulyy getting our name known.

Hope that helps.

 

[Scottish Business Owner]

You don't do it enough!! Really need to keep a presence going....people forget very quickly if you are not pumping stuff out. Start just putting some of the links up to the threads like you do on the newsletter....generate interest.

I'm not sure if I buy that Gordon and as i mentioned in my first post I could very easily set up a feed that posts directly into twitter from both the forums and the blog (I actually think the blog is already set up) but wheres the value in it?

If you only had a choice to post on Twitter or create a new article for your site what would you do? Content is king afterall and you also need to be quite selfish with your time. I haven't totally dismissed it yet but for me the power isn't staring me in the face

 

[Adventurelife]

I'm not sure if I buy that Gordon and as i mentioned in my first post I could very easily set up a feed that posts directly into twitter from both the forums and the blog (I actually think the blog is already set up) but wheres the value in it?

If you only had a choice to post on Twitter or create a new article for your site what would you do? Content is king afterall and you also need to be quite selfish with your time. I haven't totally dismissed it yet but for me the power isn't staring me in the face

I agree with you that your own content should take priority over all channel content. I also struggle a bit to see the value of twitter, however, I do see several people I know using it and it is driving serious business! Something I never thought it would.

All these things I treat as potential channels to market and you have to allocate time and resource accordingly. I am going to test for 3 months and I will feed back the good, the bad and the ugly.

Peter

 

[stugster]

Evan Williams on listening to Twitter users | Video on TED.com

 

[Scottish Business Owner]

An interesting post from Aaron Wall of SEOBook and his take on Twitter.

How Much of YOUR PageRank Are You Wasting on Twitter? : SEO Book.com

Certainly puts the cat amongst the pigeons!

 

[Adventurelife]

An interesting post from Aaron Wall of SEOBook and his take on Twitter.

How Much of YOUR PageRank Are You Wasting on Twitter? : SEO Book.com

Certainly puts the cat amongst the pigeons!

I agree and disagree with the article if that is possible.

I have no reason to doubt the view about the SEO benefit Aaron knows much more than I do or ever will. However, it is not all just about SEO. I have no clue about twitter , only just started using but I already have 2 sales meeting with companies that want to supply us with clients and they approached me via twitter.

Link all channels to market it is a time/cost/risk reward.

Peter

 

[Gordon N]

I am keen to try Twitter out in a more business like way, hence (as some of you already know!) I have setup a new account branded more towards Moray Web Solutions than me. Lets face it, bignaz doesn't cut it for B2B - I'll keep that one for personal!

If anyone wants a nosey, or to follow Twitter / MorayWeb is the new one.

 

[stuarty]

Certainly puts the cat amongst the pigeons!

Precisely - that's exactly what it's intended to do. Anybody on here promoting their own websites should learn by this!

This is a classic online marketing trick where you post a controversial article in order to provoke reaction on the latest craze - in this case twitter.

Bryan - A.W. is a master of spin and you just fell for one of the oldest tricks in the book. All that linking to it does is increase his links, his pagerank and increase the potential number of people to subscribe to his $100 a month course. That huge big advert didn't get there by accident after all Fair play to him - he makes his living out of his site and it clearly worked when you posted the link.

The article itself however is pretty crap to be honest and it contradicts what he said on 29th march last year.

"everything you do prevents Twitter from becoming a spam filled mess.....It is the complete opposite of email spam hype marketing....If I were to spew nothing but hollow hyped up marketing messages nobody would subscribe...From a social network and marketing standpoint Twitter is worth checking out and understanding."

(i'm not linking to it from here - google "seobook twitter" and read the article for yourself)

I've no doubt some of his paid content is great for newbies but you can get everything he sells for free on an SEO forum like digitalpoint. You could always read -> h t t p : / / googlesearchsucks.com/seobook-review-5-reasons-not-to-buy-seobook/

A.W does tend to contradict himself on his own advice. He's always jumping on whichever bandwagon is driving past at the time.

For example, he's telling everybody that SEO SUCKS and will be dead in a few years time but he's still selling his $100 a month course?

linky-> h t t p : / / w w w . internetbusiness.co.uk/07072008/seo-is-dead-aaron-wall/

The moral - don't believe all the hype you read.

 

[GeorgeKing]

I saw this on The Daily Show yesterday, and if you've 5minutes to kill I thought you might like it. Video nearer the bottom of the page!

'The Daily Show' Takes On Twitter (VIDEO)

 

[GeorgeKing]

I now Twitter myself (twitter.com/pikoDesign). Whether I have anything interesting to say or can make it work remains to be seen.....

 

[KMiDigital]

The way we use it is to offer it to clients as part of a social networking deal and get them to let others know whats happening at an event or even a product launch. As long as they don't go mad with advertising and marketing it seems to work quite well. It's early days to know if its working or not but most of the clients love it and we can use it on our posts too.

 

[dotsno]

Twitter's just yet another tool in your growing communications arsenal, though for many people it may end up completely useless, or simply not worth the time and energy when compared to other forms of communicating: there are a lot of things to weigh up before deciding whether Twitter will give you any returns on your investment in it.

Think of it as a telephone where the whole world can tap into your conversations; so a message you previously had to tell individually to loads of people can now be given very easily to many people with a simple "tweet" - that's what the little 140 character messages are. Kind of like texting, publicly (though you can hide your tweets to make everything private and only visible to those you choose). Kind of like an email newsletter but in miniature.

The great benefit though - is this isn't just one-way; it enables conversations between you and others. Two way texting, publicly

No doubt another new communications tool will be along soon so hold onto your hats, the world is getting faster! But for some people Twitter is going to be the ultimate way to communicate; for others not so much so. It can be a means to converse with people, or to just keep people updated; while the theory says "join the conversation", it's perfectly feasible for people to use it as more of a noticeboard first, conversation later. I know a hair stylist that's looking at using it to flag up last-minute appointments and answer questions about hair products and styling - and a dentist that's using it as a reminder system for clients who prefer that to their existing email reminder system (which is used by people who prefer *that* to their telephone reminder system!).. not exactly what it was intended for I suppose but hey... and I'm not sure I want the world to know when I'm due for a dental check-up but apparently some people are fine with it. Curious.

Twitter was invented in the 1930s really... go check this out:
Notificator - Dead Media Archive

 

[findnetworkingevents]

I think the secret is to find people who are interested in the subject you are promoting, follow them and then more often than not they will follow you back.

Use something like Tweetdeck to search for keyword mentions.

Next stage is to make sure you send out relevant tweets regularly to maintain interest.

Cheers

Stuart

 

[Gordon N]

What I think a lot of people forget when it comes to SEO or more accurately 'online marketing' is that search engine visible links are only part of the game. My understanding and belief of how a service such as twitter is concerned is live users.

Thanks to iPhones, Blackberrys and additional apps such as tweetdeck etc a lot of tweeters now have updates firing at them from all directions - myself included. If I get a tweet with an eye catching message and a link I will follow it, and so will the majority of users. If I think any of my followers would also benefit I will RT (retweet) it, so it reaches even further!

Ultimately your site should be developed with the end user in mind first and then optimised for search engines. Google doesn't buy your services or products, people do - for all search engines are an important source of traffic, services like twitter, digg, delicious etc are still sources of real people that might just want to put some money your way.