When you visit Twitter, you’ll soon see that it’s all about staying in touch. But this isn’t the kind of website that gives you free rein to say whatever you want and spend as long as you like on every post you make. Twitter is all about brevity. It’s all about giving people the basics without bogging them down with the ‘too much information’ syndrome.
140 CHARACTERS OR LESS
That’s it—that’s all you’ve got to play with on Twitter each time you want to get in touch with your followers and tell people what’s going on with your business and your life.
To put that into some kind of context, the title of an eBay auction can’t be longer than 55 characters so you’ve got less than three times that amount to make an impression on people.
You’ll soon find yourself becoming very adept at using the English language to get in touch in the shortest way possible.
So why do you need to join?
It seems like the whole world belongs to two groups—those who are thinking of joining Twitter, and those who already have. If you are in the first group you’ll want to know what all the fuss is about, so here are some reasons.
Quick and easy
We’re not just talking about how easy it is to actually join here; it’s all about the updates. We know how long—or short—a tweet can be, and that’s exactly what makes the site so accessible.
If you have got your own blog you’ll know what I mean.Blogs are a great way to get in touch with people and build a following over the course of time, but if you don’t write posts of a reasonable length you tend to feel like you’re shortchanging your readers. You almost get to the stage where you’d be better off not posting at all than posting a short message.
Twitter takes all that worry away instantly. You are limited by their 140 characters or less rule, so it’s super speedy to jump on and write a quick sentence to tell people what the latest development is in your business or on your website.
In fact, you’ll probably have to restrain yourself to keep from posting too often!
Getting connected
Twitter makes it easy to put yourself and your business in front of the kind of people you want to get in touch with. Every time you send a fresh tweet it will appear in the public timeline, which is basically a scrolling record of every single tweet sent out by all the members of Twitter all over the world.
There are plenty of other ways to get people to notice your presence on Twitter too, and good news is that the website gives you all the tools you need to draw attention to your profile.
But there are other ways to start using Twitter. You don’t just have to tell people what you are doing; people are also using the site to ask questions, ask for advice and even network with other like minded people with the intention of forming a
business relationship later on.
Are you starting to see that there is a hell of a lot of potential wrapped up in those 140 characters?
Staying in touch
Twitter isn’t just about letting people know what you are about and what you’re up to; it’s also about finding other like minded people and following them too.
Staying in touch couldn’t be easier as you can follow those Twitterers you are interested in and receive updates as and when they post a new update. Once you have found someone you like, all you need to do is hit the Follow button and wait for
updates as and when they post them.
Of course, the more people you can get to follow you the better. This book will help you to write the best updates you can and reach out to exactly the kind of people who will be interested in you and your business.
Raising your profile
If you’re looking for a quick and easy way to get your name out there and spread the word about what you’re doing, Twitter certainly fills that need. You can pick any username you like—as long as someone else hasn’t already taken in—so think about
using your business name if you are mainly going to use the site to promote your business.
It all helps to raise your profile and means that more and more people will find out about you.
Instant updates
While a conventional blog is a great tool for attracting readers and potential customers, those blog posts can get pushed to the bottom of your list of things to do.
Twitter isn’t like that. You only have to write 140 characters after all, and sometimes you won’t even need that many to tell people what’s going on right now.
You also stand a chance of getting more followers to a well maintained and thought out stream of tweets than you will to your regular blog—precisely because it’s short and sweet.
People don’t always have the time to keep reading a blog (even a very good one) so you can give people the choice of whether they want to read more or just stick with your tweets for now. Did I mention you can use URLs in your tweets if you want
to? Now there’s a thought . . .
A great marketing tool
This benefit should be obvious by now. It might take you a while to get the hang of how to put Twitter to good use for boosting your business, but this book will get you much closer than you would if you made the journey on your own.
An important point to note here is that you can customize your own personal Twitter page to include your own business colors and photo—so it’s super easy to upload your business logo and create a background that instantly identifies you and your business and makes you stand out from the crowd.
Why You Should Join Twitter
