Posted by: Troy White
May 8, 2009
Issue #669

The Twitter Tide is Turning …
Success Stories Come Rolling In

Fellow Business-Builder,

The buzz continues and my experiment with Twitter keeps getting more and more interesting.

One person wrote me very upset with me that I am even investigating Twitter. 

According to him, “it’s not designed for biz unless your group or office uses it as a platform for Interoffice communication” and then he continues on later … “I await your reports on that as you spend all your time researching this over the next three months just to satisfy your curiosity.

What I find interesting with his post is that it did reflect my thought process just a few short weeks ago!

But that is changing.

Right from day one with this Twitter experiment, I was upfront with you saying I was skeptical and I wanted real proof that average businesses are making money with these tools.  I said that I didn’t care if people were making money with “make money with Twitter” programs … I wanted brick and mortar businesses. 

And they are trickling in … and my attitude is changing … a little.

I don’t have the spare time to dedicate eight hours a week on this.  But I have freed up some time on a daily and weekly basis to play with the tools, and to educate myself on how to become more proficient at it.

Why am I “wasting my time with this”
as this person says?

Because my business IS marketing.  I am here to help my clients understand all the potential mediums out there for selling more products and services.  I need to understand the potential out there for selling my own products and services.  And I LOVE to learn.

YOU are in marketing too.  No matter what it is that you sell, you must master the ability to market your products.

And if Twitter is a tool that CAN help … you and I need to know about it and how to use it.

BUT, here is the caveat: Don’t bother wrapping yourself in Twitter if you haven’t learned how to write decent copy.  Or tell a decent story.  Or if you still have never even thought through WHO your ideal client is.

Twitter is a bright shiny object …

It can easily distract you, and take you away from what makes you money.

Much like Pay Per Click.

Or search engine optimization.

Or video marketing. 

Or, or, or …

The list is endless.  And they ALL CAN WORK.

That does not mean you should try
and make them work for you at this time.

It means you need to first get good at one form of making money with your marketing, then add to it more marketing tools, like Twitter.

Bouncing around from product launch to product launch, racking up your credit cards on yet another magic pill, will not get you the results you want.

But, if you honestly can say that you have at least one or two solid, bankable marketing tools that work for you consistently now, Twitter may be a good thing for you.

The things I am really starting to love about Twitter:

• It laser focuses your writing (you have 140 characters; you had better learn how to write concise messages!).
• It can really help you create great relationships with those on your “list.” If you have done your homework right, a portion of your list is the ideal target market you go after.
• Powerful for following trends and doing research on what people are talking about.
• Great conversation starter to get to know people – and to get in front of key, influential people you really want to know.
• They say two minimum Tweets per day gets you the best response (imagine sending two e-mails a day! Your list would be non-existent in no time.  On Twitter, it grows bigger the more you Tweet).
• You can ask questions of everyone and get immediate feedback (can you say “split testing?”).
• You can easily test new article approaches and ask for their advice on what they want.

According to Time Magazine, males make up 60% of Twitter users. 40% of the traffic is from the US - 60% intl.

The biggest stat that may surprise you is that only 5% of Americans are using Twitter. Compared to a whopping 48 percent of Americans who use Facebook or MySpace.

Some other interesting statistics:

1. 51 percent of Americans don’t use Facebook, Twitter, or MySpace
2. 52 percent of females have a Facebook or MySpace account, compared to only 45 percent of males
3. 24 percent of 55+ year olds have a Facebook or MySpace account (larger than you may have thought, no?)

Some of the areas I see it being most helpful for:

• Customer Relations
• Crisis Mgmt
• Corporate Reputation Mgmt
• Event Activation
• Issue Advocacy
• Product Promotion And Sales
• Internal Communication

Kenneth Yu, our guest writer, shared some timeless tips for making the most of this media:

1. Twitter works best when you test and automate (I am still working on the automation bit).
2. Twitter’s main role in the sales funnel and your marketing system is that of pre-selling.
3. The reason why you read all the form of Tweets is because in one screen, you know the dominant emotion of not just the day, but also the moment. Dominant emotion-style selling becomes so easy because people’s thoughts are at your fingertips. Look at the trending topics, click around and bam, instant headline, blog post or e-mail idea.

