It’s no secret that Twitter has emerged as one of the largest social media platforms over the years. Every day, there are lots
of active accounts using Twitter.
These accounts run into hundreds of millions of tweets in a day and that’s really massive. My Twitter review will show you how this is great for your business because a lot of people are active on the platform.
Twitter was started by four friends in 2006, Jack Dorsey, Noah Glass, Biz Stone, and Evan Williams. With 330 million monthly active users it is one of the most established microblogging platforms in the world.
For the purpose of this piece, we shall be looking at how to use Twitter for your business. But before then, I’d like to explain some terminologies on Twitter. The following are terminologies you first have to familiarize yourself with.
Table of Contents
Terms Associated with a Twitter Profile
When you open a Twitter profile, you’d be getting visitors by default. Now, these visitors will always check out your profile and that’s where they’ll see these terms. This part of your profile is the part that is peculiar to you. So, let’s have a look at each of them:
Handle
The handle is always accompanied by the symbol “@”. This is what you use especially when you want someone to look up your profile on Twitter. For instance, if your name is John, your handle can look like this “@John”.
Anything can be your handle as long as it contains words. When it comes to interacting on Twitter, your handle is what people see because it represents your profile.
Username
This is the name that people see when they either visit your profile or see your post. It displays just above your handle. Your username can hold up to fifty characters in case you want to customize it.
The username is the best part to infuse the name of your brand or business. This is because it displays your brand.
Profile Picture
When you create your Twitter profile, you need to have a picture that represents you. This is akin to the display picture you have on WhatsApp, Facebook, and other platforms. For every post you make your profile picture will be attached.
This picture could be a picture of yourself or something that relates to your business. But since we’re talking about business, your profile picture will be a picture of your business logo.
Bio
Your bio is the part of your profile that sells you or your business. When people visit your profile, your bio and profile picture are the first things that they see.
Think of your bio as an excerpt of your CV. This is where you describe your business and yourself. You can also include your location and the time that your business is open.
Another important thing pertaining to your business that you can include in your bio is your contact details.
Header Image
This is usually a picture that displays behind your profile picture. It is rectangular in shape. It’s advisable to change the header regularly especially when you want to make promotions. You can also use the header to advertise event details.
Terminologies for Navigating Twitter
Tweets
These are posts that you or your followers make. Tweets are displayed on your timeline.
Mention
Mentioning a user on Twitter is like tagging on Facebook. You mention people with their handles. The symbol is “@”.
Hashtag
This tag is represented by the symbol “#”. The symbol is used to tag posts on Twitter. It could be a word or phrase. Using the hashtag is a way to reach out to Twitter’s large audience.
Anything with the hashtag can be looked up. For instance, if there’s a show on TV, you can search for the hashtag of that show. This will enable you to discuss and interact with other users that are discussing the show.
Direct Message
This feature is denoted by the abbreviation ‘DM’. It is through the DM that users can send messages to you. You can use the DM if you want to send a direct message to any user without interacting through tweets. This gives you and your recipient privacy.
Timeline
The timeline is where your activities are displayed. It could be a follower that tagged you in a post or even posts you made.
All these are shown on your timeline. It shows your recent activities. Your timeline is where you interact with other users’ tweets.
Pinned Tweet
Normally on Twitter when you make tweets, the platform shows your most recent tweets on your timeline. This implies that if you make your first tweet, the subsequent tweets will cover that first tweet.
But if you want that your first tweet to always show, you can pin it to your timeline. That way the tweet will always stay visible to people who visit your profile.
If you want to advertise something that is ongoing through your tweets, you can pin it to the timeline.
Follow
This term is akin to Facebook’s “Add friend” feature if you want to add a friend on Twitter. You can follow the friend and you’ll see their tweets on your timeline.
Followers
Twitter followers are your friends. So, when they follow you, they start seeing your tweets on their timeline.
Getting a Business Account on Twitter
Before you get on any social platform to interact and share things with users, you need to have an account. Having an email account is like the key to opening a Twitter account.
So, make sure you have your email address ready. Now, let’s take a peek into creating an account for your business on Twitter. Follow this procedure:
- Navigate to the Twitter URL (twitter.com) and open the page
You’ll see a prompt to sign up. Hit the sign-up button to register your account with your email. Here you’ll provide a handle, username, mobile number, and more.
Going further you’ll be asked to input details about your birthday, age, and more. Just provide the necessary details and you’ll be fine.
