4 Tips for Creating Effective Small Business Twitter Profiles
4 Tips for Creating an Effective Twitter Business Profile
The social media service, Twitter, is becoming increasingly popular not only for personal networking, but for small business marketing as well. Twitter offers an opportunity to give potential customers and contacts literally up-to-the-minute information and resources from your small business, making it a valuable option for creating awareness around your brand, products and services. In this 3-part series, I’ll provide tips for Twitter marketing and explore ways to use it effectively for promoting your small business. This article provides 4 tips for creating an effective profile on Twitter. Part 2 includes ideas for providing quality “tweets”, and part 3 offers 7 tips for gaining Twitter “followers.”
Let’s begin with how to develop your Twitter business profile. Consider these four tips for using the Twitter profile format to your advantage.
Include a bio and website. Don’t leave a Twitter user’s first impression of your small business to chance. Twitter’s “bio” feature is an essential means of attracting potential followers. Many users simply won’t follow profiles that do not include a bio. Take the time to write a concise description of your company to use as your Twitter “bio”, and add your website address. Be sure to include a reference to your specific industry as well as a general overview of the products or services you provide.
Use a photo for your profile picture. Although a company logo is a common choice as a profile “icon”, human nature dictates that people respond much more positively to photographs of other people. Since the marketing power of Twitter lies in building relationships, begin by giving followers a face to associate with your tweets. To incorporate a reference to your brand, consider a small logo icon in the corner of your photos or use logo colors or patterns as a photo border.
Create a custom Twitter background. Rather than choosing one of the standard Twitter background options, use the valuable “wallpaper” real estate to promote your brand and inform followers about your services. Since the standard layout of a Twitter page remains constant, your website designer can easily surround the Twitter logo, navigation and tweet field with a wallpaper that specifically markets your business. Be sure to include your company logo and additional contact information as well as the addresses to your other social media accounts. The Twitter settings options allow you to set background and text colors for the standard Twitter display to coordinate with your wallpaper.
Turn off your protection settings. Twitter’s protection feature may offer an added layer of security for personal accounts, but it is counterproductive for business profiles using the service for marketing. The hallmark of social media is its inclusive and relational quality. Allow potential followers immediate access to your profile. You can always use Twitter’s “block” option to keep unwanted followers away if the need arises.
These four tips for creating an effective business profile can help you maximize your Twitter marketing efforts. Now, read part 2 of this series on Twitter marketing tips to discover 6 ideas for providing followers with quality tweets.
This post is part of the series: Twitter Marketing Tips for Small Businesses
Twitter is one of the most popular social media services, and businesses are cashing in on its marketing benefits. This 3-part series offers tips for effectively using Twitter as part of a small business marketing plan, including creating a profile, posting quality tweets and attracting followers.