Some solid information on what Twitter is and how it works - http://search.tearn.com/2009/01/learning-twitter.html

And of course, the success stories from our readers:

From Dana Willhoit …

I now get about 95 percent of my clients from Twitter. I completely make my living from Twitter, from clients I get from there, from repeat business from those clients, and from clients they refer me to.

And I’m on Twitter about 45 minutes a day - 15 minutes, 3 times a day.

Marc wrote a blistering post about Twitter, but summed it up with this …

P.S. Arrgghh! I just realized I invested 28 minutes writing a response to a blog post about Twitter. “They’re gaining on us! Run, Marshall, run!”

From my friend Al Henderson …

According to Google Analytics, visits to my sites increased this period (30 days) over the previous as follows:

Site #1 … 245.16% traffic growth

Site #2 … 154.55% traffic growth

The ONLY thing to which I can attribute the increase is Twitter exposure. Of course, that doesn’t mean it will necessarily convert to dollars … but, where is any such guarantee in ANY promotional effort?

I’ve been spending perhaps an hour to an hour-and-a-half on Twitter every two or three days. Of course, with that being broken up throughout the day, it results in far more "lost time" than just that!

Cheers - Al

Gary Cameron left some great tips as well …

Troy, here are the basic rules I follow.

1 - If I see someone new following me, I will mouse-over their link (but not click it).  This shows the brief description that the person entered.  If it is interesting, likely I will follow.  If it is blank or uninteresting, likely I will not.

2 - If I see five or six posts in a row from someone I don’t know with items that are uninteresting, it’s likely I will un-follow.

3 - The goal of my Tweets is to be interesting and relevant.  Less than 20% of my Tweets are specifically related to my product or service.  I want people to get to know ME first, THEN my product if it is something that may be a fit for them.

4 - I am more likely to follow people who type clearly in full sentences than those who use slang like "l8r."

5 - When I post a URL I prefer to use the full URL, not a shortening service if I can.  This is because A) I like to have an idea where a URL is going before I click on it and B) some firewalls such as Zone Alarm block some of the shortening services.

My thoughts for the day; I hope you find them useful.

Sincerely, Gary Cameron

Shel Horowitz shared this comment …

Troy,

On Twitter: I think one thing you miss is that 250 are not enough followers to have much impact. Because most people only check in a few times a day, only a small percentage will see any particular message. I have 1500 followers and feel like I’m just beginning to get momentum; there are many with 20,000 or more, and at least two with a million.

But as people start retweeting and responding to you, your influence will grow exponentially. It took me about eight months to reach 1000 followers but only one month to get the next 500.

Oh yes, and one way to get there faster is to start including your Twitter handle in e-mail sigs, posts, etc. Mine is @ShelHorowitz

The Blood Center of Central Texas recently benefited from a “Tweet-up.”

“You broadcast on Twitter that you wanted people to meet at the Blood Center at a certain day and time and then linking them to a sign-up form so the Blood and Tissue center knew we were coming.”

http://www.connectioncafe.com/posts/2008/08/twitter-success-story.html

Fellow Canuck, Patricia Ogilvie also shared this success story …

Hi Troy,

4500 people are registered to listen to these two calls - me included - to work on energy, and increasing abundance.

They have used Twitter and Facebook only! We retweet because we value what they have to offer. You don’t have to build a list - just submit hashtags # to group Tweets.

We’ve sent and retweeted this item #40dn and got all these people

So can you!

My Twitter Twaining continues,
and I still want to hear your success stories.

To follow my progress, join me on Twitter at www.twitter.com/troywhite (@troywhite)

I am open to the challenge and will go through Kenneth Yu’s Twitter Salvation program with open eyes and ears.  I want to find a way to make this work for my business (and my clients), if I can do it without taking me away from everything else. 

It is a fascinating medium, with huge growth and potential. 

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this … good or bad.

And thanks again for the well wishes on our 10th wedding anniversary.  We had a great night on the town with a fabulous dinner (duck … marinated for eight hours then slow cooked for another eight …. YUM!), then off to the jazz club in the basement for some exceptional music.

Great times were had.

Thanks again.

To your success,

Troy White
Editor, Small Business Mastery
Supplement to THE TOTAL PACKAGE

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Looking for past issues of The Total Package? Click here for our archives.

A Final Note:

If you have specific subjects you would like addressed, or have any comments on what you have seen here, please submit a comment below and I will see how I can help.

