Let’s face it…
Growing a business online is really hard.
You read book after book after book, attend dozens of training webinars, and even hire a business consultant, but you don’t feel connected to that conventional wisdom.
“You need to be honest.”
“Find a gap in the market. That’s the key.”
“Share relevant content, and they will follow you”. They say.
But all that advice isn’t working for you.
And you can’t help wondering…
Do you just need to buy more courses?
Or it could be that, maybe, you just need to identify techniques that give you results, and then put 100% of your focus into executing and growing those techniques?
In a word, yes.
That’s why I decided to create this Twitter for business guide; to show you 12 actionable techniques that will help you grow your business much (and I mean, much) faster.
Let’s dive right in.
1. Use “The Puffer Fish Technique” to Attract More Customers
Look:
Popular belief states that you need to be totally “transparent.”
But the truth of the matter is that you can apply a little of “fake it till you make it” philosophy to grow much faster.
Just consider the Puffer Fish. It has an interesting defense mechanism:
It fills its stomach with water to appear much bigger than it actually is. This way, it can drive away predators.
Image credit: Gosouthonline.co.za
As a business, you can fill your “stomach” with things that help you seem larger than what you really are. This will help you attract more customers than just being “transparent.”
For instance, Pipetop – a Danish prospecting solution – filled their “stomach” by purchasing several phone numbers from different countries and showing them on their website. This gave people the impression that Pipetop was a large business, not a little one.
When it comes to Twitter for business, you can apply this technique, too.
Here’s how:
Step 1: Focus on followers
People relate a large number of followers with big companies. If you manage to grow your following, people will think you’re a large (and experienced) business even if you’re just a startup.
There are many ways to get followers fast, but you can start by reading the following guides:
13 Insanely Actionable Techniques to Get More Twitter Followers
How to Get More Twitter Followers (The Ultimate Twitter Tips Guide)
How To Dramatically Increase Your Twitter Following
Step 2: Be everywhere
Typically, big brands are everywhere. I mean, they create blog posts everybody is talking about.
So if you focus on getting more social shares on every post you publish, you’ll be everywhere, and, therefore, people will be under the impression you’re a big brand.
You’re probably thinking:
“Sure, it sounds easy, but I have never created a post that collects more than 20 social shares.”
But don’t worry, the guides below will guide you step-by-step through the process of effective content creation:
The Ultimate Guide To Creating Viral Content
How to Create Viral Content That Generates 2,500 Visitors Per Day
A Data-Driven Guide to Creating Viral Content [Infographic]
Step 3: Setup a professional profile
Last but not least, you should create a strong profile.
Let’s face it, if your profile sucks, no one will think you’re a big company, but all the opposite. They will perceive your brand as unprofessional.
Make sure your handle, username, and colors match your brand. You also have to set up a clear profile picture and background image. By taking this approach you won’t only appear as a large company, but you will gain credibility, too.
Here are some of the best guides ever published about creating a strong Twitter profile:
How To Build The Perfect Twitter Profile
How to Write a Professional Bio For Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook & Google+
7 Ingredients in the Perfect Twitter Profile
2. Use “The FLLL Method” to Grow Your Twitter Account Faster
Everyone and their mom knows that when you follow someone on Twitter, he or she is very likely to follow you back.
But, is that the most effective approach to get more followers?
Of course not.
Austen Allred, the founder of Grasswire, found that when you follow a person on Instagram, and then you like their three most recent photos, that person is much more likely to follow you back.
This is called the FLLL (Follow, Like, Like, Like) Method.
With that method, Allen was able to get 10,000 followers within a week (wow!).
Want to know the best part?
This method can be easily applied on Twitter, too.
Just follow the steps below:
Step 1: Find the most popular hashtag in your industry
First, you need to find the best performing hashtag within your industry. You’ll use this hashtag to find highly-relevant people to follow.
