Your Twitter account has to actively connect with the right type of friends and industry peers if you want to derive the optimum benefits out of Twitter.
You need to initiate and encourage conversations, promptly respond to queries, discuss with clients who mention your brand, and generally interact on a regular basis.
If you are not already aware, Google is already indexing tweets – though not in real-time. Thus, Twitter pages and even individual tweets have already started appearing within Google search results.
Make sure to select an optimal handle that is appropriate to your brand and not difficult to remember. Your handle will then become part of your customized Twitter URL. However, try to keep the name short and succinct making it easy to tweet.
Select an account name imaginatively and with care. Optimize the Twitter account name to best reflect your brand. Your name appears next to your profile that can be different from your handle/URL. You should understandably have an account name that helps promote yourself, your business or your brand.
You will have to optimize your Twitter page’s “Bio” line so as to include what you may consider as mission-critical phrases for your brand. Take utmost advantage of all the permissible limit of characters – which, in this case may be 160.
Make it a point to integrate your Twitter URL into your website by placing a call to action on the site for your clients to follow. You might also integrate your Twitter URL within your site’s Global Footer. Both of these actions offer usability to your visitors and help boost your Twitter URL in the search engines.
It is imperative that you select the initial characters of each tweet meticulously. The “lead-in” of each tweet appears to be the key for SEO as it will determine what appears in the tweet’s title tag.
Please know that approximately 42 characters are factored into each tweet’s title tag, including the account name, as also the initial characters of each tweet.
Whenever possible, begin your tweet with a primary keyword phrase to theme each message. This is not to say that you should indiscriminately fill your tweets with key words and deny providing value to your followers.
Always bear in mind your retweetability factor. Please make sure your tweet’s character limits allow for optimal “retweetability.” It is ideal to keep your Twitter message to below 120 characters so that your followers can easily add RT @YourHandle in front of the tweet
It is also necessary to insert back links to redirect users back to your content. Twitter is known to be a significant traffic driver for bloggers and others using the space to share links.
Your Turn:
What is your Twitter marketing strategy? We’d love to hear your thoughts.