Recent comScore statistics have revealed that Twitter’s star is still on the rise, with a jump from less than 1 million unique visitors in June 2008 to 20.1 million in June this year.
There are some doubts as to the staying power of Twitter’s users, but those doubts could soon be forgotten as Twitter is now focused on becoming more inclusive and easier to understand. What’s more, there are a few new Twitter options out that that could be useful for agents.
New Directions for Twitter
While its popularity is still growing, Twitter has realised it needs to explain itself in a way more people can understand. So the current Twitter homepage, which is rather minimal on explanation, will soon be replaced by a website including much more information about what Twitter is and what it can do.
According to BoomTown’s Kara Swisher, Twitter’s new homepage will include a search box, information on Twitter trends and a host of tips for new users.
“You can try it out without having to sign up, so you can get an idea of what Twitter is before you use it,” Twitter co-founder Biz Stone told BoomTown. “We need to do a better job of explaining ourselves to people who hear about us and then have no idea what do to.”
Tips for Business Users
In line with this new direction, Twitter has also released Twitter 101 – a website explaining Twitter to business users from the ground up. Case studies of how Twitter has worked for big and small companies are included, along with a best practices section outlining how Twitter use should be approached.
Tracking the Numbers
Twitter 101 encourages business users to view Twitter as a tool for building relationships, but that relationship can seem very one-sided if you don’t know whether all that tweeting is having any effect.
As a recent article on Digital Media pointed out, the use of third-party Twitter reading applications, not to mention the problem of automatic “bots” clicking on Twitter links, complicate the issue of tracking how much traffic your account is creating.
Luckily, the article points us towards twitip.com and its blog post that goes into detail about the various tricks and tools you can use to get an accurate picture of how much traffic your Twitter use is bringing in.
Handy Twitter Widgets
Twitter also offers two widgets that can be added to websites: the profile widget and the search widget. The profile widget simply displays your last ten tweets, while the search widget displays tweets that relate to a search term.
Real estate writer James Kimmons suggests using the search widget as a way to distribute local real estate related news for your area. Once distributed to your followers, the search widget would also mirror this information on your website or blog, reaching another audience.
As always, propertyadguru.com is keen to hear your thoughts on what’s working - and what isn’t - when it comes to Twitter and your business, so feel free to keep us up to date in the comments.
Related posts:
- Twitter for Real Estate: Are You Getting Too Personal?
- 10 Reasons to Try Out Twitter
- Get More (Valuable) Twitter Followers
- Twitter Revamps its Guide for Business
- Twitter Tool Review: Who Gives a Tweet?
- Imagining A Twitter Future
- Twitter Influence: Can it Be Measured?
- Back to Basics: Twitter Commands Explained
- Twitter: The Ultimate Time-Waster?
- Agent Strategies: A Twitter Heavy Hitter
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