by Doreen Martel

Created on: May 27, 2010

If you manage a marketing department for a large business or you are a small business owner, you may be missing out on a great marketing opportunity if you are not using Twitter to market your business. Twitter and other social media marketing opportunities have distinct advantages over other marketing campaigns. Here are some of the ways to use Twitter to market your business.

Product promotion - If you are rolling out a new product or service, you can promote it through Twitter and get the word out immediately.  Instead of waiting for press releases, mail campaigns and other traditional marketing techniques, you can reach out to thousands of people with a simple "tweet". You can offer special promotion codes to a limited number of people who sign up to purchase your product (or service).  These promotions can be a significantly reduced cost or free.

Information - One of the challenges that many business owners face is getting information out to the public at large about their business. With the technology that is available today, and the number of websites available to promote your business, you can easily do an article, blog post or press release and submit it through Twitter.  This informational piece can be used over and over as the "reach" can change daily as you and your followers add new followers.

Surveys - Business owners need to know what they are doing right and what they are doing wrong. A survey can be set up quickly and easily and sent out to hundreds (or even thousands) of people at one time without worrying about being "spammed" by an email program.  A well thought out survey can result in improved business and marketing processes.

Newsletters - A newsletter is an ideal way to promote your business and offer information. However, if you do not have anyone subscribing to it, you are wasting a lot of time and energy writing it. Use Twitter to market your business newsletter on a regular basis and you may soon find that you have an extensive reader base.

Special events - Some business owners like holding webinars, open houses and other special events. These events may be held strictly online (in the case of a webinar) or offline (in the case of an open house). Targeting those who may be interested in learning more about your business is far easier online when you have the ability to search for users using specific keywords.

Summary

Online marketing is the way of the future. Any business that fails to take advantage of the potential of Twitter for marketing their business is overlooking a significant marketing. Not all business models lend themselves well to online marketing, but for those that do, once they learn the ways to use Twitter to market their business, they may experience significant growth.  All marketing opportunities should be explored, these are a small sampling of the opportunities that are presented when you use Twitter to market your business.

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