As an association or non-profit group, you need to do more with less. Twitter is a free tool to help you accomplish that goal. Here are 5 ways associations can use Twitter to help communicate to existing members and find new ones!
Encourage education & networking – Here is a great opportunity to learn and network with others in your industry and your association counterparts. You will also find that most conferences have a special tweeter feed (i.e. #ASAE09). If you are attending as an attendee this is a great way to keep track with what is happening in all of the various conference sessions. If you are attending as an exhibitor, this will allow you follow the conference conversations, giving you inside information on what the "hot topics" are so you will be better prepared when they visit the exhibitor area.
Build your Assocaiton's Brand – Here we see the likes of Dell, Starbucks, Comcast, JetBlue, and Whole Foods using twitter every day. Those are corporate brands, but what about your personal brand? What can you do to stand out! You are the brand, and its independent of your current employer, so make sure your tweets show your expertise which builds trust between you and your current & potential clients.
Use Twitter as a communication tool. Find and follow all the key players in your target industry (you can use www.Twellow.com to do this). Use Twitter to promote information from your associations e-newsletter, website, and/or blog. Show value by tweeting information that will help your members make more money and get the latest industry information (i.e. Read 5 ways to increase your revenues here.. or 3 Tips for holding successful open houses/staff meetings…)
Get Found! By having a Twitter account with your name, you're letting Google know you exist! Anytime your associations name on the web, you need to take that opportunity (create GoogleJuice as @JeffJarvis would say). Think about how your association can use Twitter find members or be know as your industries source of the latest information.
Use Twitter as a Direct Marketing tool to find more members. I think associations can (and should) be using Twitter to promote their association & industry news (i.e. we use HootSuite to automatically tweet out the news that is published from our associations RSS feeds) and events. Sending out membership promotions can be done, but don't make that the main reason you use Twitter. I think in this day and age associations need to give value first, and Twitter is great tool that can educate prospective members and show them the value you will bring to them.
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