A word (not by me) on Twitter, marketing and social media commitment

Recently I interviewed Michael Kahn (SVP Marketing at Performics) about Twitter and marketing. I already did a small post about it but here is some more.


I’ll leave out my questions and just share Michael’s view on Twitter marketing.


“Once you get on Twitter, you need to stay active to build a following. Hone in on your sweet spot and then start tweeting about it. People who are interested in what you have to say will start following you—your followers self-select themselves and thus are highly qualified prospects. Have a brand personality, but also offer people valuable content”.



“Build a following by holding contests and offering giveaways. Encourage consumers to talk about your brand. For instance, Chicago T-shirt company Threadless encourages its Twitter followers to tweet what Threadless shirt they are wearing that day. People who tweet the shirt are entered into a drawing to win a free shirt. Using this approach, Threadless starts massive conversations about their brand and has gained 1.4 million followers. Dell has also been very successful using promotions on Twitter, driving millions of dollars in sales by tweeting weekly discount offers to its legion of followers”.


Engagement, commitment and listening


However, Kahn warns that it requires an ongoing engagement: “On the other side advertisers should not take a ‘launch it and leave it’ mentality to pursuing a presence on Twitter. Brands need to make a firm commitment to managing their presence on this platform, whether it is to drive sales, service customers or listen and learn. Otherwise they risk being perceived as out of touch or not finishing conversations they started”.

Bookmark and Share

Join me and others on the Engagment Experts community

Follow me on Twitter

Subscribe to my email newsletter