Monday, 18 April 2016

Guide to Managing Multiple Twitter Accounts

Manage Multiple Twitter Accounts-01

As a business, you likely have more than one department within your walls. And even if you don’t, there’s probably someone working for you wearing multiple hats. Just like there is a need for someone to do several jobs or for a company to have different departments, there’s a need for certain organizations to own multiple Twitter accounts.

Numerous brands manage multiple Twitter accounts just for the same reason a company wouldn’t want to overwork a single employee. There are different tasks, needs and questions to answer from department to department. Having multiple Twitter accounts as outlets for your company can help you answer questions faster and more efficiently.

Managing Multiple Twitter Accounts Is Not as Hard as It Seems

You don’t need a second location, 2 million followers or 20 different products under your belt just to start another Twitter account. It’s important to know that two or more accounts doesn’t have to be a time-waster for you or your social media manager.

In fact, a Vertical Response infographic stated 63% of small business CEOs spend one to five hours on social media every week.

vertical response infographic example

Instead we’re here to go through the reasons why you may want to consider multiple Twitter accounts and what it takes to manage them all together in an effective and timely way.

If you’re in the mindset that your one Twitter account is working just fine and that adding another would get messy, would you say the same thing about your social media campaigns? Building up your online presence is no easy task and many marketers rely on multiple social media campaigns to do so.

However, you probably haven’t used a single campaign to build your presence, so why why stop at one Twitter account to help your marketing and audience growth? Even if you’re still debating whether you truly need multiple Twitter accounts, we still recommend that you read onward to gain more knowledge on the benefits you could have with extra social channels.

Who Uses & Why You Need Multiple Twitter Accounts

There’s a lot different reasons why you might need more than one Twitter account for your business. But for starters, having access to more than one gives you more accountability and control of your social media strategy.

In this example, Oculus, the virtual reality tech company, was able to gain accountability for its delayed shipping. On the other hand, there was no need to update this for their Oculus Story Studio account, which is set more-so on news in the virtual reality industry.

If you’re trying to answer customer questions, build social audiences or advocate employee advocacy, you could benefit from having multiple Twitter accounts. To give you a better example of who truly uses several accounts, here are some types of organizations that typically have more than one Twitter:

Colleges & Universities

One of the biggest implementers of multiple Twitter accounts are colleges and universities. Social media in higher education has become a staple for many universities and that’s because schools want to give students instant access to their vast amenities. Colleges could have a Twitter account for:

  • Alumni Associations: Promoting alumni news, giveaways, campus updates and awards could take up a school’s Twitter feed on its own. That’s why it’s necessary to keep both handles separate so information is always accessible.

  • Dining Halls: Colleges often have more than one dining hall and typically offer late night food options. Having accounts for each facility is needed if you have different hours, locations or food options.

  • Health Clinics: Universities tend to have emergency health notifications, general physicians, depression clinics and even sports medicine departments.
  • Admissions Offices: Any staffer in an university admissions office can tell you the questions never end–so why not have a specific Twitter just to answer them?

  • Athletic Departments: It’s quickly getting more popular to have Twitter handles for each major athletics club associated with the university. Athletic departments are finding it much easier to divvy up the handles rather than answer all the questions on one school account.

  • Libraries: Before mid-terms and finals, libraries are a busy spot on campus. Twitter accounts specifically for these facilities provide insight for changing hours and research options available.
  • Dormitories: Each dorm has its own unique set of standards. Students can get instant access for issues like power outages, plumbing issues and other maintenance problems.

Think about the possibilities for different departments in your business that could relate to the multiple working parts between your walls. Universities are responsible for handling a great amount of information and individual handles could help spread the word.

Enterprise-Level Businesses & Agencies

Agencies and enterprise companies are built on the idea that they can manage multiple entities successfully, so why not have Twitter handles for each major department? If the businesses is large enough there should be a specific Twitter account for:

  • Human Resources: Employee advocacy is a critical part to businesses of all shapes and sizes and being able to have human resources, product and company-wide updates on Twitter makes things easier. Additionally, advocacy programs like Bambu help bring social and employee engagement together.

