By now, we’ve all heard of Twitter and many of us have read blogs (let’s face it – you’re reading one now!) But the big question remains.

How can Twitter and Blogs generate more business for my company?

So let’s talk in real world jargon-free terms for a typical small business. In this example I’ll use two fictional garages in Christchurch; Bob’s and Steve’s.

Try to picture yourself as one of these mechanics, and your closest competitor as the other.

Now both of these mechanics provide a similar offering for a similar price. They’re both situated on the same street and at first glance there’s little to distinguish between the two. Originally, neither garage owner saw the need for much of a website. They figured the majority of their business came through passing traffic and word of mouth.

However, Steve soon realised that something had changed. Bob was suddenly getting a lot more business while Steve remained quiet.

The reason for Bob’s sudden increase in customers came down to a well thought out plan to increase their garage’s online presence.

A Targeted Effort

With the goal of increasing qualified leads, Bob set about improving the look and layout of his website. He included a strong marketing message and a clear call to action.

Through speaking with a lot of his customers, Bob discovered that many of them had initially tried to search the web for a solution to their car’s problem, rather than searching for an actual garage.

Setting up a blog

Armed with this knowledge, Bob added a blog to his site. Bob’s blog featured posts about:

- tips and tricks for maintaining a car

- common issues and their likely causes

- new car parts on the market

- occasional profiles on some of his staff

He encouraged his mechanics to provide his receptionist (who was good at typing and a stickler for error-free spelling) with one article a week to update the blog.

In no time at all, he had a brilliant resource on his site. The blog posts served to increase his search engine rankings through relevant, useful articles that would appear in search engine results for anyone looking for answers to various car problems. Bob had also opened up a two-way communication with prospects before they had even made the conscious decision to take their car to a garage.

Blog readers were asking questions in the form of comments they placed on the blog. Bob made sure one of his staff would answer these questions with the key underlining message that the reader should pop round to the garage so they could take a look at the car. This helped to suggest that Bob’s mechanics were experts in the industry and introduced prospects to the people that would be working on their vehicle.

Once the blog was operating smoothly, Bob set up a Twitter account.

Setting up Twitter

Within a few minutes he had completed his Twitter profile with a bio featuring keywords on his business, a link to his website and finally the location of his garage.

He then added 5 or 6 posts with a mixture of brief tips, specific links to some of his blog posts, and the odd personal comment about something that had happened in his home town or something he had found interesting in the news.

Bob then used a few search terms to find other popular Twitter users in Christchurch and Canterbury – his target market areas. He followed a few of those accounts and sat back to observe things that were being said and the general format of people’s Tweets.

Once he had a handle on the best practices for posting short updates, he started to reply to a few people’s tweets. In doing this, he opened up some two-way communication between his Twitter account and others. When those people replied to Bob, their own followers would see Bob’s name and see that he knew about cars and would take a look at his account to see if he was worthy of following.

After this, he used a few search terms to find people who had recently Tweeted about anything to do with their car. When he found tweets from people who were having trouble with their vehicle, he sent them public replies to ask if they needed any advice.

Whether those people were in Christchurch or Milan, Bob had shown his worth as someone who could help with car problems.

A summary of Bob’s Twitter updates

Bob updated his Twitter account a couple of times a day with:

- Links to each new blog post with a brief description

- Tips for maintaining a car

- His opinion on something he had read in the news about new car models

- Replies to other Twitter users with specific help and advice

- His own testimonials for other Twitter people that he had found useful

- Funny comments about his own amusing work stories

- His recommendations for particular car parts or petrol/oil brands etc.

A higher level of word-of-mouth promotion

Any future potential customers looking at his Twitter account would see a variety of posts from someone who had a bit of personality and was the man to talk to regarding car problems.

Bob found that even if he didn’t get direct business from his connections on Twitter, he often had customers turn up at his garage who said they had asked their own followers for a good mechanic in Christchurch and Bob’s name had come up.

Within a few weeks, his online presence had exponentially increased. His Twitter posts and blog posts all served a purpose to drive traffic to his website. Once he had more relevant people on his site, he had an opportunity to tell them what his business could do for them and started to generate more and more qualified leads.

Bob’s business began to pick-up and he became a minor celebrity online as the man to turn to for car problems.

In the mean time, Steve sat on the kerb outside his garage and scratched his head, wondering what Bob had done to suddenly pick up so much more business.

What’s your next step?

If you can picture yourself in Steve’s position and you think that a blog and/or Twitter account could work for you, or if you already have either account and want to learn some tips and tricks to maximise their performance, reply to this e-mail to register your interest in the Hot PJ Seminar; How to use Twitter and Blogs to drive traffic to your site.

The seminar will be held on Thursday 29^th October and will be presented by our Business Development Manager, Mark Lincoln, in Christchurch.

Contact one of our team now to register for this seminar which will leave you excited about your future online potential. For more seminar info, visit our blog post about the upcoming Twitter and Blogs seminar.

Posted on October 9th, 2009 by Mark Lincoln
Filed under: Marketing, Social Media