This document provides guidance on using Twitter for customer engagement. It discusses what Twitter is and why it's important, establishing a company presence on Twitter, and best practices for engagement. Key recommendations include creating separate Twitter accounts for major product lines, tweeting at least once daily per account, using hashtags and retweeting to engage customers, and managing multiple accounts through tools like CoTweet. The overall goal is to listen to customers and build brand trust by connecting with them on social media.

1. Using Twitter for Customer Engagement January 2010 Alan Belniak @abelniak

2. Agenda 2

3. Agenda 3 What is Twitter and Why is It Important What’s Our Company’s Presence with Twitter all About Who is Involved and What’s the Philosophy Vocabulary Typical Steps Re-tweeting #hashtags and bit.ly Frequency: the ol’ Quality vs. Quantity dilemma Tools CoTweet Other Resources

4. PART I: WAIT… THE WHO AND THE WHAT NOW? WHAT IS TWITTER WHAT IS OUR INVOLVEMENT WITH TWITTER WHO IS INVOLVED? WHAT’S THE PHILOSOPHY? 4

5. What is Twitter… and why is it important Micro-blogging 140 characters It’s not the same as Facebook or LinkedIn where you request to be friends note the verb… not ‘friend’; instead, ‘follow’ (no permission required) 5

6. What is Twitter…and why is it important It started small, and is now growing Used often by marketers as a way to get real-time reactions and do marketing research real-time search brand management other uses Thereality is that Twitter is a platform that permits all kinds of things. It isn’t one tool, and it isn’t for everyone. 6

7. Companies’ customers are using Twitter Slideshare Swiffer Duracell Dogfish Head 7

8. What is (and will be) our presence with Twitter? I created seven Twitter IDs, one each of our major product families. This allows our messages to be segmented. We will start to use this to listen to what customers have to say, and push out messages to customers together, we will engage our customers This may seem like it is just another task to add to your list. But this supports your role in… marketing product management tech support it is really another tool (not another task) to help you do what you are already doing 8

9. Not all Tweets have to focus on your product or service Method’s (the cleaning product)Twitter feed – note that not all tweets are related directly to their products 9

10. Who is involved? What’s the philosophy? You all reading this (and probably others) Let’s face it: media 2.0 isn't going away The meta-lesson of this education applies to all social media, and not just Twitter Our customers are online, and social media gives them a loud(er) voice. We can not engage through these channels we run the risk of alienating some of our customers that are using this and similar channels by not connecting with them there Or, we can engage with our customers start to build up brand trust, confidence, and loyalty 10

11. Has anyone not heard about the Comcast story? 11 Look at the results for a Google search on ‘Comcast Cares’ Look what’s in the first position Comcast pulled itself out of a deep PR well by engaging

12. Another reason… 12 Brian is kind of a big deal in the PR and social media space… Translation: Lots of people listen to what he has to say

13. PART II: DIGGING IN VOCABULARY TYPICAL STEPS RE-TWEET: IT’S NOT A STUTTERING BIRD HASHTAGS and BIT.LY 13

14. Vocabulary Twitter (n) tweet (n) tweet (v) or twitter (v) follower number and following number "the ratio" profile locked and blocked @ or @ message or at message or reply or mentions 14 DM or direct message Re-tweet, or RT (this is very important, as it helps you gain ‘street cred’) # or hash tags Fail Whale FTW, FTL, and other such used acronyms (http://www.acronymfinder.com/) FF or Follow Friday

15. Typical steps (1 of 2) Set up your own account at www.twitter.com(user ID, password, an e-mail address) This will be useful to help get you acclimated on your own, before tweeting on behalf of the company Submit a picture or somehow-related avatar, create your profile Be real. Be human. (more on this in a minute) Send out a test tweet, dip your toe in thewater Use @ messages to start generating some interest for your own account 15

16. Typical steps (2 of 2) Re-tweet, recommend people, and start engaging - helping and sharing are two huge currencies in social media You’ll soon realize that using the http://www.twitter.com interface gets tired quickly consider one of the many tools freely available (like Tweetdeck) The notes section of this slide has additional detail, and sites to click through to help amass people to follow 16

17. A Quick Note on Twitter Lists Your account page - see the lists you created/the lists with which you’re involved This means the ones you follow, and where you are listed. Mass-following some of these lists is a good way to start getting your own followers Consider pasting the URL of a Twitter list into TweepML.org Also, search TweepML.org for interesting lists 17