If you’re wondering how to find that hashtag, here are some guides that will help:
How to Identify Relevant Hashtags for Your Business
How to Find the Best Twitter Hashtags
How to find the best Hashtags to use in Twitter
Step 2: Enter that hashtag in the Twitter’s search
Step 3: Follow the person who appears at the top
Once you’ve entered your hashtag, Twitter will display a ton of tweets containing that hashtag.
Just filter results by “Accounts”, and then click on the first account Twitter displays.
Step 4: Retweet/like their three most recent tweets.
This step is really straightforward. Just head over to your prospect’s account and retweet or like their three most recent tweets.
This will put you on your prospect’s radar.
Step 5: Repeat the process
Finally, repeat the process with more accounts until you’re satisfied.
Just keep in mind Twitter can ban your account if you follow more than a couple hundred of people a day.
3. Pay Someone Else to Talk Good About You
This technique might sound weird, but it’s a quick and effective way to grow your business.
As a matter of fact, Neil Patel spent over $50,000 on this strategy two years ago and his results are nothing short from amazing.
More specifically, Neil paid some models to talk good about him and promote his account on their Instagram accounts.
That’s exactly how Neil got over 140,000 Instagram followers.
And Neil is not alone.
Dan Fleyshman, co-founder of Uwheels, was able to generate over a million dollars from this strategy.
Awesome, right?
Well, you don’t need to spend $50,000 to get results with this strategy, though.
Here’s exactly how to do it:
Step 1: Find your prospects
First, you need to make a list of 10-20 people who have more than 20k followers and look like they’re not making much money. For instance, amateur models or reporters.
It’s vital that you only choose people who aren’t making money from their accounts because this way they will be more likely to accept your offer.
Step 2: Find their contact information
If you’re wondering how to do it, here are some of the best guides on the topic:
Find (Almost) Anybody’s Email Address
14 Ways to Find Any Email Address in 10 Minutes or Less
Content Marketer’s Guide To Finding Anyone’s Email Address
Step 3: Send your pitch
Once you have your list of prospects in place, it’s time to start sending your pitch.
Don’t worry, it’s very easy. Here’s a fill-in-the-blanks script you can use:
——————————————————-
Subject: Quick question
Body:
Hello [NAME]
Happy [DAY OF THE WEEK]!
I was chilling out at Twitter this morning when I came across your account.
Nice work! You’ve managed to collect a ton of followers.
Anyway, I couldn’t help wondering… would you be interested in making some extra cash?
I’m running an online business and you can be very helpful to me. I’m willing to pay you some money if you decide to promote my business on your account.
This can be a win-win.
Please let me know what you think.
[YOUR NAME]
——————————————————-
4. Use Twitter’s Advanced Search to Find Targeted People to Cold Email
The key to successful Twitter marketing is to build a large following of highly-targeted people.
This way, you have more chances to turn your followers into leads, and then into sales.
Here’s where Twitter’s Advanced Search comes in very handy. It allows you to sort results based on very specific criteria like demographics, interests, hashtags, and even dates.
This helps you find users who meet your ideal customer profile. With the right strategy, you can connect with those users in a way they feel attracted to your business.
But as we both know, the devil’s in the detail:
Step 1: Head over to Twitter’s Advanced Search
Step 2: Use the right search queries
As I said earlier, Twitter’s Advanced Search allows you to filter results based on different factors. There are infinite combinations you can use to find relevant people to network with.
I won’t be able to cover all of them in this post, so here are some guides that will get you covered:
The Superhuman Guide to Twitter Advanced Search
The Ultimate Guide to Twitter Advanced Search
How to Use Twitter Advanced Search Queries for Leads
Step 3: Create a list of all the relevant people you find
Once you’ve performed your search, Twitter will show you hundreds of people who meet your criteria.
All you need to do is create a list of at least 50 people. Then, look for their contact information using the information in this guide.
Step 4: Connect with them (the right way)
Once you have your list of prospects in place, it’s time to start outreaching.
Since you did your homework, all the people on your list will be highly-targeted, so although you’re cold-emailing them, you’re very likely to get a good response rate.
