Twitter has a lot to offer the local business, but it’s all about strategy. It took me a couple of years to figure out. Back then, no one really thought about using Twitter in the office interactively. Few are talking about it now.

Let’s say you operate a micro-business, maybe one person in the office and a two to five people off-site visiting clients. By using Twitter tools like Tweetdeck, Hootsuite and SocialOomph, you can build a network of local followers that are very likely to need your services.

Why Should Your Company do This?

I believe the beauty in what Twitter offers local business is the mobility. You see it every day, people staring down at their phones to text, search or call. To do that effectively requires a compatible phone. Those phones aren’t cheap. I think that’s a strong argument for segmenting the population right there. First and foremost for most companies is building a client base of customers who can afford their  products or services. Marketing on a mobile platform increases the odds that your message is going out to that base.

Add to that the ability those clients have to tweet to their friends and family about the great company they just hired, and you’ve again increased your company’s validity online. 

How Does a Staff Work Together for Your Company’s Brand?

Large corporations have been doing this for years. They learned early on that when a company has a presence on a powerful network like Twitter, they increase their brand awareness and customer loyalty.

Small companies can learn from this as well. Each member of your company should have a Twitter handle, and a company bio and link back to the website from the profile. They should all have a picture.

With Tweetdeck and Hootsuite tools, each member of the team can be monitored in column view by all or one person. In a micro-sized company like described above, the office staff monitors the column view while the off-site staff simply interacts and comments with their phones between customer visits. All have the ability to retweet a message.

With each of the members developing their own personality and list of followers as they build this network, they begin to approach and follow the others’ lists. Brand recognition ensues, and if managed responsibly, the local market is now exposed to a company where they are already looking when they need a product or service.

This method will work with any size company, from a chain organization to a mom and pop business.

For more insight into building your local business presence online with Twitter, download your free copy of The Very Best Way to Use Twitter for Local Business today.

Exact Target reports that Twitter users are more likely to post regularly to blogs, more likely to post product and service reviews, and more likely to share coupons on coupon sites. We’re also more likely to write articles, post videos, contribute to wiki’s, and comment on other people’s blogs. This rings true for me, because as a Twitter user, I like to find interesting or educational tidbits that I can share with my readers. 

I found the statistics above on Andy Beal’s Marketing Pilgrim, a site I follow in Google Reader. They could have just as easily come from a short post and link on Twitter. Either way, I’m sharing with you here, and I’ll share this information on Twitter and our Zero To Sixty Marketing Facebook page, and a variety of other sites. Other people do the same thing, and that’s how online content gains wings.

What does this have to do with your local business? Give us something to talk about! Post your in-store specials to Twitter, offer recipes, how-to articles, tip sheets, etc. If it relates to your product or service or offers something of value, share it on Twitter, Facebook, and directly on your blog. Doing so multiplies your message and provides more opportunity for your readers to expand your reach. Get it right, and it’s free viral promotion for your business.

Are you on Twitter? Let’s connect! Just click the link or look for @ShariV. Please include your Twitter address in your comments, below.

Why should your small business be blogging? Your interaction with viewers, or lack thereof, may be the only thing holding you back from more sales. While the importance of a website is crucial in our tech-crazy era, a website that has the ability to update information through blogging will outperform in sales when compared to a company website that doesn’t. There are other ways to add updated material continually to your site, and many have value, but a blog adds something more.  

Your blog allows your viewers to get to know you. Over time, if they like what they’re reading, they’ll continue to return to the blog posts and begin to comment and share your material, most likely online. The more frequently your company name and message are mentioned online, the better. And when someone decides to link back to you, you’re rewarded with a level of authority from Google that will start to move you up the page. Good stuff, right?

Read more about why your small business should be blogging on The Richardson Copywriter.

Image Credit: svilen001 on stock.xchng

Don’t forget to dot your ‘i’s and cross your ‘t’s!

When it comes to adding your company to a search engine directory, like Google, Bing, or others, there’s a lot to be said for finishing the job. Google is the absolute when it comes to listing locally. Once a company has claimed its business and set up their listing, every other search engine picks it up, regardless of whether or not you’ve listed with them as well. Funny enough, when you look up your company through the other search engines, your Google listing is likely the most frequently returned. It’s important to get it right, as unfinished details can hamper your efforts. 

An example of this is can be found with a company who thought they had added their company to Google Places, but in fact had not quite finished the job. After enjoying a moderate rise in rank through our SEO efforts, they began to plateau and soon were outranked by a competitor who had several poor reviews and less than optimal website standards. The first company should have had no problem outranking this second company, as we later found out, had Google details been completed.

• Keywords are important – This is an ideal way to be found, so some research in this area is extremely helpful. Google allows you to craft four or five custom categories once you select from their main category. Using keywords associated with your business in the categories sections will ensure that your company is found by consumers looking for you. Strong keywords within your descriptive text, woven-well with actual value for the consumer, are crucial. Stuffing words for spider-sake that hold no value for people is absolutely pointless because this local listing service is human driven. Poor word use looks terrible and will more likely turn off your viewers.

• Location has an appropriate place - If a location is included in your company name, that’s one thing, but if you stuff locations into your company name that don’t belong there, you’re going to be disappointed. Your business may either be turned down or penalized by Google.

• Make sure you verify your company - If you don’t take that extra step at the end, your listing won’t be finalized. That means that everything you’ve just done, and it is somewhat time consuming, is for nothing. Google allows you and invites small businesses to take advantage of their local business center, now called Google Places. They will find a return for your company when a searcher uses certain terms to look for you, whether or not you’ve claimed your business. If you haven’t, you’re at the mercy of the results they find.

By claiming your business and filling out the information to your benefit, you’re given more authority as a business owner than if Google simply returned your company link for comments or social media encounters, which can happen! Take control of your online appearance by fully completing your information, or hiring someone to do that for you. Repairing the mistakes made by company # 1 made a difference immediately, and the business owner didn’t even realize those things had been left incomplete. Remember to dot your ‘i’s and cross your ‘t’s to get the most out of your small business listings.