Twitterquette - Good Manners For Twitter Users

14 etiquette tips for Twitter

It's 2 months to the day since I started using Twitter.  During that time I've gone from a complete novice to gaining some experience and starting to learn from that experience.  Like any new communications channel that humanity discovers, it takes some time for us to develop social etiquette (in this case "Twitterquette").  We start to develop a sense of right and wrong and our own little set of do's and don'ts.  

Examples;

• Don't talk loudly for long periods of time on your mobile phone on public transport.
  
• Don't speak on the telephone at the dinner table if you have guests.
  
• Don't sent large volumes of email to people you don't know to sell Viagra.
  
• Do reply to people if they take the time to write you a letter / email / leave a voicemail.
  
• Do credit the source of your story when writing a new article.
  

So how about Twitter?

Twitterquette - version 1 (after 2 months, March 2009, UK)

Here are some tips I'd recommend that new Tweeters think about when using Twitter.

Notice that most of them are relevant to all forms of communication, not just Twitter, I just explain to detail relevant to Twitter.

Twitter is a continual conversation that you can dip in and dip out of.  It's like a 24 hour party.  You can stand on the sidelines and watch, you can entertain or you can introduce people.  Just like any social event, understanding the unseen social rules will help you have a great time.  Bear in mind who is at your party.  Are they work colleagues, industry aquaitances, or true friends and family?  Who is following you?  Who do you want to follow you?

My experiences (and advice) are around the assumption that most of the people following me are mostly work-related.

So, here we go...

1. Give credit where credit is due

If you read a tweet that you like and want to tell others, rather than just plagiarising the source, use a "Retweet" to pass the message on.  The syntax is as follows;

RT @username message-content

2. Say thank you for a referral

If someone re-tweets one of your tweets, send them a direct message to say thank-you.  They are more likely to do it again if you say thank you. 

3. Keep 1:1 conversations to direct messages

If you are having a conversation that is only relevant to you and the recipient, rather than use the public timeline to do so, use the direct message feature on Twitter; especially if it's a conversation that will last several tweets.

4. Don't hog the bandwidth

Just because someone follows you, it doesn't mean they want to receive 30 tweets a day from you and have you dominate their feed.  There are a few people that I follow that send out so much trivial mush that I am now going to unfollow them.  Clearly there's a balance somewhere.  I've found (personally) that I can take 5 to 7 tweets a day from 1 person before I start to turn off. 

5. Ask for favours, but do so sparingly

If you have a good following, you can use that to your advantage.  You can for example ask people to RT (retweet) a message if it's that important to you.  It is is a great way to build traffic or awareness.  However, I got a little annoyed by a blogger who was constantly asking people to "digg" his latest article just so it would hit the first page of digg.com.  In real life we give favours and receive favours.  It's a balance that if upset means you take advantage of goodwill and lose some of that goodwill.  Just like real life, use your network & friends sparingly, for what's important.

Tip; if you want to have your tweet retweeted, leave enough characters spare so that the RT @username will fit in without truncating the message.  For me that means working to 120 characters, not 140.

6. Cite your source

If you didn't write something, don't pretend that you did. Cite your source (as in using a re-tweet) or make it obvious that you didn't write the content.

7. Recommend others

If you like following someone, why not recommend them?  On Twitter, there's a custom of doing this on Friday and including the #followfriday hashtag to explain what you're doing.  

An example; #FollowFriday @cindyalvarez (for product management nuggets of wisdom), @thetafferboy (for SEO tactics), @manne (for restaurant news)

8. Be positive

No-one likes a drainer.  Sure, get things off your chest if you have to but do so with humour.  Don't burden the world with your worries and troubles.  Share love, not trouble.

9. Add your own content, don't just re-tweet

Some users are great at finding good material on a topic and then just re-tweeting it.  A few twits that I follow do this, and I follow then because they are consistent in being fast and frequent in their subject niche.  Generally though, I appreciate a few original thoughts as well.

10. Follow others that follow you

If someone follows me, I generally check them out by looking at their bio and their tweetstream.  If I am sure I would not be interested I don't follow.  Otherwise I follow and if it turns out later it's a waste of time, I unfollow.  If in doubt, follow.

11. If something pleases you, say so

See a tweet that makes you laugh, smile or gets you interested in something.  Now and then it's nice to reply to the source and just say so.  It will make the source feel rewarded for making the effort and will more likely continue to feed you in the future.

12. If you want someone to follow a link, tell them why they should bother

As most links in Twitter are shortened, and as so many are posted each day, take the time to describe the destination content and why it's interesting.  

13. Stay on topic

You need to decide who you are.  Are you a corporate voice or are you an individual?  Are you using Twitter for your current job, for your (general professional life) or for personal stuff only.  Decide and decide quickly.  Then, decide what areas of interest you will post on and stick to it.  People that are interested in those areas will follow you. 