Here are some guides that will help you craft converting sales pitches:
How to Cold Email Anybody and Get a Response
How to convert a cold email intro into a qualified lead
How to Write a Great Email to a Cold Lead
5. Use BuzzSumo to Make Your Tweets 2-3x More Compelling
Listen:
Most people think that the key to successful tweeting is all about being “original.”
But in my experience, you should always create content based on what have already worked. I mean, content that people have heavily shared in the past. This way, your content is much more likely to succeed.
Here’s where BuzzSumo comes in handy. This tool allows you to see the most popular content around a particular topic.
For instance, if you want to discover what kind of topics and headlines are performing well in your industry, all you need to do is enter your main keyword into the tool and BuzzSumo will show you the most popular content around that topic.
You can use that information to create your own proven tweet templates.
Here are the steps:
Step 1: Head over to BuzzSumo and enter your main keyword
For instance, if you’re targeting people within the “lose weight” industry, you should search for “weight loss” or “lose weight.”
Step 3: Filter results based on Twitter shares
Step 4: Create a list of the first 20 headlines that appear
Start analyzing your list and try to find patterns; figure out what kind of headlines tend to perform better, the words, structure, and even the topic.
Step 5: Create your own templates
Once you have your list of headlines in place, it’s time to start creating your own templates. You’ll fill these templates every time you publish something on Twitter. It doesn’t matter if it’s your own content of someone else’s content.
These are PROVEN templates; people have heavily shared those templates in the past, and they’re very likely to share them again.
Let’s see an example:
In that case, you could easily create a template by replacing some key elements. Look:
How to [Your Keyword] Without [Something annoying]
Examples:
How to GET TRAFFIC without CREATING NEW CONTENT
How to MAKE MORE MONEY without WORKING HARDER
How to SAVE MORE MONEY without CUTTING EXPENSES
Simple, right?
And you can create templates from almost ANY headline you find. You just need to identify the key elements of that particular headline and replace those elements with your keywords.
This way, you’ll always have more chances to get more engagement.
Step 6: Test your headlines on Twitter
As a marketer, you can’t rely on other people’s results.
In other words, even if your templates have worked in the past, you should test how they work with your audience – you need to test them.
That way, you’ll be able to understand what kind of headlines your audience loves the most.
Here are some guides on social media testing you should read before continue:
How to Split Test Your Twitter Marketing
How to Use Bitly to A/B Test Your Tweets
12 Things You Should be Testing on Twitter
And you’re done!
Once you’ve tested your headlines, you’ll have a huge list of PROVEN tweet templates you can use to maximize your reach on Twitter.
All you need to do is pick a piece of content to share, replace its original headline with one of your templates, fill the blanks, and “boom”, you’re all set.
Easy, right?
6. Get More Engagement With This Little Known Marketing Secret
When it comes to marketing, emotions work like magic; they activate the brain’s triggers that make people take action.
Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on the way you see it), most people don’t use emotions when crafting their tweets, so they’re missing out a huge opportunity to increase engagement.
Now you might be thinking:
“Sounds great, but how can I integrate emotions in my tweets?”
The answer is simple: By using the right words.
Several studies have demonstrated that the words you use have a direct impact in people’s emotions, and when you use them the right way, you can actually entice people to interact with your content.
Here’s the most comprehensive list of the feeling words on Earth. You can use it as your go-to resource to creating emotional tweets.
Just head over that list and see which of those words you can integrate to your tweets to make them more emotional. By taking this approach, you’ll be able to increase the number of people who engage with everything you share.
Bonus tip: Once you have added some feeling words to your tweets, you can test how emotional they are with the Emotional Marketing Value Headline Analyzer.
This tool analyzes your headlines and tells you how emotional they are based on different factors. You can use it to determine whether your tweet is worth sharing.
7. Use Twitter Analytics to Understand Your Audience’s Worldview
The most important factor of marketing that works is how well you know your audience.
The more you understand how your audience thinks, behaves, and sees the world, the more effective marketing messages you’ll create.
