Tweet this: Twitter is a powerful marketing tool

Actress Lindsay Lohan and celebrity blogger Perez Hilton aren’t the only ones slugging it out for attention on Twitter.
Business-minded folks in droves are signing up for the social media tool, too - and why not? Twitter is changing how businesses - from Starbucks to street vendors - market themselves.

At a breakfast hosted by the San Diego Venture Group Thursday, former Apple fellow, current venture capitalist, author and speaker Guy Kawasaki praised social media as a free or inexpensive way for businesses to build a following.

“Twitter is the best thing to happen to marketing since television,” Kawasaki told the crowd of 600-plus people. “It’s cheaper, it’s fast and it’s free.”

Kawasaki’s nearly 90-minute presentation focused primarily on Twitter, the micro-blogging service that has users all, well, atwitter.

Kawasaki - who co-founded Alltop, an “online magazine rack” that searches and sorts popular topics - said he and four of his colleagues spend eight to 10 hours a day in front of computer screens, with Twitter a keystroke away.

Caution, however, is mandatory, said Kawasaki, who has 139,887 people following his Tweets. Yesterday, the Mac evangelist said an oversight led to a malware link appearing on his Twitter page. The link - which Kawasaki’s site Tweeted from an unmoderated RSS feed - was disguised as a link to a sex tape, but prompted users to download a virus.

“For 45 minutes [Wednesday] I was a pornographer,” joked Kawasaki.

Despite the need to tread carefully, social networking sites - like LinkedIn, Facebook, Jigsaw, Spokeo and Twitter - can be useful marketing tools, or ways to build a database, Kawasaki said.

He spent the better part of his presentation walking attendees through the above-mentioned sites, highlighting search engines that allow employers and employees to check references, share contact information, and find jobs.

Spokeo, a growing people search engine, tracks the online life of its searched users. If someone is listed on Spokeo - Kawasaki for example - the site lists which social networking tools he uses. It links to Kawasaki’s LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter - even his Amazon.com Wish List. So, if a potential business partner wants to pitch Kawasaki’s company, that would-be match could access a list of books, DVDs and CDs Kawasaki is interested in, and use those as conversation starters.

Scary? Perhaps - but Kawasaki said it’s all so “cool.”

Twitter - which has even the most tech-savvy twitterpated - is, quite possibly, the coolest, though. The free, microblogging service dominated Kawasaki’s presentation. He walked audience members through the complex maze of Twitter applications (some free, some not) that can be used to market businesses.

He navigated to Amazon and Cirque de Soleil’s Twitter pages, where Amazon posts bargains (an electric yogurt maker for $37.88!) and Cirque Las Vegas promotes discounted ticket prices. Even KogiBBQ, a Los Angeles Korean BBQ-taco hybrid street vendor, uses Twitter to post where the cart will park throughout the day. Kawasaki said customers follow Kogi on Twitter and line up waiting for the popular food cart - which even Tweets its daily last call.

Social media is fast replacing advertising; even Virgin America, a small, but growing airline, is using Facebook and Twitter in lieu of advertising to promote its brand.

Small, and medium-sized business owners don’t have to spend eight to 10 hours a day Tweeting, Kawasaki said - after all, his primary function as co-founder of Alltop is to promote the brand, so Tweeting for hours on end makes more sense for him. It’s important however, he said, for entrepreneurs to know how to effectively use social media to market.

Business owners don’t have to use all the tools Kawasaki does - TweetHawk, Twhirl, TweetDeck and Objective Marketer - but they must recognize the power Twitter and its like-functioning sites yield.

TweetDeck and Twhirl allow Twitter users to manage multiple Twitter accounts at once, and read and respond to followers. TweetHawk allows Twitter users to craft automatic responses to followers, and charges Twitter users 5 cents per message sent. Objective Marketer allows Twitter-ers to track the progress of their Tweets - i.e. how many people clicked through on links, and how many times Tweets are re-Tweeted.

When users Tweet about Kawasaki or Alltop, or re-Tweet something the business guru posted, Kawasaki’s brand expands. (A full list of sites cited in Kawasaki’s presentation will be posted on www.sdvg.org.)

“Twitter is such an enormously useful marketing tool,” he said. “They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. That isn’t true anymore. Re-Tweeting is the sincerest form of flattery.”

Kawasaki’s Twitter tips - following users who follow you, sending direct or automatic-generated responses to users to Tweet about you, or re-Tweet your posts, and using Twitter’s search engines to connect with other users - were absorbed by the eager attendees.
John and Janet McCulley of McCulley Design, a San Diego design firm, said they’re fascinated by social media and its role among business owners.

John - who has LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter applications on his iPhone - said utilizing social media is a daily commitment for small business owners.

“The key,” Janet said, “is making Twitter part of your daily vocabulary - not something you do once a week.”

Janet - who manages marketing for the firm - said she’s anxious to see how social media, in particular Twitter, evolves. No social networking site or social media tool is safe, as is evidenced by MySpace’s fall from grace. As businesses fight to capture the ears and eyes of consumers, Janet said she wonders whether Twitter will thrive or falter.

“I believe Twitter is an effective tool - I just wonder whether it’s eventually going to become noise,” she said.

Tags: SDNN

This entry was posted on Thursday, June 25th, 2009 at 12:51 pm and is filed under Business. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.