There are plenty of reasons for a person to use social media platforms such as Twitter. However, for online businesses, one of the main reasons (if not the only) would be than to take advantage of social media marketing.
The term and process of marketing on social media sites are done in such a way that it does not invade, intrude, annoy or even deter the business‘ target market on this platform. If done right, the target market will be the ones who are actively seeking out the business that they want to follow. When this happens, it can be said that the business is certainly on the right path of social media marketing.
There are millions of people who are using Twitter every single day and the number of tweets that are sent out is nothing short of astonishing. Even though Twitter only allows 140 characters to be tweeted at a time, a lot can happen in 140 characters.
These 140 characters have the potential to create enough impact and influence to either strengthen, gain or even lose more followers for the party who is tweeting. Be it, an individual or a business.
So it goes without saying that it is important on what you Tweet, and that importance is more than two- fold for businesses who have their reputation and credibility to uphold. Crafting the perfect tweet might seem like an art form, and you won’t really know what your followers respond well to unless you actually tweet about it.
Here are some known facts (based on studies) which show what Twitter followers who follow businesses find is a waste of their time to even read :
Conversations (Personal…And Ongoing)
One of the main purposes for an online business to join a social media platform is that it provides the means to engage and converse with their followers. Nevertheless, there is a boundary which can be easily crossed if the person representing the business gets carried away. A simple tweet asking the person how is he or she is doing is perfectly fine. It shows that you care and your followers like that.
But if the conversation drags on to the point of asking each other, “What did they have for dinner?”, “What was interesting on TV last night?”, “What is the plan the weekend or the rest of the week?”…and these kinds of continuous tweets are the only tweets that seem to go on endlessly and without direction, your other followers will start to feel isolated and more like an outsider who is merely listening to a conversation between 2 individuals.
Sure, nobody is doing anything really wrong here. However, your followers will feel annoyed because they did not follow your business‘ Twitter account so that they can read up on personal and trivial matters, which are totally unrelated to your business.
In short, your tweets are not providing any value (for your followers), and if it goes on for far too often and for far too long, the rest of your current followers will deem it useless to keep on following you and thus you will lose a lot of potential prospects that way.
Personal Feelings
Twitter is the perfect place to tweet about how you feel. Or if you are simply looking for a platform to fulfill or to satisfy your need to vent or rant, then doing so on Twitter is perfectly acceptable, and if you have a follower of friends, they will definitely care and will show concern and will try to console you in any way they can.
However, all of that would only play out well if you are tweeting using your own personal account.
If you representing your online business and you have a bunch of followers who consists of NONE of your friends and then proceed to tweet on emotions and how you feel regarding less-than-desirable situations that happened to you as of late, then your tweet is simply not reaching out to anyone.
Your followers are following you because their initial intention is to follow your business and you are representing that business. Not your personal self.
However there is a way where you can still express yourself personally while making your followers care about your tweets. Try to mention something like if you are tired because you have stayed up overnight in preparation of something exciting, which is soon to be unveiled and released and that your followers are going to get a good offer for it.
That makes your followers care more about your tweet and in the process, it also gets them excited and keeps them talking and wondering about what is the new project, product or service that you are working on.
Activities
Followers who are following a business on Twitter won’t care much about you brushing your teeth, or what you had for breakfast, or you if have a dentist appointment later in the day.
Instead, if you want to tweet on activities, make it related such as tweeting that you had lunch with a key player in the industry, and that you have learned tons from each other, and you are willing to share that knowledge to your Twitter followers in future tweets.
Alternatively, if you are at a seminar related to your business or industry and in addition to tweeting what a blast you are having, tweet about how it inspired you about an idea which can benefit your followers too in the future, and that you plan to implement it soon.
More personal tweets are alright when done once in a while. It shows that you are a real person, and it also helps to inject a little human “aspect” in your business. However, it should be followed by information which the majority of your followers can relate to and care about.
If you want a chance to express and just be yourself, then use a separate and personal account. Leave your business account for business-related purposed and your personal-account for more personal purposes only. That is why people adopt a different persona when it comes to delving into a different niche or representing a business. You have to adopt a persona that your target audience (or in this case, your Twitter followers) responds to.