So you’re torn… Should you use Facebook or Twitter to promote your business? The two social platforms have grown to mainstream popularity, from local restaurants to Fortune 500’s. But is one better than the other?
Of course, it depends on your business. For those of us who don’t have the time or the expertise to make a distinction, I have a solution:
What if you could have the best of both worlds and post to Twitter AND Facebook with just one 140 character statement? That’s actually entirely possible now thanks to a few new Facebook tricks I’ve listed below.
After setting up accounts on both Facebook and Twitter, these tips will allow you to share information seamlessly across both social platforms. You won’t have to decide which user base to focus on – just put it all out there and see who reacts. Not to mention, sharing information simultaneously on both platforms allows you to interact more with less time and effort.
The key is to start by making your Facebook settings and profile look a lot more like your Twitter ones. Let’s look at how to “Twitter-ize” your Facebook, and vice-versa.
1. Change your Profile to Public
Let’s face it. I may catch some flak for this given the recent Facebook privacy snafus, but privacy really doesn’t exist (in the way it used to) on the internet anymore. Even if it did, the chances that your business profile contains anything that you consider private or sensitive is relatively slim.
Twitter is more of an open platform currently, less complicated and with a lot less features. Bring Facebook in line with Twitter by going to your Privacy settings in Facebook and change each item to “everyone.”
Now, just like Twitter, your profile is completely open to anyone who would like to take a look. Customers react positively to businesses that openly communicate on social platforms. Participate, don’t hide.
2. Install a Twitter-friendly App
Facebook has a variety of Twitter apps that can help you link the two programs. The main Twitter app found here simply links the two services together so that when you send a tweet, all of your friends on Facebook can keep up as well.
There’s also Tweeter, which has a few more features, and Tweetsync which features two way linking, Facebook status changes post to Twitter, and Twitter posts are synced with Facebook.
3. Match Your Bio on Facebook to Twitter
Let’s face it, Facebook has a tendency to be a bit cumbersome and boring at times. In order to stave off boredom and keep things light and short, scrap your old bio from Facebook and replace it with the short, 140 character bio that is the same as your Twitter bio.
That way, anyone wanting to learn about you can do so in a short, concise manner.
4. Customize Your Page Background, like Twitter allows
Facebook’s same old blue and white background might be clean and user-friendly, but it also can make it hard to stand out from the crowd. Luckily, there are plugins and software programs that allow you to create your own layout. What this means is you can create a Facebook background themed on your business.
Put your logo, hours, tagline and contact information into a custom layout and users can then see these things plastered on the side of their Facebook page when visiting your site. If nothing else, this option allows you to have a different look and feel to your profile or Fan page – something users might stand up and notice.
While Twitter allows for easy background customization, many people don’t know about these options on Facebook, so take advantage of them!
5. Twitter is all about sharing
In the end, Facebook and Twitter are there to share and connect with users and your customers. In order to become a full-fledged “sharer,” you should equip yourself with the following tools
Each of these tools is a free and easy way to manage your accounts in real-time, without having to toggle between browser windows and login. You can basically create a “mission control center” that combines Facebook and Twitter into one easy setup.
While you may find some of these tips and tools fit you better than others, there’s no question that spending just a few moments now to update your Facebook page and make it more Twitter friendly can help make communicating via both platforms a simpler, more effective process. For business owners with a limited amount of time on their hands, why not go the efficient route?
The Discussion
Leave a Comment Read Again?Neat! I use various Twitter accounts non-stop, but have many times more contacts on Facebook, and rarely share anything with them! This type of an integration would allow me to keep up my normal pace on Twitter, and multiply its reach!
Thanks, Rob!
I still need to start using facebook as part of my internet marketing strategy, haha, I just started using twitter about a month ago! So you’re definitely ahead of the game in that aspect Steven!
CJ
CJ’s last blog ..Could You Make Over a Million a Year Blogging?
Yes, I agree. Facebook is kinda of use once never go back kind of website. Twitter encourage constantly twitting.
Nice! Thanks for sharing this info, its really necessary to twitter-ize our facebook profile..
I currently use only Twitter and not Facebook.
Mnay people recommend Twitter for businesses.
Tweet Deck is good, but it can come in the way of your productivity.
Many*
Ahem. Lame.
Funny, witty and informative. Great post!!
Very nice post.
I flirt with facebook/twitter as a promotional tool from time to time (I have seperate personal accounts) and sometimes fail to say massive value (compared with creating great posts and interacting with visitors directly on my own sites).
But I love the idea of bringing these tools into line so that you don’t have to worry about which had the furthest reach.
Having some kind of presence on the social networks seems essential but there is such a temptation to let it drain our time.
Thanks i was looking for this information for a long, i use firefox facebook addons
I’ve been finding Facebook a huge waste of time compared to Twitter in terms of effectiveness, but I’m going to give some of these tips a try and see what happens.
I used to love using twitter, but recently i am a bit p*ssed because of twitter over capacity thingy
I hope it won’t happen often, as i prefer using twitter than facebook.
