I’m addicted to Twitter. I use it every single day, from my laptop, my work PC, my phone – everywhere. For me it works as a way to stay updated on a certain topic – for me that topic is software development. As the one-and-only Milkshake developer, I want to receive the latest news about software development technologies as soon as possible.
During the last year or two, businesses, politicians and celebrities use Twitter. A local coffee shop doubled its clientele using Twitter. Barack Obama has an astonishing 325.000+ followers, and it is believed that his use of social media – including Twitter – made him able to connect with people and win the election. Dell made $1 million on Twitter advertising last year. And what did they spend? Nothing! $0. Twitter is free! It has loads of users, and if you take a look at their growth rate they will outperform even Facebook…
One of the benefits of using Twitter, as opposed to newsletters or blog posts, is that a Tweet is only 140 characters. The recipient can read and make a decision about an offer, in a matter of seconds.
Another benefit of using Twitter, is that you can be confident that your Tweets will reach its destinations. As of now, users of Twitter don’t have spam filtering. Of course they can chose to Un-follow you on Twitter, but that’s your own fault if they chose to do that.
So how would we like Milkshake to be connected to Twitter? Our customers must have an easy way to do the following tasks in regard to Twitter:
- Publish a Tweet when a new product is either created, has changed price, has a new picture or a new variant
- Publish product pictures using TwitPic
- Publish a special time-limited offer, as a Twitter-only offer, but also as a “global” offer, along with a picture using TwitPic
- Publish a product review when a customer submits one
- Link customers to their Twitter profile
- Publish order status notifications as a direct message to the customer
- Get a brief overview of what people on Twitter are saying about the company or its products
- Track traffic from Twitter. See how many sign up to newsletter, place an order or something else
The last task is very important. As one of our core values of Milkshake, the ability to get insight and take action immediately whether it being marketing, pricing or product inventory, will enable you to sell more as a Milkshake customer.
Twitter is working hard to figure out how to avoid spam. So don’t make your followers feel you’re spamming! Give them something for free all the time. Post some great links that are relevant to your customers. Comment on new stuff in your industry. Follow your followers, and enter short discussions. Then every once in a while, send your followers a time limited special offer. Interact first, sell second – as Seth Godin finished his blog post about The Panhandler’s secret.
Linking your customers to their Twitter profile
As with newsletters, Twitter is also about getting people to “sign up” for your Tweets so they can get your updates. If you post interesting stuff, people will start following you, but you can also do something to make them follow you. When a user sign up for your newsletter, you can use the e-mail address to see if this user is already on Twitter. If the user is present on Twitter, you can immediately ask the user to follow you. Or you can send an e-mail telling about what kind of stuff you post on Twitter, and why anyone should follow you.