If you are going to use Twitter as a channel for your B2B brand then you must be strategic. Otherwise, it’s just a waste of time. By incorporating these Twitter musts, you can actually begin to see ROI (return on investment) for your social media marketing efforts.

Share original content

Twitter feeds on great content. If you produce relevant content that your audience wants to read, you are starting a conversation. You must have a content marketing plan in place to execute this. I adhere to the 50/30/20 rule, wherein 50 percent of content is original content that attempts to answer questions, provide education and nurture the relationship; 30 percent is third party content that complements your original content; and 20 percent is purely promotional.

For the 50 percent part of the pie, it’s great to come up with a monthly featured topic, and break it down to lots of formats: eBooks, whitepapers, blogs, infographics and video, all of which you can share on Twitter. Original content that resonates with your audience and allows them to learn or have a broader understanding will get liked and shared and can lead to conversions.

Share partner and third party content

For the 30 percent part, you should curate content that makes sense for your brand, monthly topic and partnerships. You should have a third party content spreadsheet, identifying the organizations that you feel align with your brand. Examples include trade groups, publications in which you advertise, thought leaders/SMEs (subject matter experts) and those companies of which you have official and unofficial partnerships. Sharing their content of course increases the chance, they’ll share yours.

Engage with your audience

I analyzed a Twitter account recently for a brand that had been on Twitter since 2008, and they had a total of 288 likes. So in almost nine years, they’ve only liked 288 tweets. That’s not how Twitter works. You have to be engaged. You must like tweets that mention your brand (where appropriate) or those from your partners and thought leaders. The same thing applies to retweeting.

Respond

Twitter is a place where clients often bring concerns or successes to the conversation. If you are asked a question about your product or service, answer it or at least acknowledge it and respond via direct message. Not responding at all only makes a negative experience worse, and if the tweet is positive, your “fan” feels ignored.

Include CTAs (calls to action)

Why do you tweet? Do you really see Twitter as a channel for content or a necessary evil? To use it as a channel, you must guide a prospect to the next step. Most interaction between prospects and brands would be considered the Awareness stage of the buyer’s journey so that means they are just determining they have a problem. Using Twitter to publish original content that answers questions and educates transforms it into a meaningful channel for lead generation. Your post should be a quick summary with keywords hashtagged, include a photo and end with a CTA like read our blog or explore our options. It’s a meaningful ask that propels the user.

Grow followers legitimately

This is a PSA to urge you to never buy followers. Buying followers as well as using “bots” to make a post seem like it has more likes and shares continues to be an issue. Bots are really algorithms working behind the scenes. Bots look like real profiles to a lot of users, however social media marketers and influencers can spot it. Using bots may seem like a great way to “viral” or engage real users, but I would never recommend it. If you’re just “buying” engagement then what’s the point of using Twitter as a true lead gen channel.

Tag correctly

As I’ve discussed, it’s important to share the content of partners and engage with your followers. That means tagging profiles properly. If you are sharing a piece of content from a partner, then use their handle as a mention as well as the actual author of the content. This is a simple way to expand your reach. Always use handles when replying as well.

Hashtag responsibly

Just because it’s a keyword in your niche industry doesn’t mean it will have any hashtag relevance on Twitter. Twitter uses hashtags as a way to determine what’s trending and for users to search based on a particular phrase or word. Don’t over hashtag. My advice is three max in a tweet. Not sure if your keyword is a real hashtag, just search it on Twitter.

Measure and tweak

Of course measurement is an important part of ROI. But measuring just the basics of follower growth and engagement (based on shares and likes) isn’t enough. You must put context around the data. You should be benchmarking against competitors as well as determining what your actual reach and visibility are. For instance, if you had 50 likes in a month with only 500 followers, that’s decent. But it would be immaterial if you have 10,000.

You should also be measuring how Twitter is working as a channel. What’s the click through on your links? How does Twitter compare as a referrer compared to other social media platforms or organic search?

Once you start compiling data then you need to make it actionable. If the data reflects infographics are liked and shared more than any other content then consider increasing the number of those. Do more of what works; less of what doesn’t.

Have fun

B2B companies often miss this important mark on Twitter. They’re overly promotional and seem like a machine rather than a human. Stop taking yourself so seriously. There are so many national days and holidays that provide you the opportunity to tweet a trending hashtag and show off your lighter side. Resist being too cheesy.

Here’s an example: June 29 is Talk in an Elevator Day; you could suggest some fun topics like, “Ask your fellow elevator passengers their top three favorite movies.”

Twitter and its abbreviated lingo can be a great way to connect with many different buyers. Keep in mind that it’s not all about you, your products and your awesomeness. You must give to get in the Twitterverse. If you don’t have a defined strategy that includes goals, actions and KPIs (key performance indicator) then it’s really just throwing up some random content and seeing what sticks. So do these 10 key tactics and see what happens! I’d love to hear your Twitter musts for B2B, tweet me at @bethfosborne.