  • Customer Support: As we’ve mentioned many times, social customer support continues to be a major factor for businesses. Having the ability to monitor incoming questions, tag messages to certain campaigns and respond to issues right away is a major benefactor to any large company, Social Times reported. Keep customer service questions separate from your promotional content so you don’t have customers complaining next to your giveaway Tweets.

  • Technical Support: Another popular reason to have multiple Twitter accounts is so that businesses can easily manage technical support issues. If you’re counted on to be live and available 24/7, you better have a handle to address the questions as they come in at all hours. (Note: You can manage tech and customer support questions on Twitter during regular hours, but make it known in your bio).

  • Regional: Large enterprise companies often operate in different regions and countries. More businesses are finding it helpful to have Twitter handles for specific locations, services and languages so they can efficiently tailor and personalize their information. Depending on what you do and where, it helps to have more than one account for your customers to go to.

  • nestle regional example

  • Personal and Brand Voice: Many large businesses often have CEOs and social media managers posting relative content about their industry. It’s smart to build your brand on your personal Twitter as well as your business account, Grow reported. As a business owner, this helps you get the word out through multiple outlets while becoming a resource or influencer in your industry. It also helps put a face to the business when the owner is active on social media.

Even if you’re not an enterprise business or university, you can more than likely relate to at least one of these instances above. It’s important to create different handles for each unique part of your business that needs to be constantly updated or managed. Essentially, you don’t want to mix up your brand posts with numerous other updates that could have gone out on a customer support or a regional Twitter handle.

How to Manage Multiple Twitter Accounts

Now that we have looked at who uses and why someone might need more than one account, let’s figure out how you’re going to do all this multitasking. For starters, you need to cut out all of the clutter of multiple accounts.

The last thing you want to do is log in and out of Twitter all day long to get from one account to the other. Additionally, if you have more than one person with permissions and passwords, collaboration can get awfully tricky when it comes down to publishing and scheduling posts.

Using a Single-Stream Inbox

With Sprout Social’s Twitter management tools, you have the ability to control, manage, monitor and collaborate your accounts with a single-stream inbox. Being able to add multiple users to your account allows you to stay on top of all incoming messages to each account.

demo of sprout smart inbox

Our social inbox is perfect for businesses who are juggling with permissions and users on their social accounts. In fact, these tools help you tag, filter, route and mark all incoming Tweets and Direct Messages so you don’t have to worry about stepping on toes or mixing up posts.

Centralizing Messages for Engagement

If you attempt to manage two, three or 10 social accounts all on their native platforms, you’re probably going to lose some hair. Why stress yourself out when you can centralize these messages and address questions, comments and concerns in a more orderly fashion?

monitoring feature sprout

You’ll hear us time and time again talk about the importance of social media engagement and building profitable relationships with your potential and current customers. But you might not have the time or resources to address everything that comes your way on each native platform.

Avoid the social media blunders that come with sharing passwords and having employees accidentally post personal messages on business accounts. Let Sprout’s Smart Inbox centralize and organize your messages so you can get through everything without missing a critical piece of information.

Foster Customer Relationships

Like we mentioned earlier, it’s best to build relationships that can be profitable and actionable to your marketing campaigns. Social media gives you that outlet to give shoutouts, thanks or immediate help to those who want to avoid the customer service phone conversations and the dreaded “please hold” elevator music.

sprout social crm

Instead, identify and prioritize your most important Tweets on each of your Twitter accounts. Once you’re able to indicate these messages, your team can collaborate and respond more efficiently. This will ultimately build trust in your customers and foster relationships that turn into very happy customers.

Find Opportunities & Save Time

Managing multiple Twitter accounts doesn’t have to take up all your time. With Sprout’s Twitter management tools, you’ll be able to find new opportunities with customers and save time on interactions.

With our scheduling tools, you can ensure you have have content being published whenever you want so you don’t have to spend every second answering Tweets and sending out new ones. Make the most of your Twitter accounts and increase your social audience by being present on Twitter.

This post Guide to Managing Multiple Twitter Accounts originally appeared on Sprout Social.



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