Is Twitter really worth my time as a marketing tool?

QUESTION:

I run a tech startup that does online inventory management. Does it really make sense for my company to use Twitter as a marketing tool? It seems like a lot of work to be tweeting all the time, and would anyone really care? Would they even read my tweets? And even if they did, would it translate into business? Bottom line is that I think my time could be better spent on building my business, or am I missing something?

ANSWER:

by Captain Hoff (a.k.a. Steve Hoffman)

Twitter is great for marketing and communicating if you’re a movie star or politician. It also works nicely if you provide content and want to syndicate links. Traditional media companies, content sites, bloggers and news organizations are using Twitter successfully. In fact, we use it at Founders Space.

That said, I doubt it’s going to do much for you. It does require a big investment in time, unless you can automate it to work with your blog’s RSS feed, etc… And you have to ask yourself, “Would I want to get that Twitter feed?” If the answer is “No,” then don’t waste your time. You can use your time and energy much more productively by focusing on the things that really drive your business, rather than a hard to quantify, trendy marketing channel like Twitter.

One more note, I helped cofound Tap11.com, which now does advanced Twitter analytics and CRM for businesses. If you do decide to go with Twitter, you should definitely use Tap11.com or another company like them. You’ll need the analytics and tools that they provide.

I hope this helps.

Hoff