Social Marketing - Do I Need To Be On Twitter? Part II

Yesterday we asked the question, "Do I need to be on Twitter?" Checking that our audience is actually there, we now ask ourselves "what do we want to achieve?"

2) What do you want to achieve?

So lets say you own a dry cleaning service.  You’ve found your audience is active on Twitter.  Why on earth would they follow you on Twitter?  What do you want to achieve?

Scenario 1 

You want your Dry Cleaning service to appear current and tech-savvy for that competitive edge and you’ve been told that your company will implode if you don’t have a Twitter Account.  You start your account; begin adding as many people as possible and start shooting out Tweets, most probably along the lines of:

“Come to our Dry Cleaning business”

“Visit our Dry Cleaning business”

“HEY, WE ARE A DRY CLEANING BUSINESS SPEND YOUR MONEY WITH US”

The main offenders of these types of tweets, from my experience, are bands (although it’s more about their latest album than their dry cleaning business…obviously).   

Scenario 2

Your Dry Cleaning service is looking to promote exclusive deals and coupons for your customers (OK, I’m intrigued).  You respond to direct messages from your followers to provide a better customer experience (OK, so you are real). You will openly interact with a Twitter follower regarding a complaint (OK, so this is a new forum for customer relations and satisfaction).

Scenario 2 shows exactly what you want to achieve – more customers, and satisfied ones.

Conclusion: Make sure you know what it is you want to achieve.  Once you have your objective you can make an informed decision on whether or not Twitter will reach these objectives.  If you don't believe you can reach your objectives by using Twitter...then don't use it.

Examples of companies that have clearly asked themselves what it is they want to achieve:

JetBlue Airways – JetBlue provides their followers with the latest updates on in-flight services, new travel routes, fare sales and even answer questions regarding their travel services.

TrackThis – TrackThis provides their followers the ability to track any packages sent through mailers such as UPS, FEDEX and USPS.