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Twitter, now known as X, is one of the most influential social media platforms in the world.
If you’re a business owner—or the person tasked with creating your company’s social media presence—don’t panic. Managing Twitter for business may seem daunting, but with the right strategy, it can be an incredibly powerful tool to connect with your audience, build your brand, and drive engagement.
Let’s break it down step by step to help you manage your company’s Twitter presence effectively.
What is Twitter?
Originally launched in 2006 as a microblogging site, the social media platform known as Twitter quickly became a hub for real-time conversations, breaking news, and public discourse.
In 2023, under Elon Musk’s ownership, Twitter underwent a rebranding to “X,” reflecting the company’s ambition to expand beyond social media into a broader “everything app” concept. Despite the name change, X retains its core functionality, making it a valuable tool for businesses to connect with their audience.
The change from Twitter to X is relatively fresh, so fresh even that many people don’t even use X when they are talking about the platform, they say Twitter.
Why Use Twitter for Business?
Twitter (now X) is a platform where real-time conversations happen. Using it in your digital marketing strategy is an opportunity to:
- Engage directly with your audience: Respond to customers, answer questions, and join trending conversations.
- Build brand awareness: Share your values, mission, and updates in a way that resonates with your audience.
- Drive traffic: While Twitter might not always send a flood of traffic to your site, the traffic it does generate often comes from highly engaged users.
- Stay relevant: Twitter’s fast-paced nature helps you stay top of mind with your audience by participating in trending topics and events.
- Humanise your brand: The platform allows you to connect with your audience on a personal level, showing the people behind the business.
Key to Success: Shareability
The most impactful tweets are shareable and relatable. Twitter’s top moments—whether it’s a viral campaign or live event—show that content that connects emotionally or provides immediate value often garners the most attention.
Take Oreo’s famous “Dunk in the Dark” tweet during the Super Bowl’s power outage. It gained over 15,000 retweets and reinforced Oreo’s playful brand image. While your brand might aim for a different tone, staying current and relatable is crucial.
Setting Up Your Business Account For Twitter
Before diving into strategy, first, you need to create a Twitter account (if you don’t have one already) and ensure your Twitter profile is optimised for business:
- Professional profile picture: Use your company logo to make your brand instantly recognisable.
- Engaging Twitter bio: Include a short description of your business, relevant hashtags, and a link to your website.
- Header image: Use this space to highlight current campaigns, promotions, or key messaging.
- Pinned tweet: Keep an important or timely message pinned to the top of your profile.
- Customise your Twitter handle: Ensure your handle is simple, memorable, and consistent across platforms.
- Optimise your URL: If you’re running specific campaigns, use trackable URLs to measure traffic from Twitter.
Building Your Audience
After setting up your business profile it’s time to learn how to use Twitter to grow your following. You’ll quickly realise that on Twitter this requires a mix of consistency, strategy, and engagement. Here’s how to get started:
- Schedule your tweets: Use tools like TweetDeck, Hootsuite, or Buffer to plan your tweets in advance. Scheduling allows you to post consistently without being glued to your screen all day.
- Understand your audience: Leverage tools like FollowerWonk or Twitter Analytics to analyse your followers. Learn:
- When they’re most active.
- Their demographics, including location and gender.
This information helps you post at the right times and tailor content to your audience.
- Engage consistently: Twitter is a conversation, not a broadcast. Respond to mentions, thank users for positive feedback, and address complaints tactfully. If an issue arises, invite the user to a private conversation via direct message to resolve it professionally.
- Follow relevant accounts: Identify industry leaders, influencers, and potential customers. Engage with their content by liking, retweeting, and replying—this can help you gain visibility within your niche.
- Use Twitter lists: Organise your followers into lists for better engagement. For example, create lists for industry peers, customers, or influencers you want to collaborate with.