18. An example of not being human Poor ratio, likely due to the content Same message, over and over and over again 18

19. Re-Tweeting: what’s the big deal? Summary of why it is important Usual syntax Add a follow-on message if you like Avoid re-tweeting someone who re-tweets you. This isn’t to say not to do it, but note that it can appear self-serving. Keep in mind the 140 characters; if you want someone to re-tweet you, give them room! 19

20. #hashtags Think of hashtags as bookmarks… or… tags Emergent – not sanctioned or issued by decree folksonomy vs. prescriptive vocabulary Syntax Useful for linking groups of tweets together e.g.: FollowFriday, or Red Sox, or Toyota Popular at conferences and seminars to track the conversation in the backchannel e.g.: South by Southwest (#sxsw) Advice… Don’t use a hashtag that’s too long – remember, the # and hashtag text are factored into the 140-character limit Do use a hashtag that makes sense and is easy to use 20

21. #hashtag effective practices 21 http://hashceratops.org/tutorial

22. bit.ly URL shortening service (http://bit.ly/) Reduces the length of long URLs to save room in Twitter’s 140-character limit http://www.readwriteweb.com/readwritestart/2009/10/6-great-twitter-quiz-and-polli.php - (85 characters long) http://bit.ly/2yLZFM - (points to the same link, and is only 20 characters long) Gives some insights into clicks on a link (screen shots on following slides) Can be linked to a Twitter account for one-stop shopping example: swipe a URL, go to http://bit.ly, paste the URL, and Tweet out that link directly from the bit.ly page – no need to go back to www.Twitter.com 22

23. bit.ly data Number of clicks from when you Tweeted it Number of total clicks (others can create a short link of the same long URL) Listing of where conversations are happening Time of day and date information Reference source and locations over the world 23

24. more bit.ly data 24

25. bit.ly’s link to Twitter account 25

26. PART III: YOU, TWITTER, and YOUR COMPANY HOW DOES THIS RELATE TO OUR TWITTER PRESENCE? HOW OFTEN SHOULD I TWEET TWITTER SEND A TWITTER MESSAGE? MY OWN ACCOUNT, COMPANY ACCOUNTS – HOW DO I MANAGE IT ALL? 26

27. How do I manage the flow? Consider creating e-mail aliases (work w/ IT) to have content automatically distributed An e-mail address is necessary when creating a Twitter ID, so consider using the ones you create here Another way to stay on top of the content is through RSS Learn how to use an RSS reader Get Twitter searches sent as an RSS: http://search.twitter.com/advanced Or, use FeedMyInbox – an RSS feed delivered in e-mail form, but only once a day(a digest version) 27

28. Frequency: quality over quantity, but in the right volume Our (initial) internal recommendation: a minimum of one quality tweet per day from each account Set up an internal group (a wiki, a Google doc, etc.) of content you can share so you’re not all always scrambling for this Set up a recurring reminder in Outlook (tasks or calendar entries) Pre-create tweets of items (saved in the wiki or some other source, and copy and tweet at will, for you get writer’s block) Good topics include: product news , company news, link to a press release (with a relevant comment) benchmark data… (cont’d) 28

29. Frequency (continued) Conduct an informal poll – ask a question, engage the audience (see notes) Look at what your other company products are tweeting and perhaps link (RT) from them, if appropriate Use @replies to others in your stream This is what it’s all about! What’s the competition doing? Can you comment on that (being professional and courteous at all times) ? Don’t simply tweet inane, mundane information. Make it valuable. Don’t follow Twitter’s old advice (“What are you doing?”). Instead, answer, “what are you reading? What excites you? What is it about the event you are attending that is interesting (and not just what is happening)?” 29

30. Frequency (continued) Conduct an informal poll – ask a question, engage the audience (see notes) Look at what your other company products are tweeting and perhaps link (RT) from them, if appropriate Use @replies to others in your stream This is what it’s all about! What’s the competition doing? Can you comment on that (being professional and courteous at all times) ? Don’t simply tweet inane, mundane information. Make it valuable. Don’t follow Twitter’s old advice (“What are you doing?”). Instead, answer, “what are you reading? What excites you? What is it about the event you are attending that is interesting (and not just what is happening)?” 30 Key message: do whatever it is you need to do to make this a regular part of your day, time-boxed so it fits into your schedule, and coordinated with your other team members so it appears (from the outside, at least) as a well-oiled machine.

