What is Your Twitter Strategy?
I got a great email from a prospective PRstore franchisee this week, and thought I’d share it with you:
I’d like to know more about how you use Twitter. Do you have a Twitter strategy? What are your typical Tweet tactics? How do you measure Twitter success? What are your Twitter goals and how do they support or fit into the PRStore marketing strategy? I’m curious about the corporate goals for Twitter, blogs and social media, and even SEO. Do you focus on awareness and penetration to attract new franchisee prospects or is your focus to increase awareness of the "storefront" brand and ultimately reach that customer "sweet spot" of 11-100 employee businesses? Or both? If both, what percentage breakdown?
Wow. Great questions! These are questions not just for PRstore, but also for anyone using Twitter and other social media. Let’s see if I can answer some of them:
Do you have a Twitter strategy?
Yes. My strategy is a bit fluid, of course; it evolves as I experiment. In fact, experimentation is part of my Twitter strategy. Still, I try to follow broad guidelines: Provide something of value. Be authentic. Ease up on the self-promotion. Nurture relationships. Help others. Don’t be afraid to show some personality. Be interesting.
More specifically, I try to align my Twitter strategy with a few corporate goals. More on that later…
What are your typical Tweet tactics?
My Tweets typically come in one of five flavors:
- Links to my blog posts
- Links to insightful blog posts by other authors
- Questions or ideas to prompt discussion
- @replies to questions/ideas posted by other Twitterers
- Inane ramblings
There are other Tweets, of course, but these five cover most of my contributions. I stick to these tactics because they’re the right tactics for building relationships, which I consider my most important Twitter goal.
For more info on the types of conversations happening in the social media arena, check out this post by @93octane.
What are your Twitter goals? How do they fit into the PRstore marketing strategy?
Before we can talk about Twitter goals, check out my social media to-do list.
I like Twitter for its conversational nature, the connections between users, and the information sharing it enables. These traits make Twitter an effective tool for building relationships and relaying PRstore messages to new audiences.
Like a press release or a postcard, though, Twitter is just a tool. A good marketing plan uses a combination of tools, and matches the tool to the task. Twitter is just one part of PRstore’s marketing and communications program.
Do you focus on attracting new franchisees or boosting in-store sales?
PRstore is unique among marketing firms in that our success depends not just on attracting and selling to clients, but also on selling new PRstore franchises.
In-store sales make our stores profitable. Revenue from franchise sales is critical to our corporate profitability. Ultimately, our marketing efforts must reflect both needs.
With a limited advertising budget and competing priorities, achieving all of our marketing goals is no simple task. Our social media program is a pressure valve, of sorts, giving us low-cost channels to promote both agendas and to experiment with messaging.
Twitter has already proven helpful in building PRstore’s brand awareness and attracting interest from potential franchisees. Has it boosted in-store sales? We simply don’t know yet. Finding a way to answer that question is definitely on our to-do list, though.
How do you measure Twitter success?
This is the biggie. As I see it, “How do you measure ROI?” is the #1 question for social media. How do you measure the value of conversations?
I’m not good with numbers, so here’s a list of some of the successes in which Twitter played a role:
- Pushing our blog content further downstream and to new audiences via Twitterfeed
- Building brand awareness for PRstore
- Positioning PRstore staff as experts in marketing, PR, media relations, social media, etc.
- Idea sharing with others in the PR & marketing industry
- Establishing connections with journalists that may lead to publicity opportunities for our clients and PRstore
- Connecting with potential franchisees
- Answering questions about what PRstore is and what we do
This is just a start, but you get the idea.
Is Twitter worth the investment? That depends…what’s the investment? My time? I’m sure our bean counters could tell you whether it’s worth the time. Me? I’m looking long-term. If I’m still here in three years, I guess we’ll know the answer.
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Scott Hepburn is a veteran PR and marketing professional. He blogs here about marketing, PR, advertising, journalism and social media.