Communications, Media & Strategy Gavel

Twitter needs no introduction especially to marketing, communication professionals and many small scales brands. Some of the values twitter offer includes the followings. It creates brand awareness at the global level. Twitter helps brand to connect. More also, effective use of twitters helps a brand to build strong relationship which leads to verifiable business outcomes. It is a real live platform that openly promotes immediacy of information and content.

Many brands and Twitter account owners are not as successful as others and most times they end up abandoning the account regarding it as a wasteful exercise. But before you close shop on twitter, here are some great reasons why your twitter efforts seem to be of no value.

 Focus on the platform’s question: Someone has said internet looks like a worried mother. Facebook ‘what is on your mind’, LinkedIn ‘share an update’ while twitter ask ‘compose a new update or what are you doing?’  To be effective, there is no rule that says you must answer the platform’s question directly. Often, doing this makes many brands become self-centred as they end up sharing only stuffs which fan their egos. That will backfire and will never produce great result.

 Sharing obsolete information: twitter is known for immediacy. Do not come to share any news on twitter that is already stale. The only exception is if there is a new element that can be of interest.

 Lack of basic technology usage: As a player on twitter platform, you do not need to be an IT specialist. But people expect you to know the basic software which makes your effort look like a professional. So placing the link verbatim is often seen as an offence. Learn to use URL Shortener. URL shortener uses smaller space and make your thought look appealing.

 Link without your own voice: It is good to share links, but people want to see your own thought as well. When you express few thoughts before the link, it shows you have taken  the time to digest the information.  When you just share a link without your thought, what you are doing is like distributing a poison for others no matter how valuable the link.

 You do not take time to follow up: in many situations, we have seen many brands starting a conversation and left them hanging. One of the ways this is done is that they never care to look at the replies and answer some of the questions raised by their community members. Ignoring your community members’ response is one of the highest forms of digital insults.

Doing a solo run: many twitter efforts also suck because the account owners or brands are on a solo run. They never take time to connect and build relationship with others. They showed up only when they have information to share.

Abandoning twitter account for long: When you are not current or persistent on twitter, followers sometimes imagine the brand is dead or something has happened. Imagine checking a twitter profile and the last tweet was over three months ago. It may send a negative signal to potentials.

 Using the platform as sales funnel: Why it may not be completely out of place to sell on twitter, Twitter is not created for the sole purpose of selling. That is an abuse of platform.

 No brand personality: everyone wants to feel the brand they want to follow. Twitter column for bio and picture are not an addendum. They are vital to sell brand’s personality. Never joke with this. First impression last longer.

 Flooding timelines: There is a thin line between demonstration of passion and ‘showing off’. When you flood your twitter timelines, many feel offended while some appreciate it. A balance is therefore required. There is need to also study your followers in terms of how much information is too much so you do not receive many  ‘unfollows’ that are not warranted.

 Sharing irrelevant content: there is a need to find out why fans are following you. If this is not done, you may continuously share content that are not relevant to them. Some will endure your tweet for a time while others will press the button.

 What am I missing? Please add to the conversation.