"Don’t wait. The time will never be just right.”

–Napoleon Hill

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5 Comments »

1. Comment by Dean Kennedy — May 8, 2009 @ 2:14 pm

   Sounds like a great anniversary dinner!

   Twitter for me … it’s just a mini-media within the internet medium.

   Having 10,000 followers and following 10,000 friends … to me that’s just Twitter noise. You’d be doing one-way broadcasts (probably automated several times a day) in the hope of attracting the attention of your followers if they happen to see you at that moment in their day.

   Watching 10,000 conversations — your Twitter message app would receive (at an average of 2 tweets per day per Twitterer) over 800 tweets an hour.

   I know I don’t have the time per day to watch/respond to that kind of noise and turn it into a conversation with replies and retweets. And I certainly don’t let any Twitter app run live on my computer telling me of each incoming tweet — just the same as for my email program. I use it manually, when I choose, a couple of times per day, which is much less disruptive.

   But if you’re like @aplusk and can have 1.6 MILLION followers (and only follow around 100 people) … now there’s a way to influence the conversation.

   What I like about Twitter is the ability to keep up with the people I want to keep up with — because they share good content and conversations.

   That’s like taking the Facebook news feed out on it’s own to see what’s going on in my world of friends. I can check in and find the interesting bits quite quickly.

   And it’s also handy to have Twitter and my blog connected so new blog posts get tweeted (which brings instant traffic).

   A lot of what I’ve seen so far on Twitter is just trivia, noise and one-way broadcasts. That’s not good use to me of any media, whether a micro platform like Twitter or something else. Some of the massive Twitter list-building strategies simply don’t appeal to me for that reason.

   I’m not compelled to follow everyone who follows me on Twitter, I’ll only follow them back if I think they’re interesting, so my “organic” Twitter numbers (to @DeanKennedy) only grow slowly. That’s fine with me.

   I can see where Twitter as a media has plenty of useful business applications (and a recent blog post about using Twitter for Business has attracted a fair amount of traffic) — but I’ll admit I’m not using a strategic approach to make profits — just a handy way to feed my brain in terms of partly keeping up with my digital network of friends.

2. Comment by John Gamble — May 8, 2009 @ 2:34 pm

   Troy,

   Twitter’s a hoot. But it’s addicting and it also promotes ADD tendencies and short attention spans.

   I TRY to limit my time there.

   And according to my analytics, Twitter traffic is not high quality. More like hit-and-run compared to most/all other referrals (most likely due to its nature).

   But if you do want to get lots of Twitter followers, here’s the formula: How to Get 1 Gazillion Followers on Twitter

   Warning: this is NOT a workable formula for most!

3. Pingback by ‘The Twitter Tide is Turning …Success Stories Come Rolling In’ - ‘The Total Package’ — May 9, 2009 @ 6:28 am

   [...] The Twitter Tide is Turning …Success Stories Come Rolling In… [...]

4. Comment by Kevin — May 9, 2009 @ 12:46 pm

   I’ve used Twitter and all the other social media. Twitter just feels right for me. I also like the 140 space limit to get my point across. It’s a challenge!

5. Comment by Jane — May 10, 2009 @ 9:11 am

   I laughed when I read: “Don’t wait. The time will never be just right.”

   My life has had so many upside~down~turn~arounds that I have had to wait… [sigh]

   I started on Twitter out of curiousity, but quickly recognized its marketing value. I am watching, as you. I follow those that post interesting topics. Not those that only push one thing. Some I follow because they have interesting followers that I may some day follow. I also follow those that have ‘paid attention’ to me. Surprizingly even some of the famous peeps!

   I say some day because I have a lot of intentions that DO have to wait.. reasons I’ll say are important now that won’t be here forever. I am taking advantage of this time to find just the right contacts when I do need them.

   I don’t have a job other than helping my elderly mom and occationally side jobs for a cassino company, so I have the time to twitter.

   I have also used Twitter to support friends that already have profitable careers, or that need to reach out for some need. Like the cow, Molly, that escaped the slaughter house… she’s now safe probably because of some twitterers!

   LOL.. I have gotten so use to shortcutting words on Twitter, I am having a hard time spelling thing out!

   I love to write and this makes twittering difficult for me..:)

   Thanks for the great read!

   Twitter: Jass53 ><