Why Twitter “doesn’t work” for a lot of small businesses and brands

They either don’t want to put in the work or don’t know what it’s used for

Have you ever heard a business professional, small business, or just a friend say “Twitter is a waste of time,” or “Twitter doesn’t work”? … I sure have. For some reason, a lot of people think Twitter is some magic platform that we can push our content through and have thousands of people see it. Wrong.

Twitter is NOT for pushing content. Twitter is for interaction and engagement.

So how do I interact with others and engage them in conversation?

I wish I could say that it’s easy. But it’s not. It takes a lot of time and patience. And a lot more time and patience than you think. Twitter isn’t a “let me put in the time for a month and then I’ll have a following on Twitter” platform. It’s more like a “let me make Twitter part of my daily regimen and in a few years I will have a substantial network” platform. So many people are discouraged with Twitter because they try it out for a few weeks and still have 5 followers after hours of tweeting and reading through their feed.

Here’s what you do:

• Use twitter.com/search. This is a very powerful tool that can help you reach the people you want to reach. Are you trying to sell your handmade, custom iPhone cases and establish yourself as a custom case designer? Do a twitter search for “iPhone cases” and any other keywords you can tie into your target market and TALK to them. That’s right… TALK. Don’t sell.
• Read articles outside of Twitter, jump into the comments on the bottom, and then follow up on Twitter. You can follow up with the author on Twitter if you have something of value to say to them. You can also have a conversation with other readers of the article via the comments section on the bottom and then follow up with them on Twitter as well.
• Do the same thing above on forums. Forums are created for the purpose of interacting with other people on topics, products, ideas, etc. It’s the same concept as Twitter so just move the conversations to Twitter and start interacting.

Below is a conversation I had via Punta Playa Vistas, a client I’m doing media work for, and some Twitter users. Punta Playa Vistas is an oceanfront beach condo community and we’re trying to sell newly built condos. I just created and launched the Punta Playa Vistas account from scratch about a week ago. Almost every day I do a Twitter search for relevant terms to reach my target market (people looking to invest in a second home in Costa Rica and realtors across the U.S. and Canada interested in selling these condos). For the past week, I‘ve gotten 20 genuine followers after about an hour of tweeting and interacting each morning. No random follows/follow backs. These are all people that I actually talked to and that took the initiative to follow me first.

I did a Twitter.com/search for #puravida and got in contact with Karla (@Travellersoul76). The conversation below is very authentic and wasn’t used to “get new leads” or “sell something.” I actually read the entire blog post, I did like it, and I honestly want them to send me more articles. Remember what I said before, this is going to be time consuming and you have to be authentic. If I spent five minutes reading the article and didn’t like it, I would move on to the next search result for #puravida. It just so happens that interacting with Karla also got me in contact with Pollo Pass (@PolloPass).

Conversation between @PuntaPlayaLivin, @Travellersoul76, and @PolloPass

… I even went back on their blog page and read more articles. Notice how I didn’t try to sell anything to Karla, a travel blogger, or Pollo Pass, a company that offers a local discount pass you can buy for your trip to Costa Rica. Both sound like great connects on Twitter for my purposes. Keep in mind that you don’t sell things on Twitter, you strengthen the relationship you have with people and then MAYBE get them to buy your product elsewhere.

In this case, I’m not interested in selling anything to Karla or Pollo Pass. Instead, my goal was just to create open conversation and get “new Twitter friends.” Most likely they will have no influence on a future condo sale in my housing community. There’s definitely a chance they end up converting a sale for me but it’s not something I’m betting on. Let’s say Pollo Pass posts another article, I read it, start a conversation with them about the content and a recent Pollo Pass customer who just came back from Costa Rica jumps in the conversation. It just so happens that that person loved their trip to Costa Rica so much, they are interested in buying property there. Maybe it will work out for me, maybe not. I’m completely fine with just having them as Twitter friends, learning more about Costa Rica from their articles, and interacting with them from time to time.

There’s no need for me to show you in-depth examples of the article and forum interaction method. It’s the same process as the Twitter conversation with Karla and Pollo Pass. Make a comment on the article content or question forum that encourages engagement. Here’s a quick example of the technique in action. After this light exchange, I could follow her on twitter and pick up the conversation there.

http://www.buzzfeed.com/matthewzeitlin/charter-bids-613-billion-for-time-warner-cable?fb_comment_id=fbc_654773471231719_6531565_654907197885013

Go for it.

If you took any value from this article, let me know with a tweet @joekrug

Questions? Comments? Just ask.

P.S. Want more on social? This guy is the best — Gary Vaynerchuk