What is Twitter Marketing?

So you're intrigued by Twitter marketing and aren't quite sure what it is and how to go about it. Well you've come to the right place as our team have 20 years of Twitter marketing experience between them, whether it be on the subjects of Twitter marketing strategies, tips, advice or Twitter marketing software, we know what's best and what works well.

Twitter marketing is not a dirty term, it's just that many people have made it seem that way by simply creating accounts, followed as many people as they can and thrown links at them to follow. This is not what it should be about; Twitter marketing is about adding quality, making your company appealing and not just about being a 'Twitter marketing link thrower'. When done right, Twitter marketing is extremely effective. Twitter marketing is probably currently the most effective way of marketing socially and ultimately for free.

How do I start with Twitter Marketing?

Well the first step in your Twitter marketing campaign would be to get yourself a Twitter account. There are a few ways to go about this...you can either:

• Create a Twitter Account with your own name.

• Create a Twitter account with your company name.

• Create a Twitter account with a false name.

Why Would I Create A Twitter Account with a false name?

Well it all depends on what it is that you will end up marketing on Twitter. For example if you're looking at affiliate marketing on Twitter then you'll probably want to make up a profile specifically for the Twitter marketing. Don't worry, there's nothing shady about this, it's just to draw people in. You'll want to create a profile that is friendly and helpful, and it's also essential that you upload an avatar or profile picture. This can be you, your company logo or a made-up-person. We don't recommend you adding any kind of cartoon images, pictures of money etc. because people will instantly turn away from you. It screams a Twitter marketing avoid from a mile away.

Ok, what's the next step in my Twitter marketing campaign?

Make your profile look appropriate, add a nice background, don't stick with one of the Twitter default backgrounds...create something yourself or find something that's interesting. You need to appear to be human when Twitter marketing because ultimately, you are. Then before you start following people you'll want to add some tweets to your profile to show that you are a human and that you're not a spammer or anything of that sort, so people will be more likely to follow you. Start off with something like:

"Ok, I'm on Twitter! Looking forward to getting to know some new people."

(This says that you're a normal person and are in no way part of Twitter marketing)

Be positive, people are attracted to it. Once you have 5-10 interesting and relatable tweets on there, you'll need to follow people as the next stage of your Twitter marketing plan.

How do I get more followers on Twitter?

There are a few ways you can go about obtaining followers. Say you are looking for people that are interested in social media. Well you can go to Mashable's profile on Twitter and start following their followers 1 by one. This is very time-consuming but is the best way to gain targeted Twitter followers for your Twitter marketing plan. However if this seems a little tedious for you, there is some excellent software available on the web to ease the tedium of Twitter marketing. The best one we have found is Tweet Adder. Tweet Adder is a piece of Twitter marketing software that allows you to find the users of other users and add them into a database so then you simply have to click the 'follow' button and it will follow as few or as many as you like at any given time (but we recommend less than 200 per day, trust us). There are others available too. If you are more budget conscious right now, check out Tweet Whistle. We have been using these pieces of Twitter marketing software for years and we couldn't recommend them highly enough as they take so much stress out of your Twitter marketing strategy.

Are there any other pieces of Twitter marketing software than you recommend?

Well we personally love Tweet Adder but if it doesn't sound like it'd be your bag, there's also MarketMeTwee t that we mention below in our smaller business section, which gives a much more human experience to Twitter marketing, butTweetOMatic Profiteer is also highly effective when it comes to Twitter marketing. Check them all out, we know you'll find the right Twitter marketing software for you!

Sounds good, but I'm a smaller business. Do you have any other suggestions?

As a matter of fact we do. For smaller businesses there is no better piece of Twitter marketing software than MarketMeTweet. It's been made exclusively for business and is used by the likes of Hewlett Packard to give a more 'human' experience to the proceedings of Twitter marketing. It's also possible, exclusively with MarketMeTweet, to brand your Tweets without having to put a single link in your tweets themselves. Sounds interesting? A Twitter marketing trick that no-one else offers and it's ideal for small businesses on Twitter. Check it out here.

Other than the excellent MarketMeTweet, we also recommend things that may be slightly obvious but often overlooked by many small businesses: keep active. Even 2 or 3 tweets a day can show that you are an active Twitter user and not just doing Twitter marketing. Make posts that are relatable as well as interesting. Sure throw in some links to your site every now and then with an interesting description, but keep people interested and if people who you have invited to follow you look at your profile and see nothing but links, they're much more likely to see you as yet another user of the Twitter marketing community. We know it's ironic that you're going the way of Twitter marketing and trying to show that that isn't what you're doing, but what you're actually doing is making a lie to bring out the truth; the true look of you and your business. If you interact, which is ultimately what Twitter is all about, then people will trust you more and you're not just another Twitter marketing link thrower.

Also, with MarketMeTweet you can add RSS feeds to be posted to your page, including your own and any other RSS feed out there, so pick a couple of RSS feeds that your viewers may find interesting, CNN, Fox News, whatever you think, and add it to your MarketMeTweet program (simply and easily). As well as this, add your own RSS feed to it and as soon as you post a new blog post, it will immediately be posted onto Twitter; yet another plus of this amazing piece of Twitter marketing software.

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Ultimately what matters is combining an automated presence to take out the hard part of Twitter marketing, combined with some human tweets and a human presence. For example, you can get the likes of TweetAdder to schedule certain tweets for you, these can be tweets containing your affiliate links, links to your company's websites, your blog posts etc. but you also need to throw in something human to show that you're actually on there for the Twitter experience. For example, throw in some news, talk about that homeless guy throwing old McDonalds at you in the streets, talk about the weather...just post them throughout the day, it doesn't have to take a lot of your time...post 4 or 5 tweets which are coming directly from you and let the Twitter marketing software like TweetAdder deal with the Twitter marketing strategy for you. That's the best advice I can give you. People are more likely to click your links if you just give them a reason to, it's that simple!

What is Twitter marketing?