Twitter: Who Do You Follow?
If you've established a Twitter account for your business, one of your main goals is to accumulate followers. But who should YOU follow?
While it seems like the polite thing to do is to follow anyone who follows you, oftentimes this isn't a very effective strategy. Neither is following people in the hopes of having them return the favor. You're setting yourself up for a Twitter feed that is cluttered with information that isn't helpful to you or to your business.
A great place to start following may be your competitors. Rather than looking at them as opponents, realize that people in your industry share many of the same issues you do, and can be a valuable resource. Even new businesses in your field can be good to follow—if they are unable to serve a customer for some reason, you could be in a position to get a referral.
It's important to stay abreast of what's trending in your industry, so take time to find that information. Searching on Twitter is easy: just enter a hashtag # and your search term in the search box.
Here are a few business and marketing sites that you might find helpful to follow:
- @ducttape. Author of Duct Tape Marketing, John Jantsch is a small business marketing consultant with more than 97,000 followers.
- @BeckyMcCray. Over 28,000 people follow Becky McCray, a small town liquor store owner and cattle rancher in Oklahoma. Becky has a lot of insight about small town businesses.
- @ThinkwithGoogle. Stay up-to-date on what's fresh in marketing and what's coming up. With 153,000 followers—they must be doing something right!
- @blogtrepreneur. This is a great community of aspiring entrepreneurs, with excellent articles related to starting your own business.
- @edagoodman. Over 5,000 people follow Ed, a business start-up coach in the UK. It’s well worth checking out.
- @sewatch. Search Engine Watch has been on Twitter since 2009, and currently has 132,000 followers. Besides tips on SEO, analytics, social media, and content, you can read about the latest Google and Bing trends.
- @socialmedia2day. Since 2008, Social Media Today has been a source of best practices, tools and social marketing.
- Follow us - @CassoneKerry and @DomCassone
The world is full of information. When it comes to Twitter, following the right people can save you time and effort… and help you find that golden nugget you’ve been searching for in your business. As the old saying goes, a great leader is also a great follower.