That’s why analytics plays a very important role in your business. When you track how your marketing is performing, you’re able to improve and grow in a more efficient way.
Twitter itself understands it, so it provides you with an in-depth analytics platform that allows you to see how well your tweets are performing, the kind of people who interact with them, and even their interests.
This is very useful to figure out the kind of audience you have and the topics they are interested in the most.
With that information, you can start sharing more relevant content, and, therefore, start getting better results from your Twitter marketing efforts.
Here’s how you can uncover your audience’s worldview
Step 1: Head over to Twitter Analytics
Step 2: Click on “Audiences”
Step 3: Analyze data
Twitter will show you data that will help you understand your audience in a deeper way. From their interests to their demographics, household income categories, buying styles, and even occupations.
By analyzing this data, you’ll be able to understand exactly who your audience is.
Step 4: Create buyer personas
Now:
With the information you found in the last step, you should start developing your buyer personas.
In words of HubSpot:
“A buyer persona is a semi-fictional representation of your ideal customer based on market research and real data about your existing customers. When creating your buyer persona(s), consider including customer demographics, behavior patterns, motivations, and goals. The more detailed you are, the better.”
Image credit: Digitalistmag.com
In this day and age, developing your buyer personas is crucial – you need to understand who you’re talking to.
The good news is that many businesses don’t take the time to do it, so those who actually develop buyer personas have an unfair advantage over their competitors.
And you’re in luck because the information Twitter Analytics provides will be super helpful.
That said, here are three guides that will help you develop your own buyer personas the right way:
How to Create Detailed Buyer Personas for Your Business
20 Questions to Ask When Creating Buyer Personas
The Complete Guide to Developing and Using Buyer Personas
At this point, you should have a better understanding of the kind of people who follow you.
Now you can use that information to make more informed decisions and develop more effective marketing strategies.
For instance, if you found that your audience’s main interest is “Technology,” you could start creating content about software, tools, and so on.
On the other hand, if your audience’s main interest is “Entrepreneurship,” you could start creating and sharing content about growing a business.
Make sense?
Whatever the case, make sure you create and share content that’s relevant to your audience’s interests and demographics. This way, you’ll be able to get the most out of your marketing efforts.
8. Here’s How to Get More Traffic From Every Tweet You Publish
What if I tell you that you can double your traffic by just adding a couple of extra words to your tweets?
Because you can.
I’m talking about calls to action.
Calls to action have worked like magic for all centuries; they entice people to follow your desired action and put you closer to your goals.
And when you include a call to action within your tweets, more people will actually click on your links, and, therefore, you will get more traffic from every tweet you publish.
But don’t take my word for it.
Twitter itself have demonstrated that when you tell people exactly what to do, your CTR (Click-Through-Rate) increases.
The bottom line?
Make sure to include a CTA in your tweets.
There are CTAs that work better than others, though.
Here are the most converting ones, according to Twitter:
1) Ask for a Download
CTAs that ask people to download something increase clicks by up to 13%.
So if you want to generate leads through a downloadable material, this is a great opportunity.
2) Ask for a Retweet
Twitter found that tweets that ask for a Retweet get an average of 311% more retweets than regular tweets.
Don’t be afraid to ask your followers to retweet your stuff. More people will actually do it.
3) Ask for a Follow
If you want to grow your following faster, you can just ask people to follow you.
Sounds simple, but it works.
Twitter found that promoted tweets in timelines that ask for a follow increased follows by 258%.
4) Ask for a Reply
Twitter found that if you post a question and then encourage people to answer that question, replies can increase by up to 307%.
Even though Twitter found those are the most converting CTAs, it doesn’t mean you can’t try new ones. In fact, I highly encourage you to test your own CTAs, too. You might find different results.
9. Turn Tweets Into Powerful Testimonials
Science has proved that testimonials influence buying decisions in a direct way.
As a matter of fact, 78% of Americans report that online reviews help them decide whether they should purchase a product, according to a study by Ipsos Open Thinking Exchange.
