5 Reasons Businesses Can't Ignore Twitter

It's hard to believe, but it's already been 7 years since the launching of Twitter in July of 2006. Today, the social networking site has more than 500 million registered users, and is currently one of the top 10 most visited sites in the U.S. and the world.  

The sheer usage and momentum of people beginning to use twitter could be reason enough to build a twitter account for your business. But in today's marketing atmosphere, targeting your message for a specific audience to create a conversation trumps the mass consumption billboard advertising of yester-year. 



Here are five reasons you cannot ignore twitter for marketing purposes. 

1. Connecting to Customers

Connection is the main purpose of social media. You should be able to engage in conversation with your customers or your target audience. Make sure your customers know that they can engage with you on Twitter by replying quickly to mentions and questions. 

2. Branding

Your Twitter brand should convey an image of openness and personality, relative to your offline brand. This ties in to your overall engagement. Do your interact with others by retweeting or mentioning? Do you provide links to valuable and engaging content? That's what top Twitter brands do. 

3. Feedback

You should also use Twitter to listen. What does your audience do, read, and watch in their spare time? Use analytic tools to monitor trends and behaviors. If that's too much to keep track of, hire an agency that can track your engagement and tweek your strategy. 

4. News

This ties into engagement and conversation. Keep your audience aware of your latest offers and events to maintain and motivate that engagement.

5. Loyalty

After you've engaged with your customers, answered their desperate cries for help, and tantalized their senses with epic photos and neat videos, you've successfully built brand loyalty. Your followers will not only share your content with their followers, but they'll tell their friends about you offline, using their own voices. Ultimately, that's what you're after, right?

Website Study: Coca-Cola

For 126 years, the Coca-Cola Company has been branding itself on one universal ideal: happiness. As one of the world's most recognizable brands, marketers should be aware of Coke's unique designs and strategies, and should emulate when possible.  This week's website study focuses on the core aspects of the Coca-Cola (US) homepage.

Dr. Oli says: "Let's Begin!"

A: Scrolling Banner

Here, the banner serves as a header for the rest of the homepage. It creates the visual foundation that introduces the rest of the content, and it contains some of the most interesting graphic design on the entire page. On each tile is a call to action, an essential part of capturing a visitor, as 66% of all website visitors show some form of engagement according to a recent study by Chartbeat.  For those visitors, the average time engaging in content is 47 seconds.

B: Video/Multimedia

Multimedia, especially videos, also helps to engage site visitors. According to research sited by YouOn Group (video below), video content is 5.33 times more effective than text when it comes to engagement.  The visual placement of this video on the site is strategic as well: the black video frame helps draw your eye toward it in the center of the page, and its placement just above the bottom of the screen is optimal for visitor engagement. According to Chartbeat, 94% of engaged visitors view this part of the screen, the most of the entire site. You may not have a budget for video production like Coke, but you can attach videos to your site's blog, which will still help your overall SEO efforts.

C: Social

Just to the right of the video, Coke prominently displays its social media feeds. You can look at their posts from facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and flikr. Your site should contain some link to your social media accounts somewhere if not on your homepage, whether it's a live feed, or simply icon links to you account pages, or a "like" button displayed in a prominent location. Check out these examples for inspiration!

D: Complementary Content

Here's where Coke's immense marketing budget really shows itself. At ahh.com, a friendly and funny polar bear introduces the visitor to a whole new world of interactive content. Videos, games, and nifty graphics just beg to be shared, growing Coke's personal connection and further increasing its brand awareness. But you don't necessarily need a witty polar bear to connect with your audience, just something simple and unique to give your website and brand a voice. A story about your business on the "about us" page, or even personal bios of your staff can be an effective engagement strategy. 

Conclusion

As one of the world's top brands (#3 to be exact), Coke inherently takes its web design and brand engagement to the next level. But you don't need a big-league marketing budget to emulate a big-time player like Coke. Just study what makes other websites successful and make sure your web design strategically encourages visitor engagement.