Every Tuesday, I spend quite a lot of time on the road traveling on the highway to meet some business associates.
While on the highway, there would always be announcements on neon boards that constantly promote a Twitter account that one could follow to follow the latest news on traffic in the area. It got me thinking about how businesses could use Twitter differently rather than to just using it to promote their brand, engage with their audience or for customer services.
Having used Twitter for a couple of years now, I remembered some amazing uses of Twitter that I’ve stumbled before. Here are some interesting accounts that I would like to share.
1. Reward customers
Tasti d lite is a New York-based frozen dessert company. They have a loyalty program called TreatCards which rewards customers with points for spending on their products. When a customer accumulates 50 points, they are eligible to receive a free medium tasti cup or cone.
To take the point system up to the next level, customers would earn extra points when they connect their cards to their Twitter, Facebook or Foursquare accounts. Whenever they use the card, a message would automatically share their tasti experience with their friend and followers while earning them extra points.
2. Check ticket price
KLM is definitely one of the most innovative companies when it comes to social media. They have launched some of the most amazing social media campaigns to date.
They also have a Twitter account called @KLMFares which allows users to tweet their where they would like to go and the month or date of their preference. This account would then respond with a tweet automatically telling them the fare price and a link to book the ticket immediately. Here is an example.
The funny thing now is that despite people still tweeting to find out the latest fare price, their Twitter account doesn’t seem to show any updates recent at all – but I still find this an interesting example of how you can use Twitter differently.
3. Recommend Food
Do you have customers checking in and tweeting about it? Rochor Beancurd, a Chinese dessert and snack store in Singapore not only serves delicious food, but they also take their customer services to the next level by responding to customers on Twitter.
Whenever someone checks in and tweets, the owner would thank them for coming and even recommends them some food to try. Oh, and they also allow you to….
4. Order take outs
What’s more interesting about @RochorBeancurd and its owner is that they frequently get orders from some of his customers on Twitter. As he spends quite a bit of time engaging with his customers, some of his customers would tweet him or send him a DM to order take outs from his store!
5. Retweet reviews
While most businesses tend to just listen or simply thank people for leaving a good comment or checking in, this business retweets them and shares comments with their followers. That is what @myersandchang does on twitter
This exercise is pretty simple and it really means a lot to people.
6. Tweet Space
This is interesting! While the account @Laundryroom has been inactive since 2010, they definitely have used Twitter in a very interesting way before their disappearance. What the account does is tweet the number of washing machines available in the campus for people to use.
I could see this similar concept used on other types of businesses. For example tweeting the number of parking spaces available in a shopping mall and tweeting the number of seats left in a cinema. I also find that this is a great way to update your followers in a non-invasive and polite way. Perhaps this is what email marketers need to switch to!
These six examples show that Twitter’s simplicity should not stop the number of creative uses that people can innovate, but in fact its simplicity is what makes it easy to adapt and is a flexible space for business owners. I believe because of this reason, businesses are often confused as to what to do on Twitter or not knowing how to use it.
What do you think?
Have you seen other creative examples out there?
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