What to Tweet About
To effectively use Twitter for business, balance your content. Aim for:
- 90% value-driven content: Share information, tips, and updates that resonate with your audience. For example:
- A sports brand can tweet daily health tips.
- A clothing brand might share employee outfits or styling tips.
- 10% self-promotion: Highlight your products, services, or achievements, but keep it subtle and engaging. For example, share user-generated content featuring your brand.
- Timely content: Reference trending topics or events when appropriate. For instance, tweet about a heatwave with lighthearted content like “Perfect weather for post-work drinks in the sun!”
- Humorous or relatable content: People love Twitter for its humour and casual tone. Don’t be afraid to show your brand’s personality.
- Polls and questions: Encourage interaction by asking for opinions or running quick polls relevant to your industry.
- Visual Content: Tweets with images or videos receive higher engagement. Use visuals like infographics, GIFs, or product demos to stand out.
7 Advanced Twitter Strategies for Business
Once you’ve mastered the basics, it’s time to elevate your strategy with advanced techniques. Here’s how you can take your Twitter game to the next level.
1. Twitter Ads
Paid advertising on Twitter can help you connect with a broader and more targeted audience. Here’s how to make the most of Twitter Ads:
- Promoted tweets: Highlight key posts to increase their visibility among users who don’t follow you. Choose tweets with high engagement potential, such as those featuring strong visuals or clear calls to action.
- Promoted accounts: Use this option to attract new followers by placing your profile in front of users who align with your target audience.
- Promoted trends: Feature your hashtag in the trending section to gain mass exposure. This is particularly effective for major campaigns or product launches.
Pro tip: Use Twitter’s advanced targeting tools to narrow down your audience by demographics, location, interests, and even device type. Monitor ad performance closely and refine your campaigns to maximise ROI.
Image source: X
2. Hashtag Campaigns
When you use hashtags correctly you can drive engagement, reach your potential target audience quicker, and create a sense of community around your business.
All you need to do is follow these steps:
- Create a unique branded hashtag: Ensure it’s short, memorable, and relevant to your campaign.
- Encourage user participation: Incentivise users to share content featuring your hashtag by running contests or offering discounts.
- Engage with participants: Like, retweet, or comment on posts using your hashtag to foster deeper connections with your audience.
Example: Coca-Cola’s #ShareACoke campaign encouraged users to post personalised Coke bottles, creating a viral buzz around the brand.
3. Leverage Twitter Analytics
Twitter Analytics (now X Analytics) provides critical insights into your performance. There’s no point in tweeting day in and day out if those tweets aren’t bringing you any new business.
To use it effectively:
- Monitor key metrics: Focus on engagement rates, impressions, follower growth, and link clicks.
- Identify top-performing content: Analyse which tweets resonate most with your audience and replicate their successful elements.
- Track audience behaviour: Use the data to refine posting times, content formats, and messaging strategies.
Action step: Schedule a monthly analytics review to identify trends and adjust your strategy accordingly.
4. Real-Time Twitter Marketing
Twitter is all about the ‘now’. People use it to keep up with daily life and the bombardment of information is welcome on this platform as opposed to others. Think more is more.
Engaging with live events and trending topics can improve your brand visibility. To do this effectively:
- Stay alert: Use tools like TweetDeck or set up alerts for industry-related trends.
- Be prepared: Draft templates for quick responses or tweets, ensuring they align with your brand voice.
- Add value: Don’t just join a trend for the sake of it—ensure your input adds to the conversation.
Caution: Avoid controversial topics unless they align closely with your brand values. If you take the wrong side in a hotly contested debate you risk losing potential customers and alienating your brand completely.
5. Collaborations and Influencer Marketing
Nowadays people are more likely to trust an influencer or a friend than they are your brand. This is because brands often oversell themselves where as outsiders have honest opinions. What does this mean for you? You need social proof and you need it now.
Partnering with relevant influencers or complementary brands can help you tap into new audiences. Here’s how to execute:
- Identify the right partners: Use platforms like BuzzSumo to find influencers whose audience aligns with yours.
