Posts Tagged ‘Marketers’

If you want people to see your Tweets on Twitter, you gotta have followers. Obviously, that can drive a person to commit himself or herself to building up the biggest follower base possible as quickly as possible.

One of the most popular techniques to get those followers in place is to start following others. There’s a tendency out there in Twitterland for those who’ve been followed to follow in return. That generous reciprocity can make it easy to build a follower list that will really turn heads.

That’s why following as many people as you can without setting off the “you’re probably a spammer or a bot” alarm is such a popular technique for new Twitter marketers.

There’s a problem with that strategy, though. It doesn’t work very well.

Yes, you get the followers. The problem is that you get a bunch of followers who aren’t really interested in anything you’re saying. They followed out of kindness, ignorance or because they’re not really a human being an they’re programmed to follow when followed.

When it comes time to market to that motley crew, you can guess just how effective it is. It’s like cold-calling the first set of numbers in the phone book or emailing random addresses. It’s not targeted and It doesn’t convert.

You best bet is to focus on building a truly interested and targeted social network. The results will be a lot better than what you get with the “big follow” technique.

Here’s something you should know about the average Twitter user if you’re in the Internet marketing business: The run-of-the-mill member of the Twitter community doesn’t like you very much.

Sorry, but it’s true. And who can blame those folks for feeling that way? They’ve seen their completely legit, commerce-free social networking venue attacked by some of the lousiest spammers in history.

You have the guys with the direct messages featuring affiliate links. You have the robot accounts that work around the clock pounding anyone who was silly enough to follow with link after link after link. You have goons who self-promote to the point of nausea, balancing self-congratulatory Tweets with their sales page links. Ick.

So, unless you’re marketing to other marketers via Twitter, you are going to have to come up with a much better and far more trustworthy approach than the spammers and clowns who’ve already started to poison the pond.

That’s the bad news. The good news is that it’s very possible to do just that. If you’re using Twitter the “right” way, you can overcome a built-in bias against marketers.

There are two ways to approach Twitter from an Internet marketing standpoint.  You can either try to figure out how to really get involved and to parlay that into improved business or you can try to find the shortcuts and secrets that will dump a pile of cash in your lap overnight.

Here’s the scoop.  The people trying for a quick score aren’t making money.

The only way to really use Twitter to your advantage is to use it the “right” way.  You need to be a real user an a legitimate member of your (and others’) social networks.  You need to contribute and you need to interact.  If you’re there looking for a quick buck, everyone will smell you coming from a mile away and they’ll lock down their wallets before you get near.

Let’s say it again to make it clear:  Real users make more money with Twitter.

That’s ugly news for the get-rich-quick crowd, but it’s great news for marketers with enough perspective and understanding to recognize a good thing when it’s staring them in the eyes.

Have you figured out how you can really use Twitter?  Do you understand how that usage can lead to real business improvements?  If you still have questions, you need to learn more about Twitter.  Otherwise, you’re wasting your time.

Those of us who’ve been around the block a few times can get a little gun-shy about hopping on the latest “big thing”.  We’ve seen popular trends and sites that the world gushed over go cold and dead more than once.  We’ve seen the “game changers” quickly transform into a standard-issue piece of the process.

That’s probably why some of us have been reluctant to get going with a plan to leverage the power of Twitter to improve our marketing.  We’re just suspicious and cynical enough to wonder if this is just another fad.

There’s no way to say definitively that Twitter is going to be a big piece of the Internet landscape in five years.  There’s no way to say what’s going to be happening with the web in five years.  Anyone who claims to know is feeding you a line.

It is, however, safe to say that Twitter is going to keep growing through 2009 and that it’s unlikely to collapse any time soon.  This is one of those trends that hasn’t yet reached its peak and even if that peak hits soon, the fall-off will take awhile to really set in.

Here’s the good news.  Unlike those other situations where it was necessary to act at the beginning of the trend to make money, there’s still plenty of marketing room in Twitter.  It’s not virgin territory, but all things considered, not many marketers have really tapped into its potential yet.

Don’t be cynical or suspicious this time around.  This one’s the real deal.  It’s going to stick for awhile and the moneymaking potential is strong.

Let’s say you wanted to find two thousand people who would share an interest in your upcoming product.

Now, let’s say that you wanted a way to contact them and to send them updates and even a purchase link when you were ready to go.

Time for a squeeze page and an auto responder, right?  Not necessarily.  There’s nothing wrong with creating a list, but there could be a much more efficient way to get the job done.

Twitter.

You can gather thousands of followers and “Tweet” them the messages of your choice at any time.  You don’t need to worry about opt-ins, delivery or staying on the right side of the regulations.

If you’re not using Twitter to create a “shortcut list” that can drive traffic to your offers, you’re missing a great opportunity.  This is one of the easiest ways to get started with permission marketing in the history of the Internet and many marketers are already making money by talking to their followers instead of just sending those emails to their list.

Are you on Twitter?  Are you using it the right way?  If you’re not sure, you need to do some investigation.