Success on Twitter boils down to one fundamental factor: engagement. The more people you have liking your tweets, sharing your in-tweet links and interacting with your Twitter account profile, the more success you are going to have on Twitter. That being said, here are a few quick, easy ways to boost your Twitter engagement.
#1: Inject a little brand personality into your tweets
If you are using Twitter as a bland, PR-style communication platform, then you are doing it all wrong. Try to inject a little brand personality into your tweets. And the easiest way to do this is via media like GIFs, videos, images and even infographics. However, don’t go overboard on the GIF memes – this can start to get a little juvenile after awhile. But don’t be afraid to adopt a distinctive tone of voice and “brand look” as you go about composing your tweets.
#2: Keep an eye on hashtags and trending topics
A real key to Twitter engagement is talking about the issues and topics that are front-of-mind for your user base. And one easy way to do this is by charting the #hashtags and trending topics on Twitter. Instead of inventing your own silly brand-centric hashtags that people will never use (e.g. #TacoBellTacosRock), think about using hashtags that people are already using on a regular basis (e.g. #TacoTuesday) And simply keeping an eye on which topics are bubbling to the surface on Twitter can help guide you on what type of content will do well on Twitter.
#3: Respond to all users promptly
This one is the really hard one, because it requires you to have someone maintaining your social media accounts on a near 24/7 basis. In the real world, your retail store might close for business at 7:00pm, but potential customers might be tweeting about your business at all hours of the day and night. It’s best to respond promptly to all @ replies (that is, when users are specifically mentioning your Twitter account in their tweets), as well as all DMs. And, if you maintain a social media dashboard to monitor hashtags and trending topics (see #2 above), then the next big step is to track as many users as possible who are mentioning you in their tweets.
#4: Conduct a social listening campaign
A side corollary of #3 above is that you are actually listening to your users, and not just blasting out tweets to as many people as possible. In the social media world, they refer to this as “social listening,” and it’s vitally important. Spend one day a week just hanging out on Twitter, seeing what concerns, criticisms, or issues they might be experiencing. Then, be proactive in reaching out to them. You’ll be surprised at just how easy it is to convert a one-time customer into a long-term brand advocate just with one simple reply.
#5: Use Twitter analytics tools
Finally, you’re going to have to delve into the world of Twitter analytics if you want to see any long-term boost to your Twitter engagement. With a little analytics magic, you can analyze when is the best time to tweet, what topics and ideas resonate the most with your user base, and what types of media content (see #1 above) are doing the best in terms of social sharing.
Final thought
By following all of these five steps, you will be well on your way to boosting your overall Twitter engagement. Your goal should be developing a regular schedule of engaging Twitter posts. Over time, you’ll see how customer engagement on Twitter eventually translates into real-world business objectives like higher sales or more retail foot traffic.
