Christian Business Blog

Track Mentions of Your Christian Business Brand on Twitter

~ submitted by guest blogger, Nicole Beus

Ask yourself this: “Why am I on Social Media?”  What’s your answer? Let’s assume that you did not answer “to waste time” or “because I have nothing better to do”. You are most likely on social media for one of two reasons:

1. To build business contacts
2. To connect with friends and family

If you fall into one of the two reasons above (specifically the 1^streason), you need to be able to track conversations and mentions. If you don’t you might let business get away.

On Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn and some other specialty sites, it’s fairly easy to track a conversation, but on Twitter it can be a little more difficult. This is a reason why you might stop using Twitter: you can’t track your ROI (Return on Investment). Don’t let this be an excuse!

Twitter succeeds by having an in house search function, which is far easier than other platforms. At the same time, let’s acknowledge that it misses some mentions at times and you can use some applications to further your checks and balances. Let’s explore Twitter and a few additional options:

Twitter: If you want to mention another Twitter member, all you have to do is use an “@” in front of their handle. For example if you want to tag The Shepherd’s Guide simply use @shepherdsguide. 

Now if you want to check who has tagged you, all you have to do is put “@(your Twitter name)” in the search box at the top of the Twitter page. This basic built-in function catches most mentions of your company on Twitter.  From the search results page you can reply, retweet or mark the mention as a favorite. Replying to each mention is a great way to build your relationships and loyal customers.

Another built in function on Twitter is the use of hashtags (#). It’s a good practice to create hashtags for your company and specifically for special events. By doing this you can track the hashtag mentions which may not include an @mention. For example, for Shepherd’s Guide you could use #shepherdsguide or let’s pretend that there is a conference coming up in 2012 – the hashtag you might create could be #sgconf2012.

Again, once the hashtag is introduced into Twitter you can go up to the search box and enter “#sgconf2012” and find who has been using it and talking about it. The limitation is that Twitter tends to only search the last week to 10 days in my experience. Which moves us to the next category…

Outside Applications: While there are many applications created to enhance Twitter use, let’s focus on 3 that can be extremely helpful.

1. HootSuite – This program acts as a one-stop social media control room. You just add a “stream” to your account and you can see posts by those you follow, your posts, your scheduled posts, your mentions (by others) and even more right next to each other. What’s even better is that you can reply, retweet, and direct message from HootSuite to the tweeter that mentioned you.
2. Twubs – Register the hashtag you want to use at Twubs and be able to search mentions of it. While no one really owns a hashtag, by registering it, Twubs search function will find occurrences of your hashtag since the day you registered it versus the limited time Twitter will search for it. You can also reply, retweet and direct message the tweeter directly from the Twubs search screen.
3. TweetBeep - Noted as “like Google Alerts for Twitter” this service is pretty straightforward. Sign up for either a free or paid account and keep track of @replies and @mentions of your company and/or products. What is really nice about this, and something mentioned on the TweetBeep homepage, is that you can also keep track of tweets mentioning your website or blog even if the links were shortened. Now that’s key for ROI and building your brand.

Remember that consistency is the key and by applying these tools and tips on a regular daily schedule, you can succeed at Twitter for your business.

~ Nicole "Indy" Beus is the owner of Indy's Services a Social Media Management, Graphic Design, and Virtual Assistance company since 2006.  To learn more about her, follow online on Twitter: @Indys, Facebook: Indy's Services, or Indy's website indyses.net.