Are businesses using Twitter – You Bet! - Dell Computer, Starbucks and Home Depot to name a few, but how can 140 characters per Tweet make a difference to your business? What’s the trick so to speak?

Twitter is a form of permission based marketing which basically means followers are choosing to hear their message. Reasons vary from discovering new and special offers (Starbucks is great at this) to providing industry information like travel tips (JetBlue) or Ford Motor Company who has their Ford Drive Green page to keep followers aware of eco friendly products and developments. Although each appeals to a different audience they all have one common goal – ADDRESSING THE NEEDS OF THEIR FOLLOWERS. This message is something we continually drill because it gets down to the essential question every follower, reader, friend, fan or prospective customer asks – WHAT”S IN IT FOR ME?

To put it another way, what benefit are you providing for your followers? The key to running a successful Twitter campaign is to provide useful information to your followers that address the needs they have. As a small business owner you probably don’t have the name recognition of the fore mentioned companies but providing useful information directly related to what service / product your business provides can overcome this. For our purposes, Twitter is the place to brand yourself and your business as the trusted local expert, the “go to guy” for your specific topic. How?

Focus on the needs of your followers! All to often businesses use Twitter to report some award their business has received or talk about how wonderful their company is. WRONG! The customer could care less – What’s in it for me! Your goal is to share your knowledge and provide useful solutions to the needs of your followers. This can be done a number of ways.

• Post a link to a blog: When you find or craft a blog directly related to your topic share it. This can be a “how to blog” on installing a kitchen faucet or a point of view on a new law or code change – may be a video relating to your topic. It depends on your industry of course. Blogs containing statistics, charts and diagrams are particularly useful because they cut to the chase. Anything useful to the follower that focuses on your topic or location is acceptable.
• Offer a link to a white paper: A white paper is an authoritative report or guide that addresses issues and how to solve them. White papers are used to educate readers and help them make decisions.
• Recommend a link to an article: This can be an important local news event found in a local newspaper or an article written by you or others as a “how to guide” or tutorial relating to your topic. - Possibly a point of view regarding an industry development or a press release about a new service / product your company offers. A Press Release about a new location or new service area your business or others offer that followers will find useful.
• Report industry news updates: Changes to codes or laws, recalls and product improvements, anything newsworthy about you topic or area that followers will find useful
• Inform followers about great local discoveries and events: Based on your location you may want to share great finds of other valuable services and products or special events. Reporting upcoming weekend attractions is always good or informing followers about a great lunch special offered by a local restaurant is useful. Going out of business sales and seasonal offers in your area. Anything and everything that assists your local followers to save money is great.
• Links to your website: Sharing links to your website and other non competing websites that benefit your followers are fine. Special deals pages, monthly specials and how to pages work well. Remember your followers are here by choice there needs to be some upside for them to go to your website.

As you can see your goal is to brand yourself and business as a local authority. By sharing developments and information beyond your own business you are further addressing your followers needs. Although keeping on topic should be your focus enhancing and sharing your knowledge of the local area gives the follower greater uses for following you.

When your Tweets include positive links about other non-competing local businesses chances are they will follow you and return the favor.

All of this has one common goal for you - PROMOTING YOUR BUSINESS.

Like any other platform you launch a sales campaign in, building trust and setting expectations are essential. In the outlined above you’re doing this 140 characters at a time in three steps.

• Build awareness and trust: Share useful information regarding you field and location with followers.
• Reveal a treasure trove of useful content: Invite followers to discover useful content on your blog, in your articles, on your website and so on.
• Overwhelm followers with your expertise and knowledge: Engage followers with so much expertise and insight that they simply can’t resist obtaining your products and services.

Twitter and all social is a build on process, it doesn’t happen over night. You are developing and sharing content to gain an order of trust with people in your area of influence.

What about expectations: Because you have been tweeting about the best solutions to on topic needs and also about valuable offers from your company and other local companies your followers expect to find the best services and products at fair prices. Note: before Tweeting about other services, products and offers make sure they are credible - you don’t want to make a bad recommendation.

There are other methods of marketing on Twitter but this one is as good if not better than most.