X (formerly known as Twitter) is the leading ‘microblogging’ social media platform which, if used well, can communicate a great deal about your business and act as a valuable marketing tool. Using X can assist with your company's SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) strategy generating additional inbound traffic to your company’s website. Tweets can contain info about your company, articles you may have written or useful links to other related content. It’s free to use, and if used effectively, will help to promote your brand, interact and develop relationships with customers and engage with like-minded businesses. However, X is the one social media platform that can often be very daunting for the uninitiated. So how do you get started?
Steps
Method 1
Method 1 of 3:
Creating an X Account for Business on the Website
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Visit the X website. Go to the [twitter.com/signup Twitter sign-up page]. A “Join Twitter Today” page will open.
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Fill in the details on the “Join Twitter Today” page. Enter the name of the business on the first text box, the phone number or email address of the business on the second box, the password you would like to use on the third text box, and on the last box, enter the username that identifies with your business. The username should be less than 15 characters long.Advertisement
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Click the “Sign up” button. The “Sign up” button is below the text boxes and is in blue color. This will direct you to a new “Phone Verification” page.
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Enter your country information. Select your country from the country field on the page by clicking the arrow button on the first box. On the second box, preceded by the country code, enter your business’s phone number.
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Verify the information. Click the big blue “Verify phone number” button. You will then receive a message in your phone containing the verification code. This code will be used in the next page that comes.
- Once you receive the code, enter it into the text field area on the next page. Click the blue “Verify” button below to go to the X/Twitter account starting page.
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Click the “Let’s Go” button. This button is blue in color and is found at the top left side of the X/Twitter account start page. This will take you to the page for choosing the business interest.
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Select your business’s interests. On the “Business Interest” page, you will see a bold title “What are you interested in?” Below this title is a list of business categories. Select the category that best suits your business by clicking on it.
- After that, click the large blue “Continue” button at the top right side of the page. The continue button will direct you to a suggestion page that contains X accounts with interests similar to yours.
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Choose accounts you would like to follow. On the suggestion page, click on the checkboxes to the right of each X account you would like to follow. These are the accounts that share your business interests. You will be able to see what they are up to through their tweets. You are only able to see tweets of the accounts you have followed.
- Click the large blue “Follow & continue” button on the top right of the page to begin following the accounts you selected. This will also lead you to “Customize your profile” page.
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Customize your profile page. This simply means adding images to your that speak more about your business and a brief description of what your business does. To do this:
- Upload a profile picture—On the left side of the page is a square box. This box contains a camera icon named “Upload profile picture.” Click this icon then browse your computer to the location where the image you would like to use as profile is saved. Select that picture and click “Open” below to have the picture uploaded. The uploaded picture will occupy the square box mentioned above.
- It is advisable to use the company logo as the profile picture. The picture need to be 400 x 400 pixels and 2MB maximum size. The picture format supported are JPG, GIF, and PNG.
- Upload a cover photo—At the top part of the page is a rectangular box. Inside this box is a camera icon named “Upload header photo.” Click this icon then browse your computer to the location where the picture you would like to use as cover photo is saved. Select that picture and click “Open” below to have the picture uploaded. The uploaded picture will occupy the rectangular box mentioned above.
- A picture to be used as cover should be able to communicate more of what the business does. It can contain the business products or the business colors. The picture needs to be 1500 x 500 pixels and 5MB maximum. The picture format supported for header pictures are JPG, GIF, and PNG.
- Add a business description to your page—At the bottom left of the page are three text boxes. On the first text box, type a short description of your business. The description should be at most 160 characters long. On the second box, enter the location of your business, and on the last box, type the website address of your business.
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Click the blue “Save” button to capture the details once you’re done. The “Save” button is found at the top right of the page. This will direct you to your new business X platform home page.Advertisement
Method 2
Method 2 of 3:
Creating an X Account for Business on the Mobile App
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Launch the X app. Go to the apps icon on your phone menu and tap on the X icon. This will direct you to the X app welcome page.
- If you do not have the app, visit your device’s app store ( Google Play for Android; the App Store for iOS) to download the Twitter application for free.
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Tap the blue “Sign Up” Button. This will start the process of creating your business account. You will be taken to the Sign-up page where you will be required to fill a few business details.