14. Be real

I do like to hear the occasional snippet of non-work related stuff, even if I follow you because of your professional interests.  Think: if you go to a professional networking event; no one jumps straight into work, there's always some related chit chat about sport, the weekend or what's in the news.  Too much personal stuff becomes trivial, but it is always nice to see something of the person behind the machine.  I find a 75% work interest / 25% non-work interest is a good balance in the working week and vice-versa at weekends.

It seems to me that the first rule of Twitter is therefore NOT always to answer the question "What are you doing?".  Great Twits are much more subtle.

You can follow me on Twitter at www.twitter.com/davidcnorris.  

(My interests are; ecommerce, marketing, restaurants, product management, cycling, skiing, movies.)

Other blog posts that I've found on the same subject:

Twitterquette 101, Part 1: Why your tweets turn people OFF!

10 Twitter Etiquette Rules

Twitter: Decoder ring and twitterquette

Seven Steps To Heaven

Where online marketing fits in creating customer value, and what this means for return-on-investment calculations

Ecommerce is relatively young, but it’s maturing fast. Increasingly there are few businesses that don’t / can’t exploit the online channel as a route to market.

Many have used online marketing to great effect, and there are plenty with experience and success in areas such as email marketing, SEO, paid search and affiliate marketing.

Of course, the great thing about these methods is that they can be measured and spend can be justified with the success that it brings. However, all too often these channels are viewed in isolation and success is sometimes simply measured by the number of transactions that can be directly attributed to the relevant email, affiliate or search campaign.

It’s clear to me however that to measure success, online marketing investments must be viewed in their context of the overall marketing strategy.

Getting back to basics - what is marketing?

Marketing is concerned with creating value for customers and extracting value from customers.

Long term value creation is based on sustainable competitive advantage, which is derived from the ability to provide superior value for customers and provides the reason why customers consistently buy from one company rather than another.

In ecommerce the value we can provide for customers is based on a number of different factors, including, but not limited to...
- Price
- Choice
- Filter and choice selection tools
- Ease of purchase and payment
- Brand reassurance (if the site is well known)
- Personalisation
- Reviews / advice from other customers
- Delivery and shipping
- Customer service

When we spend money on marketing activity to communicate our proposition to our customers and our potential customers, we are doing three things...

1. Bring new customers (acquisition)
   
2. Generate repeat purchases from existing customers (retention)
   
3. Generate more revenue per customer (development)
   

Given the above I think it really helps to understand WHY you are investing in SEO / PPC / Affiliates / Email etc. A good starting point is to think about customer value and then think about how much a customer is worth to you over their lifetime.

I’ve been a customer at Amazon.co.uk for about 10 years now. I may well be a customer there for another 30 years if they don’t screw up. Clearly, whatever activity they did 10 years ago to get me on board worked, but importantly, it must be measured not against my initial purchase but on the total lifetime customer value.

Over 10 years, I have purchased 190 items. I just checked, on my account history, it’s all there! Plus I rented DVDs on a subscription for 3 years. I am probably worth to Amazon about £4,000 over the 10 year period. PLUS – being a fan I’ve recommended many people over the years.

My first order was Steve Redgrave’s book of rowing, £16. Great book. I don’t know how much Amazon had to spend to acquire me as a customer, but I know for sure that if they had measured their marketing investment on my first purchase only, they would have got it completely wrong.

How to calculate a lifetime customer ROI...

CUSTOMER VALUE
[Price] x [Annual Volume] x [Customer Years]
+ Referral Value
+ Promotional Value
= Total Customer Lifetime Value

VALUE CREATION COSTS
(Cost of Acquisition)
+ (Cost of Retention)
+ (Cost of Development)
+ (Special Requirements)
+ (Marketing Overhead)
= Total Value Creation Costs

TOTAL VALUE = (CUSTOMER VALUE - VALUE CREATION COSTS)

On a really simple level, to gain a sustainable competitive advantage any business needs to provide
- the best customer value (however the customer judges value)
- and the best return on marketing investment over the full customer lifecycle

To help put this into perspective, I find the following model useful.



It shows the key stages in “owning” a customer and for each stage; specific promotional goals are required to achieve the customer response. For a company to be truly successful they need to draw potential customers through all stages.

These stages are the steps by which customers receive and use information in reaching decisions about what actions they will take. From not knowing about your product/service to recommending it to others, there are 7 steps to heaven.

The highest marketing costs are usually for the first stages, on the left. The biggest returns come from the stages on the right.

Now to the crux of what this article addresses...

Where do all of the “online marketing” methods fit on the model above? By understanding this, you have a framework to better present your marketing spend in its proper context.

Awareness: Does the customer know that the product/service exists?

