Would you like to use promoted tweets to boost the content of your SMB? Discover the blue bird’s recommendations to ensure maximum engagement!

The SMEs have taken over Twitter…

Small and Medium sized Businesses are very fond of Twitter. In November 2013, there were more than 4,5 million accounts in the world, with a growth of more than 50% over the course of the year.
The SMEs have understood that Twitter is a valued ally for highlighting their content and creating engagement within their communities.

 

…and seem to have made the right choice!

Twitter hasn’t hesitated in proudly justifying this craze, by announcing that 9 out of 10 users have already contacted a SMB account. An impressive figure, supported by two others, user-eccentric, confirm that 73% of users following a SMB on Twitter, have a better image of the latter. Better than that, 60% confirm having made a purchase thanks to Twitter’s presence.

 

Promoted tweets at the heart of success

Figures one can only dream about and that we wish all SMBs, who have launched themselves into the adventure with Twitter. A lot of these have also taken the plunge into investing in advertising, allowing the blue bird to come up with some figures relating to the impact of promoted tweets and draw up some recommendations. Twitter has been able to analyse nearly 190,000 promoted tweets, emanating from SMB accounts.

But first, let’s see what is a promoted tweets:

“Promoted Tweets are similar to organic Tweets. They can be retweeted, replied to and favorited. Promoted Tweets can include links to websites, hashtags and rich media.” — biz.twitter.com

These tweets can take the shape of a simple tweet (Classic Twitter Card) or a special tweet (Paying Twitter Card)
NB: The Twitter Cards available in Over-Graph are part of the classic cards and can be used independently of any advertising campaigns.
To promote your classic Cards and create your paying Cards, you need to go to the campaign management platform: Twitter Advertising.
The aim of these tweets is to increase your engagement, thanks to accurate targeting, and proposing tweets with large photos, to attract the user’s attention and give them a larger area on which to click.

We want to remind you that the idea of engagement isn’t limited to favourites and retweets. In a previous article, we explained the different metrics behind the term:
“Sum of all the clicks on the tweet. Specifically, the Retweets, Favourites and clicks on “More details”, the link, photos/videos, hashtags, and even directly on the user’s profile”.
Ensure that you do not neglect the number of clicks on your tweets, as they are true indicators of performance on the quality of our content and that of your hashtags.

 

For the classic Twitter Cards

The first thing to remember is that promoted tweets with less than 100 characters, seem to create up to 18% more engagement, compared to those including more.

 
As the old saying goes: “an image is worth more than a long speech”; adding an image to your promoted tweet could increase your engagement in an extraordinary way, topping the 300% (313% more precisely), as well as the number of Retweets by 52% !

 
Let’s continue with iconography, with a tip, this time, concerning the use of the photo gallery (Twitter Card available in Over-Graph) that would increase engagement by 173%, compared to a tweet with one single photo. If you have several images to illustrate your link, please don’t hesitate for a second!

 
Do you have a Vine account? It’s the right time to use it and boost your Twitter content! Preferring the addition of a Vine to your tweet, instead of an image, will increase the engagement by up to 256%!

 

For the paying Twitter Cards

This analysis gave rise to two types of paying Twitter Cards, that are only accessible as part of a Twitter Ads campaign.
More specifically, the Lead Generation and Website Cards.

The Lead Generation Cards are tweets which include a text, a pic, a short description and a call-to-action (CTA) button, those last two appear when you click on the tweet to expand it:

“The Lead Generation Card makes it easy for people to express interest in what your business offers – they can seamlessly and securely share their email address without leaving Twitter or having to fill out a cumbersome form.” — support.twitter.com

Extremely time-saving, allowing an increase in engagement of 42%, compared to a tweet made up of a strong CTA and url.

More about creating a Lead Generation Card, click here: How to create Twitter Lead Generation campaigns in five steps.

 

Webiste Cards are one of the last Cards created by Twitter to generated more traffic to your website:

“A Website Card enables you to feature your website content within a Tweet and allow the user to click through to your website directly from the Card. When the Card is tweeted, it will be appended with an engaging image and additional information about your website.  This should help drive even more traffic from Twitter to your website.” — support.twitter.com

One of the advantages is that you can include elements directly from your site, in the tweet, rather than a simple url, making it more engaging. the Website Cards register a level of engagement that is 43% higher than a tweet containing the url of your website.

More about Website Cards, click here: Setting up Website Card.

 

A global recommendation

Last recommendation, [and one of the most important, as it is relevant for all tweets, all accounts, all makes] the promoted tweets with accounts that respond with @reply, at least once a week, see their engagement increase by 18%!

Don’t forget that Twitter’s strength is their ability to easily create a conversation with your audience, so if someone takes the trouble to send you a tweet, ensure you take the time to respond to it. Your brand will be even more appreciated by this person, and may change the latter into a prospect, even a client.

You are now completely ready to launch your first Twitter Ads campaign!