Jul 07 2009
Twitter For Businesses: What’s In It For Me?
We all know that email is a great way to drive traffic to your business’s Twitter page. But in my view, the biggest challenge for businesses using Twitter is convincing your customers that your corporate tweets are relevant, interesting, and worthwhile.
So, I was fairly intrigued to read about new restaurants in Boston using Twitter to create buzz around their grand openings. Of course, an event like an opening is inherently interesting to local consumers because of its newsworthy nature. But after the first customers are served, how does the restaurant continue to use Twitter effectively? What would I want them to tell me?
I guess I want to know what’s in it for me. Daily menu specials or entertainment listings might be beneficial to Twitter users. Even better, if we’re talking about a very busy restaurant where I can almost never get a reservation, Twitter would be a great place to share table availability due to last-minute cancellations. (Maybe then I would finally be able to eat one of the tasty daily specials I always read about!)
In fact, wouldn’t it be great if any appointment-based business – both large and small – posted cancellations? The spa that is booked four months out…your doctor…your dentist… the possibilities are endless! Twitter could be the answer to profiting from excess inventory, with the added benefit of making loyal followers happy at the same time. Taking this idea one step further, maybe one day airlines will use Twitter to find volunteers to take a later flight when overbooking occurs, meaning that you could volunteer before even leaving for the airport and therefore minimize your wait time (while expediting the initial flight’s departure). One company who is already putting this concept into action is Dell, who uses their @DellOutlet Twitter account to sell refurbished PC’s (a kind of remnant inventory) as they become available. According to recent news stories, Dell has made over $3 million in sales thanks to their tweets.
Who knows, maybe someday the DMV will let us know when they are having a particularly busy day so we can consider going another time – I know we could all see the benefit in that! Let’s keep our fingers crossed.
Photo credit: Boston.com
