Written by Andra Picincu

Increasingly more companies use Twitter for business – to do market research, do brand advocacy and reputation management and provide selected highlights from a conference or event. Twitter allows them to expand their brand and thus generate new opportunities.

In this article, Mahendra shows you how you can integrate Twitter into your Powerpoint presentation and receive instant feedback. Steven has written about using hashtags effectively. And also, you can learn more about Twitter Lists to follow people more closely.

But to be more innovative in the use of Twitter for a business setting, here are 10 useful tips.

1. Expand Your Network

Using Twitter, you can join topic groups related to your business and career and gain valuable information from scanning others’ tweets. Your company will gain new customers and potential partners. Do a search for keywords related to your product on Twitter Search and then follow the users.

Anyone can use Twitter to build a personal brand. Your customers and prospective clients will perceive you as an approachable social personality. Twitter is designed to establish consistent and deeper relationships for future benefits.

2. Share Expertise To Build Credibility

If you hold free workshops, seminars or web meetings; let people know that it’s starting soon, how to participate and join in by tweeting about it. You can also link to your presentations and videos. Twitter can help direct people’s attention to your events.

Offer solutions to those who are struggling with something in your field of expertise. Share your ideas internally in a very efficient manner and broadcast links and headlines that can drive traffic to your website.

3. Highlight What’s Special

Twitter allows you to share the latest news and events related to your business in 140 characters. Set up a Twitter feed for the specific purpose of notifying customers when new products come in. You can use this free platform to inform event participants and highlight what’s special. Sharing valuable information and useful tips helps you build a strong web presence and gain visibility on the Internet.

4. Look For Leads On Twitter

Twitter can be used to direct traffic to your websites. You can share information that is useful for prospective clients or employers to enhance your reputation. Avoid hard-sell tactics: focus on building relationships. Don’t be afraid to take full advantage of Twitter and gather information about what customers, competitors and others are saying about your business.

Don’t think of what you can get, but rather what you can learn and what you can offer. Use free applications like Mr. Tweet to check your profile and finds relevant connections for you.

5. Communicate With Employees

Twitter is a great collaboration tool, which can be successfully used to save time and money. Forget about sending endless emails and calls – you can rather release short tweets to your team members describing what you have to say. Share what you’re doing so people learn about the type of work you do.

6. Run Special Deals & Promotions

Offer incentives to those who follow you on Twitter. You can give them free coupons, discounts, package deals and samples. Twitter is a great way to create interest and secure attendees.

Social networking is excellent for those who want to promote products, services and ideas directly to a target audience. Twitter marketing is a task that involves two-way audience engagement.

7. Receive Customer Complaints

By accepting customer complaints in the open, other consumers can see what kind of company you really are. Twitter allows you to respond quickly to shut down any impending service or complaint received. Communicate effectively with each of your clients and ask for their honest opinion. Make your goals public to compel you to reach them.

8. Interact With Your Competition

You can read the tweets of your competitors daily and stay in touch with them. Although this rarely happens in the real world, Twitter has changed it all. This free platform allows you to follow companies, experts, leaders and competitors in your industry. It’s not enough to monitor the latest projects released by your competitors. Tracking their mistakes is even more useful, because you can analyze their moves and see what exactly went wrong.

9. Organize A Local Tweetup

Twitter can help you organize meetups. All you have to do is to send a message announcing the time and place of the meeting. It’s an informal and effective way of planning a meeting. You can get in touch with vendors, suppliers and other people with whom you can form partnerships.

10. Create Brand Loyalty

With Twitter, you can always stay in touch with your followers. All these people are potential customers, so you must help them get used to your products and services. Participate actively to conversations and tweet constantly. This way, increasingly more people will find out about your business, while you will gain loyal clients.

Using Twitter for business, you can convert conversations into actions. A fresh and interesting personality attracts followers. Share information that is helpful for potential customers or employers to gain recognition.

Do you use Twitter for your business? Have you any Twitter tips to effectively reach out to your customers and business partners? Share them in the comments.