- Create mutually beneficial campaigns: Offer influencers something valuable, whether it’s monetary compensation, free products, or exclusive experiences.
- Track performance: Use unique hashtags or links to measure the success of collaborative campaigns.
Pro tip: Micro-influencers often deliver higher engagement rates at a fraction of the cost of larger influencers.
6. Twitter Chats
Hosting or participating in chats is a great way to showcase expertise and connect with your audience. To get started:
- Choose a relevant topic: Focus on subjects your audience cares about and where you can add value.
- Promote the chat: Announce it across your channels and encourage participation by highlighting the benefits.
- Make it easy for your audience: Use a branded hashtag to organise and track the conversation, so anyone can follow along.
- Prepare questions: Structure the chat with pre-planned questions and allow time for open discussion.
7. Experiment with Twitter Spaces
Twitter Spaces (now called X Spaces), the platform’s live audio feature, is perfect for real-time discussions and building deeper connections. Here’s how to use it:
- Host Q&A sessions: Answer audience questions about your industry, products, or services.
- Launch new products: Build excitement by unveiling products live and sharing behind-the-scenes details.
- Collaborate with experts: Invite guest speakers to co-host Spaces and provide additional value to your audience.
Actionable step: Promote your Space in advance and provide a clear topic to attract the right audience.
Managing Twitter Challenges
While Twitter offers numerous benefits, it also comes with challenges. Here are the best practices for how to navigate them:
- Handling negative feedback
- Respond promptly and professionally.
- Avoid getting defensive; instead, focus on resolving the issue.
- Use direct messages for sensitive conversations.
- Avoiding overposting
- Stick to a consistent schedule without overwhelming your audience.
- Quality over quantity: One impactful tweet is better than ten mediocre ones.
- Staying relevant
- Keep up with platform updates and trends.
- Regularly audit your strategy to ensure it aligns with your audience’s interests.
- Avoiding automation pitfalls:
- While scheduling tools are helpful, ensure your content doesn’t feel robotic. Engage authentically to maintain a human connection.
How To Measure Success on Twitter
To evaluate the effectiveness of your Twitter strategy, track these key metrics:
- Engagement rate: The percentage of users interacting with your tweets.
- Follower growth: The rate at which your audience is growing.
- Impressions: How often your tweets appear on users’ timelines.
- Click-through rate (CTR): The percentage of users who click on links in your tweets.
- Conversions: Actions Twitter users take after clicking through to your website.
- Sentiment analysis: Use tools to gauge the sentiment of mentions and responses to understand how your brand is perceived.
Regularly review these metrics to identify strengths and areas for improvement.
5 Inspiring Twitter Case Studies Across Industries
Looking for inspiration? Here are a few brands that excel on Twitter:
- Wendy’s: Known for its witty and bold tweets, Wendy’s has built a loyal following by engaging directly with fans and playfully roasting competitors.
- Netflix: Netflix’s Twitter account mixes humour, memes, and pop culture references to connect with its audience on a personal level.
- Airbnb: By sharing user-generated content and highlighting unique stays, Airbnb inspires followers and strengthens its brand community.
- Monzo: The digital bank uses Twitter to provide exceptional customer support and share updates in a transparent, approachable tone.
- National Geographic: By posting stunning visuals and engaging stories, National Geographic captivates its audience and encourages interaction.
Final Thoughts
Using Twitter for business effectively takes time and effort, but the rewards are worth it. It’s a powerful platform for building connections, engaging with your audience, and showcasing your brand’s personality.
Start with a solid foundation, experiment with advanced strategies, and adapt based on performance insights. Most importantly, stay authentic and consistent.
Finally, have fun!
For the most part, people like Twitter because it’s funny.
Check out our social media marketing services to learn how our business can help you grow your business grow its’ audience and generate real results.
Article by
Nicholas Turner