31. Guidelines Does your company have any guidelines? You might want to make some. Go here to get started. Essentially an extension of an employee handbook. Don’t over-think them. Ours are summarized below. DO Be authentic – disclose who you are and for whom you work Be positive – this is a chance to engage with people; pretend it’s like meeting them for the first time at a party Be respectful DON’T Lie or pretend to be someone else – authenticity matters Be negative with respect to the competition Disclose sensitive information, especially with respect to earnings, acquisitions, or recent deals (unless pre-approved) REMEMBER Whether you think you are or you aren’t, you are always representing the brand 31

32. CoTweet www.CoTweet.com the site support Lets multiple people tweet through one account Lets one person tweet through multiple accounts 32

33. PART IV: REFERENCE SITES TO HELP YOU UNDERSTAND MORE MISCELLANEOUS 33

34. Sites to help you understand more http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddO9idmax0o&rel=0&color1=0xb1b1b1&color2=0xcfcfcf&fs=1 – Twitter in plain English (CommonCraft video) http://mashable.com/2009/06/24/twitter-brand-best-practices/ - Twitter best practices for brands http://thesocialmediaguide.com.au/2009/05/30/the-ultimate-list-of-twitter-tools/ - Desktop and Web Clients www.twitter.com/ and then a user name http://search.twitter.com/advanced –? :) :( {sentiment} http://www.bit.ly –URL shortener http://www.hashtags.org/ - good to see what’s been said around a hashtag http://pelfusion.com/tools/30-twitter-tools-for-managing-followers/ - tools to manage followers 34

35. Still more http://www.gradontripp.com/2009/08/27/can-you-judge-a-book-by-its-cover-umm-maybe/ - notes on why your bio and profile matter http://business.twitter.com/twitter101/ - a Twitter 101 Guide http://business.twitter.com/twitter101/best_practices - best practices http://danzarrella.com/retweet-etiquette.html - tips to increase your chances of getting re-tweeted http://mashable.com/2009/10/06/retweetable-tweets/ - more tips to increase your chances of getting re-tweeted http://tweetbeep.com/ - tweets sent by e-mail on the hour http://mashable.com/2009/05/23/video-for-twitter/ - sharing video via Twitter http://mashable.com/2009/05/19/twitter-share-images/ - sharing pictures (also see www.yfrog.com) 35

36. … it never stops http://www.chrisbrogan.com/50-ideas-on-using-twitter-for-business/ - great list of ideas http://www.OneRiot.com, http://www.Collecta.com, and http://search.twitter.com/advanced - social pulse aggregators http://translate.google.com/translate_t# http://www.subjectivelyspeaking.net/?p=201 – how not to use Twitter http://delicious.com/abelniak/twitter+howto?detail=2 – a curated list of Twitter tools http://business.twitter.com/twitter101/case_dell - case studies http://business.twitter.com/twitter101/resources - other Twitter resources http://mashable.com/2009/01/21/best-twitter-brands/ - 40 brands on Twitter (you’ve heard of these brands) http://mashable.com/2009/07/03/twitter-filter/ - filter your Twitter stream http://mashable.com/guidebook/twitter/ - The Twitter Guidebook by Mashable! (the closest thing to the definitive source on Twitter; some of the links in this list are repeated here) 36

37. Call To Action Create your own account and test the waters Start generating some of your own followers Look for a meeting request from me to talk about CoTweet, and to get the company accounts log-in information Work with your teammates to set up a cadence and schedule that might work for you Think of questions for each other, and for me Ask me questions Share content and experiences 37

38. Summary You can say a lot with 140 characters Connecting to customers on Twitter aligns with our corporate social media strategy This is a shared challenge and responsibility, across many organizations and functions – let’s make the most of it! Use this deck as a reference; share what you learn with the others Focus on quality, and create a cadence of communication that’s right for you Use the tools available to ease any perceived burden and optimize your time Start! 38

39. Parting thought You want this… But you’ve got to go through this… 39 *minus the boots

40. Thank You Alan Belniak @abelniak // http://www.twitter.com/abelniak http://www.SubjectivelySpeaking.net