What do your tweets say about you?

His tweets get noticed!

I hope you’re on Twitter.

I hope you tweet regularly.  I hope you connect with lots of people and follow their tweets . . . and I hope you review your tweets regularly.

Yes, I hope you review your tweets regularly.

Your tweets say a lot about you and you might be surprised by some of the things they reveal.

As a professional person and someone representing a professional practice via the social web, your Twitter persona is an important component of your practice’s online brand.  It’s also an element of your content marketing strategy.  It’s worth thinking about your organisation’s brand as you develop your approach to Twitter.

Ask yourself the following questions to help you with your review.

Who will want to read your tweets?

That depends a lot about what you include in your tweets, and that’s the point.

If you’ve asked someone in a junior role in the office to “do” social media for you, then you’ll get the sort of tweets posted that seem right to that person.

You could find that your account is tweeting to your office junior’s  friends.  If the hole puncher has just deposited its contents on the floor of your office, or all over a computer keyboard, your junior staff member might consider tweeting about that.  He or she might tweet later about how long it took you to clear up the mess, and so on.

That’s not good for your image.

Then ask yourself: Who will want to read about this?

Note, I don’t say, who will read about this, but who will want to read about your office’s  problems with the hole puncher?  Are these the readers you’re looking for?

Will your professional community be interested?  Will your clients be interested?

Who will retweet your tweets?

Do you have something to say that will interest others?  Do you have something to say that others might be interested in telling others about?

Quotations and pithy comments come into the category, as do useful tips and news. That’s one of the reasons why there are so many quotations on Twitter.

You could also commit to tweet about trends in your industry and the tips your clients need.  Recruiters might remind their clients about aspects of data protection.  Surveyors might inform their clients about new regulations and so on.

Ask yourself this question: Are your tweets retweetable?

If you’re looking to use social media to build contacts, gain new clients  and cement relationships, then at least some of them need to be.  Check out how you’re doing.

Who will want to get in contact or follow you as a result of seeing your tweets?

This is an important question.

Twitter is all about being social.  Do your tweets encourage people to take action?  Do they encourage people to get in touch, or to visit your website, or to send you a message?  Do your tweets encourage people to follow you?

• Are you encouraging some sort of interaction?
• Are you being social but in a business context?
• Are you making connections with the right people?

Are you selling?  If you are then there’s a whole different set of issues to consider.

Why are you tweeting?

Once you’ve reviewed the questions above and considered your answers you might want to visit your Twitter account and review your tweets for the last month.

Why did you tweet what you tweeted?  Did you have a rationale for your actions?

What response did you hope to get? (You did check the responses, didn’t you?)

Are your tweets sending out the messages that you want to send out?

Is there anything you might want to change about your tweeting habits as a result of reading this post?

Let me know your thoughts either in the comments box – or via Twitter.

By the way I’m on Twitter at:

http://twitter.com/BMargaretAdams

There are plenty of excellent guides around on the web about Twitter and about social media.

I follow Social Media Today on Twitter.

http://twitter.com/socialmedia2day

I also follow Outspoken Media.

http://twitter.com/outspokenmedia

A good starting point if you’re thinking about using Twitter in a business context is a post by Chris Brogan.

Fifty ideas on using Twitter for business

Now you can set out to become a Twitter expert in your niche and explain to your office staff what should be happening via your Twitter account and what shouldn’t.