Hey Rob,
Nice Post. I’m currently using twitter more than facebook and i think Twitter is much better than facebook.
Anyways, Thanks for sharing this great Tips.
~Dev
Rob,
One thing that really bothers me is when people don’t have their own gravatar. Why? Because they are missing out on the opportunity for people to truly know who they are and start putting a face with a name.
This same concept needs to go into Facebook and Twitter in that you should have the same picture everyone all matching the one that is on your about page for your blog.
I have a facebook account, but i don’t focus on it because it is already difficult to manage blogging and twitter and top it with facebook will be a mistake on my part
I personally think that Twitter and Facebook accounts should be separate. Twitter just seems a lot more suitable for posting updates and things because its quick and to the point. Facebook on the other hand is more social and you can easily get distracted before you even find out the message
I think the best way to know which tool or plugin works for you is to actually try them out. I’d also like to add that we should make our posts enticing whenever we share content that links to our site.
LMAO – Privacy online?
Even Google is often ignoring the noindex tags in robots files and headers of web pages, there is no privacy on the web.
Thank you for the information.
But I like rather using both with equal importance rather than making it look like other.
I am completely against the first point. I know you can increase your reach a little by making your facebook profile public but it is not worth the effort.
Reasons
1. I want traffic and marketing from Facebook not the other way round. It is difficult for me to explain but you need to send traffic from your blog or other sources to facebook and they read the status and come back to your blog. What a waste.
2. Facebook is to make friends, its not like that people are going on searching for keywords on Facebook as they do on Search Engines and Twitter. So…… Understand my point yourself.
3. Instead of making your profile public you can make a fan page and make that public. Serve the same purpose. Why would you like to share your personal status public?
PS: I know there is nothing called privacy on Internet but there is at least a little there.
Excellent stuff. I just recently rejoined twitter; not sure when FB will come back, but I’ll keep this just in case!
You are right twitter and facebook are all around but facebook still has a slight edge.Your tips are really useful for those who want to make their their brand popular on facebook too.
Great post Rob! I really enjoy using Hootesuite to post to both Twitter and Facebook. It is great because you can add multiple profiles and post to one or all of them. Also it is web-based so if I am not on my computer I can use it from someone else’s. Anyways, thought it was worth a mention.
One thing I have noticed concerning Facebook and Twitter is who follows me on each. They are very different crowds. I have a lot more interaction with comments on Facebook but seem to have people on Twitter that are truly interested in what I am talking about. Meaning they may share a common interest.
Thanks again Rob!
Very good, and very witty Rob!
Great article and information! My opinion is that if you want to promote your business you should use facebook (from these 2 options), because I think twitter isn’t that kind of a site.. I mean most people use it to share what are they doing and stuff like that.
But facebook has the option to create a fan page for your site, and it’s better to promote there.
Really great post Rob!
I haven’t really considered using facebook but i will work on it and take your advice into consideration.
Thanks a lot for the great post,
-Onibalusi
I was wondering how to customize my Facebook page so it reflected my blog and looked more personal, instead of Facebooky. And now thanks to this article I have the power. Thank you for the great tips.
There are a couple of other things here I will check out, but I find Hootsuite gives me great options for posting to both Twitter and Facebook, but sometimes I don’t want to hit them both with the same stuff and Hootsuite gives me the option to choose the services I want to post to with a simple check mark.
Great post.
thanks for this tips.
Good deal! Why does one have to be better than the other? Why not use both? Facebook is better for being your company’s profile. Twitter is better for being your company’s announcement page.
This is a great post. These 5 tips to use Twitter and Facebook are good and quite easy to set up. And as you say, it is all about sharing, I think it’s the key of these 2 websites.
It is all about sharing but be careful when linking the two sites together. You may have very different users on each of the sites, and it may be important to customize interaction and content for the two sites separately.
Good post, thank you! It’s great to know some techniques for personalizing your Facebook profile.
i think those techniques are really valuable for personalizing my Facebook Profile. Especially because Facebook Profiles get more and more important.
Thanks a Lot!!! Really now I wont have to open separate pages for facebook and twitter accounts, I can just virtually integrate Them!!! Time saved that I would have been wasted on entering my Email id and Password…. Really thanks!!!!
Create a Facebook Fanspage and make it as simple as possible, or you can make your Twitter page as complex as possible.
Thank you for those tips. I wanted to integrate a facebook and twitter account, but now I’ll do it for sure !
Before, I use twitter more, thanks for the great tips.
thanks for your tips. I am using facebook for business. but i can not use twitter for business purpose. so i don’t want to integrate facebook with twitter.
Well, there is a great relationship between the twitter and the facebook and we can easily generate more and more traffic through the effective utilization of the twitter profile with facebook so that you can increase the popularity of your website by this way…
I’d rather have a Facebook Page for my business, thanks.
Facebook and Twitter is best social media marketing platform thanks for great tips it helps me a lot to bring instant using these awesome online tools to build brand reputation and also it improve my Google Trust rank.
thanks for that. Very usefull to twitter ize facebook
I enjoyed reading your insight…social media software is vital in marketing today, we work at creating it every day.
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