The bottom line is that if you really want to increase your sales, you should consider adding some testimonials to your sales page.
But how do I get testimonials? You ask.
Well, today I will put it easy for you. Head over to Twitter and turn some of your tweets into valuable testimonials.
Example:
Brian Dean, the founder of Backlinko, found that people on Twitter were talking wonders about Backlinko’s newsletter. So, instead of just thanking people, he decided to feature some of those tweets on their site and use them as testimonials.
Those testimonials give Backlinko the power to convert more visitors into subscribers.
And you can apply the same strategy.
You don’t need to perform dozens of customer interviews to get a testimonial. As long as you have happy Twitter followers talking good about you, you’ll be ok.
Just grab a couple of those tweets and feature them in your site. It will boost your credibility right away.
10. Invite Your Twitter Followers to Join Your Newsletter
I’m sure that a huge percentage of your email subscribers follow you on Twitter.
But have you ever wondered what percentage of your Twitter followers are subscribed to your email list?
Probably a tiny percentage.
You should consider inviting your followers to join your newsletter every once in awhile. By doing that, you will notice that some of them will start actually joining.
I know, this technique is super straightforward, but it’s surprising how many marketers forget to promote their newsletter on social media.
If you’re one of those marketers, you’re missing out a huge opportunity.
So, head over to your Twitter account and invite people to join your newsletter right now.
You can use the following tweet:
“Are you on the Social Quant [Replace this with your site’s name] newsletter yet? Sign up today and get [say what people will get if they decide to sign up]”
11. Boost Every Tweet you Publish With Empire.Kred
When you have thousands of followers, it’s really easy to get your tweets retweeted and liked like crazy – you only need to write it, hit “Publish”, and “boom,” traffic comes.
But what happens when you have just a couple hundred of followers?
You’re screwed, right?
Well, not quite…
You can use Empire.Kred to boost your tweet’s reach.
This platform allows you to put your tweets in front of targeted people that would happily comment, share, and like your content.
Want to hear the best part?
You don’t need to pay a dime for that service.
There’s a catch here, though.
You need actually to do some work. Those people will happily share your content, but you need to do them some favors, first.
Empire.Kred has its currency (eaves). To earn eaves you need to complete missions, which mainly consist on sharing, commenting, and/or liking other people’s content.
Once you have a decent amount of eaves, you can create your own mission, and that’s the funny part. Once people start sharing your content, everything becomes much easier.
Sounds really simple, right?
Because it is.
Step 1: Sign up to Empire.Kred
Head over to Empire.Kred and create a free account.
Step 2: Complete 30 missions
Before you start promoting your own content, you need to get some eaves first.
A rule of thumb is to complete 30 missions. This won’t only help you to get lots of eaves, but to build trust within the community, too.
First, head over to “Missions.”
Then sort missions based on your personal interests.
Finally, start completing missions.
Step 3: Create your own mission, but do it this way
Once you have completed 30 missions, it’s time to start creating yours.
Be aware, though, that sometimes eaves are not enough to get people sharing your content; sometimes, you need to give them a more powerful reason to do it.
Instead of just asking people to share your content, focus on highlighting the benefits people will get if they decide to interact with it. This will entice more people to actually completing your missions.
Step 4: Engage with people
Last but not least, make sure to thank people who complete your missions.
Most people don’t do it so this will help you stand out within the community.
Your Turn!
As you can see, growing your business on Twitter is not that hard when you have the right techniques – and this guide has you covered.
Now you have two options (psst…smart people will choose the second one):
You can ignore this Twitter for business guide and continue your life as if nothing would happen
You can pick one technique from this guide and start implementing it in your business right now.
Be aware, though, that if you choose the first option, you will regret it for the rest of your life.
You won’t succeed.
So, come on, leave a comment below and let me know what technique you’re going to implement.
The post Twitter for Business: 11 Actionable Techniques to Grow 10x Faster appeared first on Social Quant - Twitter Growth Done Right.