Twitter is one of the most popular social media platforms on the planet. The application has over 326 million active users every month and over 500 million tweets are sent every day. It is a way for celebrities to stay in touch with their fans and for comedians to work on new material. However, you should never overlook Twitter’s potential for franchise marketing.
Twitter is an excellent tool for franchise owners. Customers can follow you and stay in the loop on everything going on at your company. In order for this to work, you need to give consumers a reason to follow you in the first place. Here is everything you need to know about how to use Twitter for business marketing effectively, especially if you have a multi-location franchise business.
1. Tweet Often
The first step is to create a Twitter profile in the first place. Once you are active, you want to start tweeting. Ideally, you will tweet at least once a day. If you are only tweeting once weekly or monthly, then you are doing it wrong. You also want to engage with your followers. When customers leave feedback or comment on your posts, you should respond promptly. Appoint someone in your franchise to be in charge of checking the company’s Twitter page a few times a day.
Just like how you use traditional marketing tactics, you need to know your primary demographic and target those individuals through Twitter. Not every tweet has to be about your business, but the things you do post about should be relevant to your business. You can link to relevant articles in your field and post memes if your target audience includes younger people. You simply need to give people a reason to follow your business.
2. Create a Detailed Twitter Bio
At the top of your Twitter profile is your bio. This is an excellent opportunity to draw people in when they visit your page for the first time. You have limited space, so you need to concisely talk about your company and what your franchise stands for. It is also recommended to include a link to your company’s webpage. This bio should have a consistent style and tone to match the rest of your tweets.
3. Get Your Colleagues Involved
When you first create a Twitter profile, you want to build yourself up right away. The simplest way to do this is to look internally. You can ask employees to follow the page. You can also ask them if they would retweet from time to time. With your employees following you, their followers will also find out about your business, and your company will only grow from there.
4. Interact With Experts and Influencers
You can find some of the biggest influencers in your industry on Twitter. For example, restaurant owners should follow the most famous chefs in the world, such as Gordon Ramsey and Guy Fieri. In addition to these big names, you also want to find influencers local to your area. These people tweet regularly, and you can stand out by responding every so often. When you respond to these tweets, you do not want to appear overtly promotional. You want to be casual and open-minded. Once you start getting some recognition, you can look for chances to collaborate.
5. Fit Twitter Into Your Overall Strategy
You need more than just a Twitter account to build a following. You also need to think about how your Twitter account interacts with your Facebook, SnapChat, and Instagram pages. You do not need a business account on all these sites, but you should be active on the sites that will help you reach your customer base.
You then need to decide how you will use Twitter to build your brand. You can use Twitter as a way to get more people to follow you on Instagram where you are primarily active. Twitter is also a great way to boost the number of people who visit your company’s webpage and blog.
6. Time Your Posts Properly
In addition to knowing who your primary demographic is, you need to know when those people are most likely to go on Twitter. There are paid tools available that will allow you to learn this information. Content on Twitter often does not remain in people’s consciousness after the first hour. You need to post during times when people will see it right away. That likely means you need to maintain a presence on Twitter even during the weekends when your business may be closed.
7. Include Extra Formats
Constantly posting regular tweets will get old after a while. The truth of the matter is that people are more likely to engage with photos and videos. You can also post links to your webpage to give people more information. Many people are hesitant to click on links because they may not know where it will take them. However, once you build trust with your followers, they will be more likely to click on links to your website.
8. Understand Every Aspect of Twitter Language
There is no faster way to show you are out of touch with the younger generation than by using a hashtag the wrong way. You should know how to use Twitter properly. You should include hashtags when possible, but you want to make sure you understand the origins of the hashtag first. You do not want to make the same mistake as DiGiorno.
When you @mention people, you need it to be appropriate and positive. In the event the @mention is the first word in the post, then you need to include a period first. This will ensure the person you are mentioning can actually find it. Finally, the shorter the post the better. Although Twitter now allows for 280 characters, you should still try to make quick, concise points to get people to read.
9. Follow Your Competition
It may seem counterintuitive, but you should follow local competitors. This allows you to stay abreast of your competitions to see if there is anything you could be doing differently. These businesses may have more followers, which is a great opportunity for you to see how you can grow your fan base. You may learn that your competitors post far more often than you, or they post more engaging content.
10. Utilize Promoted Tweets
Twitter allows people to buy promoted tweets. You can select which tweet you want to promote, and Twitter will put it in front of people who do not currently follow you but may be interested in your services. When you do this, you should make sure the post is not spammy. You want to show you can provide value to the individual’s life. You never want to resort to clickbait. You want these promoted tweets to be concise so that people are tempted to follow your Twitter page. You can review the analytics of these promoted tweets later to see which ones were the most effective.
11. Offer Discounts to Twitter Followers
One of the best ways to add value to your Twitter page is to offer discounts and incentives to people who follow you. For example, you can host a contest where the next 20 people who follow you will get a coupon for 20 percent off a product. If you do these contests often enough, then people will be likely to follow you because they know they can directly benefit. Additional contests include having people post pictures of themselves inside your store. When they do this, you can retweet it, and you have just gotten some excellent content to promote.
12. Respond to Negative Feedback Promptly
Many people use social media to reach out to companies after a bad experience. When you find these negative reviews, you need to respond right away to try to retain the customer. You want to come across as polite and professional to Twitter users who find the interaction. You can send someone a private message to address the issue in private before you post anything more publicly. You do not want to ignore negative comments or else it will come across as though you do not care.
13. Avoid Controversy
Larger franchises can do well on Twitter by taking a stand on certain issues. Smaller businesses need to be more careful unless they know a vast majority of the consumer base is on board with the message. However, in general, it is best to stay away from political or religious posts. You want to avoid alienating anyone.
14. Recycle Content
This may sound lazy, but it can work to your advantage. If your business has big news to share, then you should feel free to post it a few times a week. You can accomplish this without sounding like a broken record. Change up the phrasing so that no one has to miss the important news.
15. Use Twitter Analytics
Twitter offers basic analytics anyone can use. You can pay for more in-depth details, but ultimately, the basic ones are suitable. You can see how well certain posts performed before and how many interactions you get every day of the week. You will see which days and times are best to post on. You should still post daily, but you may want to consider posting more frequently on a day when you have more eyes on your content.
Hire Professionals to Maintain Your Accounts for You
Now that you know how to use Twitter for marketing your business, you can start building your online presence. Plenty of businesses are not currently on Twitter, so you can take a step in the right direction by simply making a profile. For additional help managing your Twitter page and other online profiles, you need to get in touch with the social media professionals from V Digital Services. Contact us today to get started with streamlined social media services. With our help, small- to mid-sized multi-location businesses can start competing with larger corporations.