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A New York-based spa deals site, @SpaSally, gained 60 new followers and increased sales by a third when it offered a $25 spa deal to the @bronxzooscobra on Twitter.
@HiltonNewYork received a retweet and response from the Egyptian cobra after tweeting: “@bronxzooscobra Do you have a place to stay in NYC tonight? We can offer you the Penthouse ssssuite #snakeonthetown.”
After Charlie Sheen created his own hotdog concoction at Infield Hot Dog Stand in California, tweeting a photo of it, Infield sales tripled, says stand owner Robert Davition (FOX Small Business).
Recently, businesses have made quite a push to tack their brands onto trending Twitter accounts and hashtags. It’s not only a great way to gain millions of brand impressions and grow Twitter followers, but if brands can jump on a trending Twitter topic in an authentic way, it may even increase credibility and sales.
So how do brands align with pop culture phenomena like Charlie Sheen, Rebecca Black and the assortment of animals taking over Twitter (see @RoyalPony @BronxZoosCobra @BronxZooKeeper)? The same way consumers do. Simply tag the trending account in a retweet, reply or hashtagged post. If the tweet is clever enough, it could get picked up by the intended Twitter handle, retweeted, and seen by millions in just minutes.
It’s not surprising that smaller, localized businesses have successfully tied themselves to trending accounts. Notice Spa Sally, Hilton New York and Infield Hot Dog Stand are all small-scale, local businesses or franchises. The Hilton New York account most likely needs far fewer post approvals than the Hilton Worldwide account does. With the ability to tweet more freely, smaller brands can write quick, clever, authentic posts that are more likely to be retweeted by the current ‘it’ Twitter account.
In a few short words, the key to tying a brand to Twitter trends: keep posts simple, funny and organic.
With constant updates and 140-character messages, Twitter is the environment to create the authentic voice of an organization.
Twitter has received a lot of popularity lately, with “tweets” from mega-corporations such as Comcast, Zappos, and Jetblue. Even President Barack Obama twitters.
Twitter is a great way to reach a mobile audience. Followers might receive tweets on their cell phones and comment back in seconds. No matter where the audience is, followers can find out what’s going on at the company.
With only 140 characters to update followers on corporate news, links or events, many corporate twitterers have adopted an authentic, short-hand tone of voice.
Southwest, for example, tweets about weather, flight delays, and most recently, live updates aboard the new wi-fi equipped aircraft. SouthwestAir uses a light-hearted tone to chat with followers on Twitter. Employees post tweets using phrases such as “super cool” and “bummer.” Followers also exchange jokes with employees frequently. With its high customer satisfaction ratings, Southwest can interact with customers in a casual manner, similar to how Southwest flight attendants talk with travelers on-board.
Comcast twitterer, Comcastcares, answers customer service questions and concerns. Comcast doesn’t have as high customer satisfaction marks as Southwest, and therefore utilizes Twitter to gain customer trust.
Comcastcares, maintained by Frank Eliason, director of digital care at Comcast, has done a remarkable job revamping the frustrated relationship between Comcast and its customers. Comcastcares has a slightly serious tone because customers need their questions answered quickly and accurately.Wachovia uses a very formal tone to interact with customers on Twitter. Twittering Wachovia employees don’t introduce themselves with photos and professional information like those at Comcast. In fact, Wachovia doesn’t provide as much corporate information or links to other corporate social media as Southwest does either.
Wachovia sends out tweets with a formal, marketing tone. Check out the tweet from @greenbanking on March 27th. Greenbanking promotes paperless billpay, in a commercial voice, which is much less authentic than the voice of SouthwestAir.
But is a casual, joking tone too aloof? Or is a marketing voice too distant? Jokes may decrease credibility, but formalities may take away from the authentic relationships built on Twitter.
Tone of voice on Twitter depends on corporate culture. Southwest uses an authentic, jovial voice because employees are encouraged to act that way in real-time. Wachovia employees naturally use a formal tone because of the rigid structure of the banking industry.