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Enter your business details on the Sign-up screen. You will see five text field areas on your screen. Enter your business name into the first text box area, your business email address into the second text field, the username you would like to use in the third text field area, enter the password in the fourth text field, and the phone number into the last box.
- Note that the username should be between 6 and 15 characters.
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Tap the “Sign Up” button at the bottom of the screen. The button is blue in color and will direct you to the next screen on account customization.
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Upload a profile picture. On the customization screen, you will see a square box with a camera icon at the top left of the screen. Tap the camera icon to browse through your phone to select a profile picture. Touch the picture you want to use as a profile picture to select it. Once selected, tap the “Upload” button to have your picture uploaded to your profile. This picture will occupy the square box.
- The picture needs to be 400 x 400 pixels and 2MB maximum size. The picture format supported are JPG, GIF, and PNG.
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Upload a cover picture. At the top middle of the customization page is a rectangular box with a camera icon inside. The camera icon is named as “Upload header photo.” Tap this icon then browse your device’s Camera Roll to find the picture you want to use as cover. Select that picture and tap “Upload” to have the picture uploaded. The uploaded picture will occupy the rectangular box mentioned above.
- The picture needs to be 1500 x 500 pixels and 5MB maximum. A picture to be used as cover should be able to communicate more of what the business does. It can contain the business products or the business colors. The picture format supported for cover pictures are JPG, GIF, and PNG.
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Add a business description to your page. Below the square box is a text field area named “Bio.” Enter the description of what your business is about. The bio should be a maximum of 160 characters.
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Tap the “Save” button at the bottom right of the screen when you’re done. You will be taken to your new account’s dashboard in the X app.Advertisement
Method 3
Method 3 of 3:
Good Practices for Your X Account
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Create a brand-consistent profile. Your X profile is effectively an extension of your brand. When setting up your profile, you must ensure it’s consistent with your company branding and brand guidelines. Make sure that the branding across all social media platforms is consistent. Your branding should be instantly recognisable to new visitors.
- Choose an X handle that reflects your company name
- Choose a relevant and representative image
- Make your profile as informative as possible
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Start following. Make sure you follow relevant people and businesses. Consider starting by following - Trade bodies/organisations, Business partners, Your own clients, Future customers, Your direct competition and Your email address book (you can grant X access to your email address book)
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Communicate! That’s what X is all about. Generally speaking you can break down Tweet content/Tweet types into the following:
- Tweet – Something you write (in a 140 characters or less) and which you post to all your followers
- Hashtag – Hashtags are searchable on X (and now Facebook), if you use the #marketing within your Tweet somewhere, everyone who performs a search for #marketing on X will likely come across your Tweet.
- Retweet (RT) – Someone else’s Tweet that is of interest and you choose to share with your followers.
- Reply – Start of a conversation – you reply to a specific Tweet and the string of the conversation is then visible on your timeline
- Mention – A post containing the X handle of another user: eg, @caburnhope_mktg great new website by the way!
- Direct Message (DM) – A message you send to a specific user (they must follow you to receive the message) which is private and only seen by them.
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Share! X is a useful way of driving traffic to specific pages on your company website, creating appealing content is essential. Content can be in the form of news items, new product announcements, offers, blogs, brochures, opinion pieces, photos, videos etc.
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Integrate. Maximise the opportunities that other users have of finding your X account.
- Use ‘Twitter follow’ badges on your website
- Include your live X feed on your website
- Some other social media sites will offer the opportunity to include a link to your X stream (Facebook for example)
- Link posts from other social media platforms to your X account
- Use share buttons on your website making it easy for them to share your content
- Add social media icons to your company email signature
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Find your customers. You can use Hashtags # or Search other user’s lists can to find other users/potential customers who may be useful to your business.
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Etiquette. Most importantly every social media platform has an etiquette that you should follow. Be mindful that everything you post on X is in the public domain; each Tweet needs to be professional.Advertisement
Community Q&A
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QuestionCan more than one person control the company twitter account?WFTop AnswererYes, you can use TweetDeck for controlling your company profile. It helps to manage a Twitter account for many users.
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Tips
- Avoid the hard sell.Thanks
- Experiment with Tweets and gauge reaction.Thanks
- Be helpful, engaging, witty, and professional.Thanks
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