Do you want to make your Twitter marketing efforts unbelievably powerful and successful?
No doubt you’ve read dozens of articles covering tips are tactics for success. But the rise of Donald J. Trump is rewriting a few of the established Twitter marketing rules for brands and individuals.
In this article you’ll discover 10 amazing, but unusual, tips to start winning on Twitter.
1. Be Very, Very, Very Authentic
Authenticity is an overused word that gets thrown around way too often by brands and businesses. With Donald Trump, we’re seeing true authenticity, not a brand that knows it needs to be authentic in order to truly connect with consumers.
Trump’s supporters don’t view him as “authentic.” They view him as a successful straight-talking, politically incorrect businessman who shares their concerns about important issues. Trump is true to himself – what you see from him on Twitter is Trump, whether you love it or hate it.
Tip: Don’t talk about how authentic you are. Show it! Share your opinions and feelings. Being authentic will help you build a more engaged Twitter following.
2. Boring = Bad!
Look, everybody is being told the same thing: create great content. But if everybody is creating great content, is anybody actually creating great content? No, you need to raise the bar.
Donald Trump stood out from the other Republicans because he didn’t sound or act like the other politicians. How can you be entertaining in a way that’s unique, but also relevant to your industry by aligning with the interests and needs of your industry?
Tip: If you aren’t entertaining your followers, they will look elsewhere. Figure out a unique way you inject your own sense of humor, insights, or inspiration to stand out on Twitter.
3. Turn Your Losses Into Wins
In marketing, losing is inevitable. Whether you work for a brand, business, startup, or agency, no doubt you’ve experienced a painful loss of some sort-whether it was in the form of a lost client, lost traffic, a social media crisis, or a failed product launch.
As Trump has said before, sometimes by losing a battle, you find a new way to win the war. Losses are an opportunity to reassure your audience that any setbacks are only temporary. This is an opportunity to unite, inspire, and fire up your audience.
Tip: Turn your negative into a positive. Use a loss to energize your audience or communicate how excited you are about getting on track and winning in the future.
4. Have An Opinion
On Twitter, Donald Trump has always been a little different and a little outrageous. He’s not afraid of taking risks by tweeting things that others would consider bold or controversial.
Trump truly embraces the idea that there is no such thing as bad publicity. He believes controversy sells.
If you watched any of the Republican debates, no doubt you noticed that a lot of the questions were about Trump. He dominates the conversation, whether it’s on social media or in media coverage.
Tip: Many individuals and brands are afraid to have opinions and stick to them for fear of offending someone. Consider breaking the “rules” every once in a while and sharing a strong opinion – ideally it should be relevant to your industry or what you want to be known for.
5. Attack the Competition
Donald Trump is famous for fighting back when he feels wronged, whether it’s one of his opponents or the media. Sometimes he is relentless, hurling attacks over the course of hours, or even days or weeks.
We’ve seen plenty of examples of ad campaigns designed to attack the competition through the years-remember Apple’s great Get a Mac series of ads? Or Coke vs. Pepsi? Even recently there’s been T-Mobile and Sprint vs. Verizon.
Tip: There are plenty of ways to attack the competition-and it doesn’t have to be negative-you can attack your competitor by highlighting your superior product or service.
6. Amplify Your Greatness
“Humble” is not a word you’d use to describe Donald Trump.
Trump uses Twitter to talk about how well he is doing in the polls, favorable media coverage, and how great he is on a variety of topics (everything from national security, to the economy, to foreign policy, to how perfect his health is).
Tip: Whenever good things happen to you or your business, tweet about them. Let the world know about all the great things happening with you. People like to associate with greatness and success!
7. Keep Your Message Simple
One best practice with Twitter is to keep your messages short and simple. And considering you only have 140 characters, that’s saying something!
But Trump has a masterful way of using few words to express huge ideas (e.g., “Make America Great Again”) in a memorable way. Some of the best slogans have been incredibly simple. Think: “Just do it”; “Think different”; “I’m lovin’ it”; “It’s everywhere you want to be.”
Tip: Tell your story with as few characters/words as you can. Forget 140, can you tell a great story in 30 characters? Or 24? Or 10? What’s your memorable slogan?
8. Tweet When You Have Something To Say
Many marketers want to optimize their social media schedule. They post all these silly rules, like post no more or less than X times per day and only at these times on these days.
C’mon.
Trump might tweet 12 times in one day. Other days it might be nine tweets. Or three. Or 11.
It always depends on what is going on in the world that’s relevant to his campaign, be it a huge news event, something he’s doing, or somewhere he’s going.
Tip: Stop worrying so much about what some social media platform’s research says are the best and worst times to post on Twitter. Worry about having something interesting to say whenever you DO post.
9. Make News
Many publishers now embed tweets within news stories. Trump recognized this, and makes sure to share his opinions on some of the biggest stories–and he has often become part of those stories.
Just recently we’ve seen Jeff Bezos make news about the new Kindle, Roger Goodell announce news about a streaming deal between the NFL and Twitter, and even the Pope used Twitter to announce his arrival on Instagram.
Tip: Twitter isn’t just about sharing links to content, posting inspiration quotes, or chasing the latest trending hashtag. You can use it as a way to generate awareness about something newsworthy about your or your company.
10. Quote, Don’t Retweet
Whether it’s business, or social media, it’s always about people. As Trump has said before, it’s nearly impossible to be successful without relationships.
An accepted best practice is that you should retweet other people’s tweets. Not for Trump.
Trump quotes praise from his followers (sometimes adding a few words of commentary). This still builds engagement, but it’s kind of a brilliant way to make sure that his followers will see his face in their feed and thus actually read the (praiseful) tweet and see the message.
Tip: Showing your followers that you’re listening to them will increase loyalty and build an engaged community. Loyal, engaged followers are the most valuable followers.
Make Your Twitter Marketing Great Again
This post isn’t about whether you like or loathe Donald Trump. That’s irrelevant. Whatever you think of Trump, the man, you can still learn a few Twitter marketing lessons from Trump about getting noticed, being wildly entertaining, and growing an engaged following.
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