Branding Friday: Offer Your Expertise on Twitter

Today I’m actually at IZEAFest doing more networking at a conference, but I wanted to talk about using Twitter to establish yourself as an expert. Those of you who read me often know I’m really big on becoming an expert.  Or in my case, Eggspert. Whatever. I hope you’re doing the things I’ve recommended so far. Are you using Twitter?

This is something I could stand to be better at. I do it well for my clients but not for my own brand.

The key is to find conversations that you can contribute to. Twitter Search makes it easy to look up keywords in your industry to see who’s talking about them. You might find someone asking what the best brand of {insert product here} is to buy, or someone who wants to know more about what you already know. Follow these people and reply to what they’ve written.

But a caveat:

Don’t try to sell them on your product.

It’s better to answer a question they have or send a link to a relevant post or article. They’ll be grateful for the help, but if you come after them with “My product is best!!” they will flee for the hills and talk about you.

@ComcastCares is an overdone example of using expertise on Twitter, but it works. Comcast isn’t even my cable provider, but one day I had an issue and they offered to look into it for me anyway. @JamesPero, a contact I made in Florida, always answers when I have a tech question. Nothing in it for him but help. If you’re on Twitter a lot, you can probably think of a person or two who always helps you out. Be that person.

My assignment for myself, once I recover from 2 conferences and determine whether I’m going to a third, is to start delving into the conversations about marketing, social media and PR on Twitter. I want people to know I’m available to answer questions they have.

And if you’re not following me on Twitter, I’m @eggmarketing.