• Online PR, social media marketing
  
• Finding a link to the product when doing a Google search on a relevant keyword (PPC / SEO)
  
• Finding the site on a search from their mobile phone
  
• Clicking on a banner advertisement
  
• Seeing a reference from a known company (contra deals / competitions)
  

Interest: Does the customer think that product might meet their needs?

• If the customer does not know what they are looking for: inspiration is needed, ideas and suggestions
  
• Special offers can drive interest for price-sensitive customers
  
• SEO/PPC must match on specific keywords used and tailor the ad copy to that interest
  

Evaluation: Does the customer have enough information to make a decision?

• Build great content. Photos, maps, specifications, availability
  
• Peer reviews and expert reviews, the community can provide the content
  
• Provide booking services that allow customers to compare and contrast options. Search and filter tools are needed to narrow down choices
  
• Create a shortlist, share with friends (collaborative decision making)
  

Preference: Does the customer choose your product to purchase?

• If the customer already knows that they want a specific product and they search by product name, be sure your PPC / SEO / affiliates takes them directly to the product
  
• Have the product in stock
  
• Ease of purchase (payment methods)
  

1st purchase: Can the customer make a purchase easily?

• Always available, real time, 24/7
  
• On all places where the customer might be (as many websites as possible – affiliates, plus own website)
  
• SMS / email confirmations. Delivery and shipping instructions. 
  

Repeat purchase: Can you easily communicate with existing customers and maintain a relationship with them?

• Make it easy for your site/product to be found again through search 
  
• Maintain a customer database
  
• Email marketing
  
• Segmentation / personalisation of messages
  

Advocacy: Is the customer so impressed by the service that they tell others and generate even more business?

• Customer satisfaction emails
  
• Customer reviews
  
• Guest recognition and personalisation
  
• Case studies and customer-based PR stories, distribute online
  

I find that looking at online marketing as part of the overall marketing strategy helps to provide a better understanding of how to calculate a meaningful return-on-investment beyond the immediate gratification offered by same-session conversion metrics.

What’s obvious to me from the above is that not only is online marketing core to the success of an ecommerce business, but that website product management is also clearly a marketing activity. Often there’s confusion about who owns the website functionality. To me it’s clear; it’s part of the overall customer experience, and forms part of the marketing mix.

One important final note; as we are all different as individuals, so are companies and products. There are some products that do not lend themselves to a lifetime customer value view as much as others. Products or services that are bought infrequently need to mainly address customer acquisition, whereas products or services that are bought frequently or repeatedly required much more emphasis on retention and development.

I’d love to hear comments on how the above list could be expanded. If you have any thoughts about what should / shouldn’t sit on the 7 steps to heaven, let me know!

Why Does A Restaurant Need A Website?

I was looking over a discussion forum when I came across the following question...

"My good friends David and Terra own an amazing restaurant and bar in Colorado. They have owned the restaurant for a couple of years and do a steady business of mostly repeat customers. That's good. They don't have a web-site yet - that's not so good. I constantly obsess about all of the opportunities that they are missing because of it."

It's a simple question really. Why do I need a website?

Here's my reply to the question...

Not having a website is like having a road with no signposts to get to it.

The majority of potential diners are looking online when deciding ahead when to dine. If they don't find your website, they'll find someone else's. You need to interact with your customers in the channels which they inhabit.

Your marketing relies not only on your physical presence (your location) but also on your virtual presence. I'm sure there's a sign on the front of the restaurant and a menu in the window. Having a website takes that same principle and gets your storefront into the virtual world.

Of course I imagine what your friend is thinking is not "do I need a website" but rather "what is the return on investment" that I get for spending those hours and dollars on a pretty set of webpages.

It's simple; your website needs to work for you and pay it's way. It needs to take reservations, it needs to provide directions, menus and it needs to persuade people that your restaurant is where they want to dine.

At Livebookings we've found that you can convert 1 website visit in every 10 to become a reservation. And when you take those reservations, they give you email data that you can store to start building a guest database. After that you can do email campaigns to build a stronger relationship with your customers and encourage repeat diners.

Share Joy, Not Trouble

I may have studied Religious Studies at University, however I'm not a religious person or a person of faith.

Recently, when going through my late mother's affairs, I found a small handwritten note used as a bookmark. I think it's my Grandmother's writing but I can't be sure.

Despite not being a believer, I have great respect for the message, especially point 5 (see below) and the last sentence.


1. Have quiet time in the morning and the night.

2. Have a note book handy, don't try to think but rather try to RELAX. Write down any thoughts that do come to you.

3. God cannot speak to you unless you are LISTENING.

4. You can tell him your troubles and RESOLUTIONS and then LISTEN and OBEY.

5. Don't talk to people about your troubles. SHARE your joys with them and even with them LISTEN and they will, in the end, ask you to help them.

Here it is:- "When God speaks Man must LISTEN and OBEY. A changed man can help change the world."