Tracking Twitter Clicks

According to Twitter’s CEO Dick Costolo, Twitter delivers an estimated 100 million clicks to websites per month.  If you are using Twitter to promote products, do you know how many clicks your links are generating?

Measuring traffic is a cornerstore in any marketing campaign.  Off-line it’s done by offering coupons with specific codes so retailers know where their sales are coming from, what method (direct mail, for example) results in the greatest number of coupons being used.  All the information that is gathered is used to fine tune sales and offer more personalized choices for consumers.

You can do the same with Twitter and it is not expensive.

There are several free and commercial click tracking plug-ins available for WordPress blogs.  If you don’t want the headache of registering a domain name, setting up WordPress and installing a plugin to do it for you you can try these click tracking services:

• ClickMeter (http://www.clickmeter.com)
• ClickTrax (http://www.clicktrax.com)

These are the two that I found with relative ease.

If you’ve already got a website, and have or can install a WordPress blog there are many solutions for you.  The solution that I’ve used for several years is called REDIRECTION (http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/redirection/).  REDIRECTION isn’t really intended to be used in the manner which I’m using it, but it works and it is free.

Another product from MaxBlogPress called Ninja Affiliate provides some great functionality.  Read a little more about it at http://www.oibo.org/why-buy-ninja-affiliate.html.

If you want more tracking options, you can combine Ninja Affiliate or REDIRECTION with Google Analytics.  You’ll need to modify your link and add some variables at the end of it.  Several URL shorteners also offer click tracking.  I’m not overly fond of these because you lose control of the shortened URL but they do get the job done.  A few URL shorteners that provide statistics are:

1. TweetBurner – http://tweetburner.com
2. BudURL – http://budurl.com
3. Bit.ly – http://bit.ly

Social Networking & Marketing Using Twitter

First and foremost, social networking is just that SOCIAL and NETWORKING.  It’s not SOCIAL MARKETING, SOCIAL SPAM or anything else.  Just because you register on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ or any other social network out there does not mean that simply posting your business or product will get clicks.

Don’t you know the adage about building a better mousetrap?

Start any type of social spam and you will find that you will not gain any followers (other than by other spammers) and you’ll probably get outed as a spammer and have your account(s) terminated.

You want to leverage the power of Twitter to your advantage, missteps could spell disaster for your business.

Social networking means that – providing something of value back to the network you are growing and taking from that network those items that will benefit you.  It also means networking with others, asking questions, answering questions and on Twitter, re-Tweeting interesting stories so others that may not be following the same people as you gain some benefit.  You can certainly automate things — but going into that is beyond the scope of this post.

As you build a strong network of likeminded individuals then you can slowly introduce your marketing to them – but blast them with marketing and you will not survive.  That said there is nothing wrong in mixing marketing with social networking in the early stages and at the same time providing information.

For example suppose you are a printing business, and in serving your customers you know that one of the most common questions is about “bleeding” (no, not when you get a paper cut).  You could post to Twitter or to your Facebook page something like this:

“Bleeding?  You don’t need a bandaid to fix this – learn more about bleeding when to use it, and when not to.  Learn more at http://www.YOUR-WEBSITE.com“

While you are marketing you are also providing some legitimate information and are not simply blasting Twitter messages (which probably will not get read anyways) or making and sharing useless Facebook updates.

How To Do Twitter Correctly

Yes there is a right way and wrong way to do Twitter.  I won’t go into actually setting up an account at this point, but will go into some of the guidelines that you should follow once your account is set-up.

Once you’ve set-up your Twitter account, verify your e-mail address so that you can customize your account, create a real profile, upload an image of yourself or business logo and generally make your account appear legitimate (you still need to get busy following people, adding value so that others follow you).

Within Twitter:

1. Edit your profile.

• Add a picture, don’t use the default egg unless you are an egg.
• Add a real name, people like honesty.
• Set your location – you must be located somewhere, right?
• Do you have a website?  Enter it!  Are you opting for a Facebook page only, display it!  Using LinkedIn only – show it!
• Create a short bio, you are limited to 160 characters.
• There is also an option to post your Tweets to Facebook.  You may want to do that.

Within your profile you can also change the default design.  There are not many superb ones to choose from, but there are some there.  Ideally you should pay someone to create a design for you, it should not cost you more than $150.00 – $200.00 for a design that is uniquely you or your business.

You can also permit other applications access to your post to Twitter, for example I’ve got several applications on my iPad, iPhone and HTC MyTouch Android device.  When I’m using any device and am within an application such as Pulse Newsreader (available for iOS and Android devices), I can Tweet a story directly from the application (this is the social aspect of social networking).

I can also respond to Tweets directed to me (mentions), or to direct messages.  You also have the ability to revoke access, so don’t worry that some rogue application starts posting nasty Tweets – but in any event you shouldn’t be allowing every application access to your Twitter account.

Some resources for you of companies that are doing Twitter right:

• http://www.singlegrain.com/blog/9-companies-doing-twitter-right/
• http://mashable.com/2011/01/07/twitter-brand-strategies/

Who Do I Follow?  Will They Follow Me?

Good question.  There are many Twitter directories out there.  If you are serious about utilizing Twitter as one facet of your marketing plan then I suggest you make use of the Twitter directories — register on them and actively seek out like minded and complimentary individuals and businesses and start following them.  You will actually be quite surprised that most people you follow will follow you back.  It’s an unwritten law when it comes to Twitter (though not always the case with everyone) most people will follow you back if you follow them.

Need Twitter directories?  Here are a few to get you started:

• http://wefollow.com/
• http://www.twellow.com/
• http://justtweetit.com/
• http://twitterpacks.pbworks.com/w/page/22555521/FrontPage
• http://twibs.com/
• http://www.tweetfind.com/
• http://www.mytwitterdirectory.com/
• http://twiangulate.com/search/

So how do you do Twitter right?  Here are some guidelines that I follow that work well for me:

• Find leaders in your industry and follow them.  You can use http://search.twitter.com, or use Google, look for interesting people to follow!
• Follow back EVERY real person that follows you, you’ll be able to tell who is real and who is not easily.  If you have followed some boring people, no harm in unfollowing them — but remember, they may reciprocate.
• Grow your relationships, when someone mentions you in a Tweet or direct message and they are a REAL PERSON, follow them back – don’t forget to thank them if they’ve re-tweeted one of your tweets.
• Retweet funny, and interesting stuff – don’t be scared or worried that a million people just retweeted it.  Everyones circles of followers is different.
• Reply to your direct messages unless they look like junk Tweets or messages.
• Share links and other relavent content that you find around the web (quality counts) such as web posts, news articles, research papers, polls, surveys etc.,
• Share content through aggregators, I use Pulse Newsreader and frequently share quality articles on my Twitter feed.
• If you have your own blog and post content to it, link that to your Twitter feed – but remember it’s not about self promotion all the time, get SOCIAL, mix it up, chat with others, reply to questions where you feel you can add value don’t be shy!
• Don’t take anything personally, and have fun!
• Don’t spam.  Don’t spam.  Don’t spam.
• Block spammers.

OMG – Too Much!  Can You Do This For Me???

Yes, we can.  We’re finalizing some of the details of our Twitter Marketing Service.  Please bookmark our site or simply reply to this post with your real e-mail address and we will notify you when it is up and running.

We will also be offering a small number of FREE accounts to help launch our new service, selected randomly.  Register by commenting on this post in order to become eligible.