Finding Talent for Your Business with Twitter

Twitter is a social networking site where you can meet up with friends and keep up with loved ones. But, you can also find others there who can help you in your business interests. Use Twitter to establish a rapport with business owners like yourself and others who may end up working with or for you.

Everyone knows that you can have fun on Twitter but what about the business implications? Twitter has been touted as a way to keep in touch with your customers and staff without having to call a meeting. But, did you know that Twitter can help you recruit for new blood in your company?

It can be hard finding just the right person to staff your business. This especially goes for freelancers who you communicate with over the telephone or through email but don’t see in the flesh. You’d like to get to know that person first or at least know that they came highly recommended.

Twitter can be used like an ad in the newspaper but only with more readers who will actually see the ad. Newspapers are great but when marketing to a large audience, you would do better marketing on a forum that gets noticed regularly. The hottest way to do that these days is Twitter.

First, find a niche Twitter community that meets your business needs. If you are looking for virtual assistants, copywriters, graphic designers or freelancers communicating with other business people could bring leads. They may know of someone or where to look. There could even be a community devoted to certain types of business professionals.

With Twitter it is easy to post questions in your tweets. Within these communities, ask if anyone is looking for freelance work. You can post your company name and website for them to find out more information about the position.

People are looking to connect on all levels and business is one of them. It is a good idea to have a separate business and personal account so tweeters can look at your business profile to learn about your business. If you have a business Twitter account manager, they can monitor the account and follow up with any interested parties.

Twitter is a useful platform for finding talent to fill out your business needs. You can connect with business professionals who can offer leads on new staff. Also, you can post job opening tweets once you have gauged that there is interest from other tweeters.

Designing Your Twitter Background

More and more business owners are now marketing their businesses on Twitter. With any serious business you want to have a professional online presence. Many social networks allow for the modification of their default theme, and with that Twitter is no exception. But you want to take it to the next level. You want your background to stand out and set you apart. Making use of a custom-designed background will create a substantial impact. How can you design your Twitter background? Let’s first start with the information you wish to convey. You will want to include your business name, perhaps a logo, textual links to your business website or possibly other social network URLs. Other information you can include a short bio, contact information or a photo of yourself. Next you want to consider your palette, and color for the sidebar. All of these elements will display to the left hand side of the Twitter post area. For a more professional and cleaner look (for those who want to use Twitter as a marketing tool), don’t include any tile on the image. You can use imaging software such as Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro to create your background. You need to create a large image that can occupy the computer screen but without tiling. It is suggested that you create a background image 1280×1024. Understand that making use of anything smaller will create a situation in which your visitors see less of your design. For your sidebar, you can line up your images or photos, business info, and website; this bar begins on the upper left-hand side of your image. It can also include your name, job title, blog URL, specialty, social network URL, and other important information. Save you image as a jpeg or if you wish to have a faster loading image, save it as a gif. Once you have saved your image, login to your Twitter account. On the upper right, click on ‘Settings’. From there you will want to click on the ‘Design’ tab. Click on the link ‘change background image’. By clicking on ‘browse’, you can now find the image that you’ve previously created. Leave the tile check-box unchecked. Finally, click on ‘save changes’. After several seconds, you will have a custom Twitter background image. Your background on Twitter tells a lot about your personality. If you plan to use Twitter for online marketing, make the background more professional as well as making sure that it suits your image and personality. There are many editing programs that you can use aside from Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro so choose the program you are familiar with and will aid you in creating the background you are looking for. If you are uncomfortable with creating your own image, there are a few resources on the web to help you accomplish your goal:

Twitter Gallery – Fun and interesting background designs, not able to modify, free and ready to use Free Twitter Designer – Personalize your Twitter background that have the same look and feel as those done by professional graphic designers – free and easy to use Twitter Backgrounds.com – They create a professional background for you for $99

Business Rules for Socializing on Twitter

Twitter is a social networking tool, built to, well…socialize and network with others. Many businesses have caught on to this nifty network marketing tool. Since then Twitter has exploded as an easy to use, online platform that can be expanded to help develop branding, promote products, and keep clients in sync with what is happening on the forefront of your business.

There are a few different rules businesses must follow when networking on Twitter, but for the most part, things work the same as they do for an individual user. Here are a few things to think about when using Twitter as a business tool.

• Update your profile – Keep your profile updated and current with any new developments or projects currently in the works. This helps your customers understand where you are going as a business and it also makes them aware of any changes you have planned.

• Stay professional – While it may be fun to get into a heated debate over who will win the Kentucky Derby, keep your tweeting business oriented. It is not a bad thing to express your opinion every once in a while, but do make sure that it falls directly in line with the mission statement and operating procedures of the company under whose name you are tweeting. If you are a sole proprietor, obviously you have the decision making power here, but if you are in business with others, develop a policy for how individuals will tweet.

• Be personal – People like to know they are talking with actual people. In this age where digital voices prompting our actions are standard, people find great delight in the ability to communicate with intelligent human people who can actually listen and respond rather than deal with canned impersonal messages that don’t meet their individual needs and desires.

• Give to get – Do not, I repeat, do not, just spam your followers with announcements of new products or websites for them to look at. Converse with them, answer their questions and ask them exactly what they are looking for. Once again, be human and socialize with them. It is ok to interact with your customer online the same way you interact in a face to face meeting, just keep it professional.

• Use tracking devices – Implement the use of hashtags and other tracking devices as searchable references for your customers. This makes it easy for them to follow you and your business developments. The easier it is to follow you and what you are doing, the better chance you have they will actually do it. Let your customers know when you have initiated a new search term and what those terms mean to them. Your business is about helping the customer get to your product as easy as possible. Hashtags are a great tool to help this happen.

• Make their life easy – While conversing with your prospects, make sure to ask if there is anything they believe your business can do to improve – and then listen. Customer feedback is one of the most valuable tools to a business. What better way to get feedback than online when you are already in conversation with them? You can develop customer loyalty simply through listening to and responding to their opinions.

The biggest difference between a business account and a personal account on Twitter is the language and posture you present while socializing. Don’t be a machine, check your replies and messages, respond to questions and be human. Follow these simple rules and your business will develop a new social networking tool that can be used to reach thousands more clients in no time.