A simple social media strategy for Twitter

If you’ve been looking for an actionable social media strategy for Twitter, then here’s a simple plan of attack you can follow.

It will help you get more and better quality followers, higher interactions, increased trust and hopefully a few new customers down the track!

Attracting followers

If you’ve got an email sign-up form on your website or a great e-book or free tool that is behind an email form, start requesting people’s Twitter handle, if they have one.

By the way, if you don’t have an email form in front of your premium free content, inbound marketing software like Hubspot lets you do this easily, but if you’d like a free option you can set one up using JotForm. The first 100 subscribers are free.

Connect with subscribers

Since you’re collecting this social media intelligence, put it to good use and connect with them via Twitter. Most people will be familiar with your company since they’ve visited your website, so they will be thrilled that you’ve made the effort to follow them.

Interested people will actually follow you back and you’ve got yourself the first step of what will hopefully be a fruitful relationship for both parties!

Can I fast track this?

There are no short cuts, but if you haven’t been building email subscribers and don’t have sign-up forms on your website you should take a look at Tweepz. You can search for appropriate people to follow and kick things off.

For example, my ideal buyer is a “Sydney marketing manager” and a simple search on Tweepz shows me all the people on Twitter who fit this criteria.

Getting to know you

When you’re both following each other, Twitter lets you send DMs (direct messages) which are private. Introduce yourself, ask a question and away you go! A bit like when you meet someone in real life, right?

High interactions

When you start these personal conversations, you’ll discover the level of interaction you have with your followers will skyrocket.

Should I un-follow people?

In a word, yes. If they don’t seem to be interested in what you’ve got to say or if they’re an obvious mismatch with your ideal buyer criteria, then feel free to. And don’t feel bad, you’re unlikely to offend!

Do you seem trustworthy?

The most common mistake I see is people who are new to Twitter going on a ‘following rampage’ when they open their account. People don’t trust you much if you’ve only got 89 followers but follow 654 people.

Unfortunately you look a bit desperate, like the guy slinging business cards around at a networking event. Or worse yet, people may assume you are boring because not many people are following you.

A good rule of thumb is to keep your following to followers ratio at 40:60 and, at the very least, keep the numbers equal.

Good luck

Remember, it’s not a race to get the most followers; it’s an opportunity to connect with potential buyers and participate in a community of real people!