Once you have created a profile, you’ll need to verify your account with your mobile number. So, Twitter will send a code that you’ll be using to verify your profile to that mobile number.
After verification, you need to create a password that you can remember easily. After that, proceed to complete your profile by filling out the necessary details.
The next thing is to give your profile a face by uploading a profile picture. Since the account is for business purposes, your picture needs to be your business logo.
Using Social Media for your Website Promotion
Once you have your website up and running, Twitter will become one of the many social media platforms that you will use to get your brand out there.
If you are totally new and ready to get your website started, then you can start today for free and learn all about social media marketing. Plus quality content, good SEO practices, email marketing and so much more in a safe friendly community.
I’ll even mentor you on your journey so that you can really get started growing towards your success. Read more below and take the plunge into your future success today.
Write your bio
This is where you describe your business and give details on how potential clients can contact you.
- Now, you’re all set to explore Twitter. You can post your tweets, add friends and have fun advertising your business.
Conclusion
Whether you’re on Twitter to interact with loved ones or to conduct your business, you’re on the right platform. Twitter makes it fun to reach many people with your opinions and promote your business.
I hope this has helped, please leave a comment, like, and share. Thank you.
LILY
Greetings! I have known twitter for years, and I have always considered it as a platform to interact with friends from all over the world. With the huge crowd it has, I understand how important it can be to an online business, in terms of marketing. I agree with you a hundred percent that twitter makes it fun to reach many people with your opinions and promote your business.
Twitter certainly has a following and is very popular, especially with Generation Z and that makes it a great place to connect and attract them to your business. Keeping your posts upbeat and eye-catching will soon have them following you and devouring your posts.
Your site has so many wonderful ways to make money online. It can be overwhelming to decide which platform to use. Which platform is your favorite?
Twitter is an excellent place to share blog posts that you write. It takes a lot of work to write a blog post, so promoting one’s position on multiple platforms would worth the effort. I have used it a little bit. It is worth checking out more.
Hi Sharon, I think my favorite site to promote on is Pinterest. I enjoy creating pins in Canva and seeing how many people look and save and click through to my articles. I do enjoy Twitter as it is very quick.
Which is your favorite promotion site?
I don’t use twitter anymore but this is a good article to break it down and explain it for people who are just starting out. It’s a great platform for marketing individuals and single products so if you’re trying to use is for social media marketing do the research on your target audience and then reach out to that twitter community.
Definitely a great social media outlet for specific niche markets. As always you need to do your research and understand who you are trying to reach. It can really draw a lot of traffic to your business.
I had never used twitter up until about two years ago. I was able to open an account. But then I got all confused with the retweets, and forwarding and all that sort of stuff. I decided it was not for me. Had I read your post back then, I would already be a twitter expert today. It’s not so complicated after all. Thank you very much for this explanation. I will give Twitter a second chance.
Excellent idea Abel. I guess anything new usually takes a little time to understand. I’m glad that this has inspired you to have another go. Wishing you great success.
Thanks for sharing. I’ve honestly never used Twitter and don’t intend to. BUT I didn’t realize they had a business profile option. What sets the business profile apart from a standard profile? How is it typically used, who should have a business account, and what makes it different from other platforms, especially when considering business marketing?
Hi Molly, When we think about Twitter we tend to think of friends sharing the moment with each other and that is fun but a business profile is there just to promote your business. This is a great way to keep business and pleasure separate and only send business messages to people who would be interested. You don’t want to bombard anyone, especially your family and friends. I guess keeping them separate will really work for you.
Very nice round up of the Twitter platform. For anyone who is just starting out and needing to create a profile for their personal use or business, they should have no problem following this step by step review/tutorial.
Since I’ve started building my own website/blog, I feel twitter is a great place to start and master some marketing. I feel it is like a cocktail hour or hangout where you can really provide value and learn about your niche or industry.
Well written. I wish you continued success!
What a great comment Brian and thanks for the encouragement. I’m pleased that Twitter is working out for you and it’s all about consistency with social media. Keep up the good work and get out there and be noticed. Wishing you great success too.
Thanks for all your advice with Twitter, I am relatively new to the platform and can be a bit unsure about how much time I want to devote to it, as opposed to focusing on developing content for my website. I am concerned about getting too focused on too many platforms at once. What do you think about this?
Definitely choose two social media sites that suit your business and stick to promoting on them AL. It is so easy to get sidetracked and waste a lot of time for not a lot to show. It takes a while to get known. I would suggest two social and two writing platforms (Quora, Medium, LinkedIn etc) max for daily promotion.