Twitter Q&A: Les Affaires 2011 Webinar #rslaf

I gave a live webinar on Twitter on Tuesday to about 75 people and several questions went unanswered due to lack of available time. Here are the answers that in any case can be useful for anyone else who wants to set up a Twitter strategy. For those who would like to watch the Webinar (paying) and register for a summer camp where 3-hour workshops on marketing on Twitter and many other very Web marketing topics, it's here (Adviso gives the Twitter Workshop and Web Analytics Workshop).

Here are the questions I was asked:

Marie-Pier Perreault asks:

"What do you think of people or companies linking their Facebook account to their Twitter account and vice versa?"

Answer: You really have to use account synchronization sparingly. If your platforms are a copy of each other, the added value becomes very low, other than allowing your 'followers' to choose which platform they prefer to follow you . For example, a status may interest your professional network (more Twitter) while another could interest more your personal network (more Facebook), sometimes both. In this case, it may be interesting to make occasional synchronizations, with a tool like Selective Tweet, for example, which will only synchronize the chosen statuses.

Samuel Jacques asks:

"If you're in business to business, how can you use tweeting well?" 

Answer: Conduct research to identify hashtags, users, and lists that are relevant to your industry and then participate in existing interactions. Also, it is wise to create contexts of conversations that do not already exist to position yourself as a thought leader in your field of activity.

André Boudreau asks:

"Don't you think people can use this medium to justly complain? "

Answer: Of course! It is the revenge of the tweeters who have been put on hold dozens of times in call centers to complain, today it is the companies who have the burden of capturing these complaints and managing them publicly to demonstrate listening to them and ensuring the loyalty of their customers. What's interesting for companies is that resolving a complaint publicly may earn you points with many more Internet users than the one complaining.

Eric Chenet asks:

“How do we invite future followers to follow us on Twitter? if we only have their email, can we invite them via twitter?"

Answer: We can invite them to follow us by email. By following people yourself, adding yourself to relevant lists and participating in the conversation by naming people, replying and retweeting, you will quickly find followers.

Martin Vallée asks:

"How much time do we have to spend on Twitter each day?"

Answer: It depends on the volume of the conversation you're talking about, but the bigger the volume, the bigger the opportunity as well. Usually, you can count a few minutes a day, but it can go much further if you have a complex strategy and it works well for you on Twitter.

Isabelle Lauzon asks:

“How many hours per week should an SME spend managing their account? Thank you! »

Answer: same as above. Ideally, you dedicate someone to monitoring and free them up for a few hours a week (2-8 hours?) depending on the volume and this person relays the relevant information outside and inside the company.

Julie Parent asks:

"How do we know when someone we don't follow is talking about us?" 

Answer: You need to install alerts. Tweetdeck-like tools allow you to do this for Twitter and Google Alerts more broadly. For more complex business needs, several paid solutions can help you.

Luc Tousignant asks:

"Do you have more examples of businesses leveraging Twitter in promoting their products/services? Success stories? In Quebec? "

Answer: Adviso! We generate between 10-20% of our traffic with Twitter and a good percentage of our conversions as well. Desjardins also uses it quite well in relation/customer service mode. iWeb also generates quite a bit of business with Twitter, from what I've heard. I have many other cases among my clients that are confidential.

Marjorie Dubois asks:

"How do we install the Follow and Twitter buttons on our site? "

Answer: Twitter offers a tool to generate these buttons and add them to your site.

Diane Arseneau asks:

"Is it better to create a Business Events hashtag or one per event?" Because they are different target audiences…”

Answer: It depends. if you do events very regularly, different hashtags, but with similar logic, like “#company name + event name”. If it happens very infrequently, I suggest you instead create one for the brand and focus the conversations on it.

Corinne Paquette asks:

“You were talking about firehoses as an archival tool; do you have any to recommend? "

Answer: they are very expensive (about $100,000/month, yes, yes) so I suggest you use tools that themselves have a subscription and that dilute the cost between their many clients, for example Radian6. Google and Bing themselves paid $25 million for access.

Corinne Paquette asks:

“You used several tools and platforms for your demo – twitter.com, tweetdeck, hootsuite, … NetVibes; do you have any to recommend? What are the advantages and disadvantages of each? "

Answer :

• Twitter.com: Twitter's main web platform which is increasingly approaching a tool for writing statuses, responding to your followers and sending direct messages. Also allows you to discover trends on Twitter.
• Tweetdeck: personal tool that allows you to manage several social media and create columns to follow lists, keywords, etc.
• Hootsuite: manage multiple social media accounts in a collaborative way, suitable for teams.
• Netvibes: follow RSS feeds, in particular those of Google alerts, Twitter search or other.

“When is the best time for Twitter to have a retail promotion? Days & times of day? "

Answer: It depends, give it a try and "track" your links properly to find out. There is no magic answer and the type of product will also play a big role.

Louise Dubé asks:

“Is it possible to have access to the slide presentation presented in a file format on my computer? "

Here it is on Slideshare or download it here.




Other presentations from Adviso Internet Strategy.

Answer :

Dave Cameron asks:

“Is there an ideal subscriber/follower ratio? "

Answer: There are several visions that confront this effect. Many follow those who follow them by default and end up with very balanced followers/following ratios, others consider that it is better to have more followers than people you follow. There is no right answer, but rather to have a vision for your business that will be respected by all who get involved.

Caroline DESFORGES asks:

"Apart from the area of emerging technologies and communications, are there other areas where Twitter is particularly popular?"

Answer: It is true that this area is where there is the most action. There is a lot of action in financial, cultural, environmental and all things retail, people are exchanging a lot of information about the products they buy/want to buy.

Marie-Pier Perreault asks:

"A preference for Hootsuite or Tweetdeck?" 

Answer: If I'm working Solo, Tweetdeck and Team, Hootsuite. For the solo, it's a matter of taste.

André Boudreau asks:

“Do you consider that we reach more employees or decision-makers in the case of business to business? Should Tweets reflect this or even general tweets are beneficial? "

Answer: I would tell you that we often join the influencers, that is to say not necessarily the decision makers but those who will greatly influence it. Obviously, each case is different, we have not the same reality in a large company as in an industry populated by startups for example.