This past week has been a pretty exciting week around here. Last week, I began managing the Inman News’ social media streams. I’m pretty excited to say that within the 1st 7 days we have over 700 new Twitter followers.
I am fired up about the results we have had by simply ‘turning up the dials.’ So how can YOU grow your Twitter traffic?
Here are my top 4 tips plus a cool update from Twitter’s blog:
1. Work smart. Have a plan. Don’t get distracted.
I could just end my blog right now because that’s really the core of what I’m doing to grow our follower list at Inman. I have a simple plan that I follow every day. Where do you want to drive traffic to? What message do you want to convey? One of my favorite Twitter products is HootSuite.com which allows you to plan your tweets – much like drip marketing. Spend 1 hour a day on Twitter and plan out 95% of your tweets. Also, Hootsuite just launched their iPhone app this week. This is quickly becoming my favorite Twitter app.
2. Don’t be passive. Twitter moves fast – you better keep up.
Twitter is not Facebook. Twitter is not email. Don’t make the mistake of thinking you can just tweet once or twice a day and that’s going to cut it. Log onto Twitter and look at your Twitter stream. Scroll to the bottom of the page – when’s the last tweet? An hour ago? Half an hour? For me it’s 2 minutes ago. If you aren’t on your follower’s radar– they will NEVER see your tweets – so be aggressive. Word of caution: don’t just tweet to tweet. Put out good content and good links.
3. To be followed you must be a follower.
Twitter is not a “wait and see” marketing tool. You can’t expect for people to just find you and follow you. One of the fastest ways to generate new followers is to follow like-minded people. Use the search function and search for people who are your target audience. In TweetDeck you can save searches so if you plug in a specific search like “Manhattan Real Estate,” anytime someone tweets about that subject, you will be notified
4. Recognize and connect.
Aren’t you surprised at the number of people who just spew information out there and never interact!? Don’t be one of those! Your daily plan has to include checking to see who mentioned you, retweeting others, and responding to DM’s. This may be the last point to this blog but this is SO important. A great video for breaking this all down in 10 minutes a day is a fantastic video by Laura Roeder.
One last thing – breaking news from Twitter on their blog yesterday.
Twitter is beta testing a new function for companies called “Contributors” – it enables users to engage in more authentic conversations with businesses by allowing those organizations to manage multiple contributors to their account. This could be huge for brokerages – you could have the CEO, Broker/Owner and Marketing Director tweet on the same handle – but you would know who “the voice” would be.
These Twitter tips are so easy to do – but they are also so easy NOT to do. For every 5 real estate agents and brokerages on Twitter, there are 25 that are not. The odds are your favor – take advantage of it! And if you’re not yet following me on Twitter yet, click here or here!
posted by: Katie Lance, Marketing Manager, Inman News
