Twitter: Why And How To Use It For Business

There are so many uses for Twitter. I still however, find some people and companies not completely embracing Twitter.

I utilize twitter extensively with my Jennifer’s Review blog as well as other social media outlets to promote my posts. My latest blog stats have shown that social networking sites drive more traffic to my blog then google. Twitter is a large part of that strategy and traffic.

What are some uses for twitter? Sales, customer service, engagement, sharing information, creating a feed that promotes personal branding and a sharing of your knowledge … the list goes on. If you are creative – twitter can be used so much more than just a simple “What are you doing?” way.

One of the exciting new features of Twitter is the new location feature. Afraid to use it? I admit – it can be a little nerving letting everyone know where you are (or aren’t) … however … for a business … this is fabulous! Think of the location feature for a bar or restaurant who wants to promote a drink, lunch or dinner special for Tuesday to anyone in their immediate area? Not only will their current followers know of the special – but now they have the opportunity to attract those that may be in their area and not familiar with their business.

For me personally, I may be passing through a new location … I can search “dinner special” on twitter and get only those tweets with “dinner special” in my search pertaining to my current location. I now know who around my specific location has a dinner special going on. I think that adds a whole new level of engagement for businesses and one I’m hoping to see a lot of people start to use.

I wanted to share with you a video from TED.com – a great place to watch some great videos from innovate leaders and thinkers. The one below is from Evan Williams the co-founder of twitter from his speech at TED 2009. Would you ever have thought that a simple platform of sharing 140 characters could have turned into what Twitter is today?