Stacey E. Burke: 20-year-old lawyer and legal marketing expert whose firm advises law firms in all practice areas.
getty
Although Twitter has a significantly lower number of active daily users than other social networks, it is still an extremely powerful and influential medium. Twitter remains in the top ten most used social media channels in the world, with approx one in five American adults using it. Despite ongoing complaints of abuse, fake news and lax surveillance, Twitter remains incredibly popular. Many Twitter users get their news on the site, because it often comes out faster and more organically than in the mainstream media. According to Pew Research, seven out of ten adult Twitter users in the US (69%) get their news and/or get a better understanding of the news on this social channel.
Part of the reason Twitter is so popular as a news source is that it keeps users’ content short with character restrictions on tweets; this keeps things scannable. Each “microblog” tweet is limited to a maximum of 280 characters. Twitter is the original quick scan platform that provides users with bite-sized content that can be consumed easily and quickly. This remains one of the most loved features and it paved the way for modern social media use like TikTok, Snapchat and Instagram.
Why is Twitter so important?
Twitter is important for an infinite number of reasons, but two of the main reasons are its massive impact on the news and its ability to collect voluminous data and act on it.
According to Pew researchFor US-based journalists, Twitter is their most frequently used social media channel for their work (69%), meaning the coverage we see in the media is inspired by, influenced by, and influenced by tweets. This shows that active Twitter users often have a disproportionate impact on journalists and the news. For example, if a group gains traction on Twitter to stage a protest, the media can follow online and be the first on the scene to cover the event.
Twitter also enables the real-time transmission of information in a way that no other social network does — at a rate of bolt 6,000 tweets per minute—and the data generated by all this chatter could reveal important trends. This was never more evident than during Covid when pandemic-related health and safety data was shared by people in the medical field, patients who had experienced illness and those in quarantine. Twitter can also help during severe weather events such as earthquakes; if many users feel it and tweet it, it could help alert first responders, meteorologists and others who need to know and be able to respond.
Additionally (and from a digital marketing perspective), Twitter can help build backlinks to your company’s website and other digital properties.
Your profile
The first thing users see on your Twitter profile is your photo (profile image), so make sure to use the same image you use for all your other digital properties so that you can be easily identified. If you’re not tweeting as an individual but on behalf of a brand, the profile picture should be your logo. You should also create a header image that outlines what you’re doing (e.g. “Estate Planning Attorney in New York”) using graphic design software such as Canva.
A Twitter account contains some fields that make up a user’s profile. The bio section is limited to 160 characters and should be engaging enough to let users read what you have to say and/or follow you. Here you try to briefly explain who you are and what you do with strangers. Additional fields include a location, website, and date of birth, all of which are optional.
Your Tweets
How you compose your tweets, both text and images, helps establish your personal brand and encourage interest and engagement. Use the social channel purposefully to present yourself as an industry leader in your niche. Another thing to consider besides text and visual appearance is frequency. You can post to Twitter every hour if you want because the lifetime of tweets is so short and the channel is designed for higher volume communication than other social platforms.
Your involvement
Responding to your tweets and account mentions will increase your ability to appear in more users’ feeds. Being helpful by answering questions and providing information is a great way to build your network and increase your following and visibility in a sea of nearly 300 million monthly active users.
However, reach beyond just contacting those who associate with you. You can find your Twitter tribe by searching by location, hashtags relevant to your business or interests, and even following your competitors to see who and who is following them. Plus, you can put your competitors on a Twitter list instead of actually following them due to invisibility. Then you can look at what they tweet and how they interact with other users.
Your stats
Twitter has self-contained, free statistics available through Twitter Analytics. Some of the key performance indicators (KPIs) to track month-over-month include:
• New followers.
• Link click.
• Top tweets (the tweets with the most impressions or engagement).
• Engagements (the number of interactions with a tweet including likes, video views, @ replies, retweets, and clicks).
Social media marketing is only getting more important.
A social media marketing strategy helps engage an audience in a different way than other digital tactics. Social media is accessible through apps on our smartphones that we take with us everywhere. Many would argue that social media has become a necessary daily activity; and, so if it’s for millions of users, why wouldn’t you want your business to be present and active in this meaningful way?
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Janice has been with businesskinda for 5 years, writing copy for client websites, blog posts, EDMs and other mediums to engage readers and encourage action. By collaborating with clients, our SEO manager and the wider businesskinda team, Janice seeks to understand an audience before creating memorable, persuasive copy.
