Activating Your Advocates:

How to engage and grow your customer base using Twitter

Read someone’s Twitter timeline and its going to feel like walking into a private party. The Tweeter will be replying to followers who have replied to his tweets and addressing issues that other followers have raised. There's probably plenty of  interesting content too, but much of the timeline of a good tweeter is directed at others.

One good reason a Tweeter could - and should - mention one of his followers in his timeline is if that follower is one of his key marketers. Every good business has people like this - loyal customers, the ones raving about your products to their friends, send inks of your articles to their contact list and are always getting in touch with questions, suggestions and feedback. These people are worth gold to any business and good marketers will do everything they can to keep them happy and to make the most of them.

Twitter lets you do both. And it helps you find them too.

In fact, there are all sorts of ways to discover who is talking about you the most on Twitter - and companies are using them.

In September 2006, for example,  Business Week described how Tweeter Jonathan Fields had spotted William Shatner boarding a JetBlue flight at JFK airport in New York. He sent out a tweet stating he wondered why the actor was flying a budget airline. Immediately he received an email saying Jet Blue was now following him on Twitter. The company was alerted about the mention and responded by following a customer who had already shown that he was prepared to talk about the airline. Now ordinary people have access to this same incredible technology.

There are a number of ways to do that.

One is to simply toss your username into Twitter’s search engine on the home page or search. twitter.com. See who comes up. You will be able to count who has mentioned you the highest number of times in their tweets and who is giving you the most praise.

But search will only tell you who has talked about you in the past, not who is talking about you now.

Twitter has a tracking system that can do that. Type “track [keyword]” into your instant messenger or cell phone and everytime someone types in that keyword, such as @username, your will be able to see what has been said.

You will then be able to check out who they are or reply to their tweet.

That’s one useful way to stay informed about what people are saying about you.

However, not everyone uses Twitter on their mobile device and when tracking to discover your biggest advocates you want to keep records of what people are saying. This will enable you to create detailed lists of who is generating referrals on your behalf, which topics interest them the most and what is most likely to spark a retweet or reply.

Monitter.com helps you do this. You can keep track of three different keywords in real time. Its fun, but you can’t keep the  tweets permanently, so unless you are watching it all the time and making notes, you will lose some people.

TweetBeep.com is the best way to keep track of what people are saying about you, your brand, product, even your industry. This works like Google Alert - ever used that? Simply sign up and you’ll be able to enter keywords that you want to follow. TweetBeep will search for them every hour or every day, depending on your choice, and send you an email every tome it comes across a new mention of that term.

Set up filters in your email client and you’ll soon have all of your keywords arranged into  folders so you can see which Twitters are most interested in  the topics your business covers.

The first thing you want to do is make sure you’re following those Tweeters. They are going to be tweeting about all sorts of other topics too, and because they are of interest to you, you’ll want to know what they are saying.

Then you’ll want to start bringing them into your conversation. If they haven’t replied to one of your tweets already, start by introducing yourself.  Find one of their tweets to reply to and offer some good information.

Even if they have only mentioned your subject, not your name or product, there is a good chance they will be interested in what you are offering so it should not be difficult to get them to follow you and start building a relationship.

Usually, if you have done your homework, read the other person’s timeline and paid attention to the kind of things that catch the Tweeter’s attention, you will get a person’s attention. For example, if someone you follow replies to questions you should get a reply to a good question.

Once you have the relationship you want to make the most of it. Before you release a new product, reply to all your top advocates and ask them what they think. Give them sneak peaks of what you are doing so they’ll rush off and tell their friends.

Here are two ways to keep your advocates engaged:

If you notice they have left a great recommendation for you in a tweet, direct message them to give them a bonus reward.

When they mention they bought your latest product or they are reading your blog post, drop them a line and ask them what they think. They will be thrilled and you’ll get a testimonial in their timeline.

When you can see who is saying nice things about you - and what they are saying you can take all sorts of steps to encourage them and keep them spreading the word. That’s activating your advocates.