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Or, how Twitter can join the dots between people, products and profit

Tweeting has been commonplace in the small business marketing landscape for some time now. With the right strategy and tools in place, and along side other activity, Twitter allows you to communicate on a much more personal level, and can definitely influence the buying decision. Here’s a little fiction to help illustrate the point…

A day in the life of 140 characters:

08:45: CEO of ‘Company X’ gets an email advising that his latest product has been nominated for ‘Best New Widget Product of the Year’ Award.

08:51: CEO phones the marketing team and asks what can be done immediately to announce the nomination.

The marketing manager advises that they will:

• Web: Create a new page in the ‘News’ section of the website (which has a handy little PDF download, and the facility for the public to leave a comment on the award nomination, or sign-up for progress updates). It also has a link to a widget sheet download;
• PR: Publish a press release;
• Literature: Look at adding the award logo/short list message to the current collateral portfolio;
• Social Media: Promote on social media (blog, Google+, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and YouTube);
• Email: Send a customer email alert or newsletter – ‘News just in’.
• Internal Communications: Advise all colleagues and brief them to promote the nomination.

09:59: Once the news goes live on their site, the marketing exec drafts and schedules five related tweets for different times of the day (with a nomination logo image) to their followers. It includes the hashtag created by the Awards company:

@companyx: “Delighted to be short-listed for ‘Best New X Product of the Year’ www.companyxyz.com/news/awards-short-list/ #widgetawards”

10:01: ‘Key Customer Y’ gets off a train at city centre location. They check their mobile phone for Twitter updates and spot said tweet from one of their favourite suppliers. The customer is very happy to be using their service, so decides to re-tweet.

@keycustomerY: “RT @companyx Delighted to be short-listed for ‘Best New X Product of the Year’ www.companyx.com/news/awards-short-list/ #widgetawards <~ A fantastic product”

10:30: Marketing exec drafts some ‘cut & paste’ copy for the rest of Company X to use in social media updates (Linkedin status, email signatures etc). Copy gets circulated with an internal communication about the announcement. The marketing team also conducts a review of all their current collateral/literature to see where the award provider’s logo can be added to promote the nomination.

10.36: Meanwhile, one of Key Customer Y’s Twitter followers (a good mate of the MD at Small Business Z) checks their Twitter feed and notices an interesting re-tweet (RT) about a product that seems to fit the bill for a problem he was chatting to a friend about recently. He ‘favourites’ it and then clicks on the link and is taken to the provider’s website, where there’s a news item. He emails the link to his friend, the MD at Small Business Z, with a note about the Award nomination.

10:41: Whole of Company X is now talking about the nomination and the web page has gone live. All staff email signatures include a link to the website where people can sign-up for further alerts about the award. Google+, Facebook and Linkedin have also been updated.

10:42: Small Business Z’s MD sees the email from his friend, and sends the link to the product buyer with a request to find out more product information.

10.45: Small Business Z’s product buyer receives the link from the MD and bookmarks the page to check later. She also decides to follow Company X on Twitter.

A day later: The next day she sees an update on LinkedIn from someone she knows mentioning the same product, which reminds her to pop back to download the product sheet. Whilst there she also signs up for updates. Company X’s product is now on Company Z’s list to consider.

Our tweet has done its job!

Do you have any great examples of where Twitter has joined the dots in a buying decision?