Here is a list of 7 common mistakes that I see from companies using Twitter.  Don't try these at home...or at the office!  Avoid these mistakes like the plague whether you are a mom & pop shop or a Fortune 500 company.

7.  Branding:  Your company twitter account should be an extension of your brand.  Common branding mistakes on twitter include:

  • Using a personal twitter account for business.
  • Not using a your business logo as your avatar.
  • Not customizing your twitter page.
  • Not linking to your website.

6.  Messaging:  Twitter is much more useful when you choose to portray your message opposed to simply re-tweeting (RT) others in your industry:

  • People want to hear something new and exciting, a RT is something that has been said already.  Use them sparingly.
  • Ask broad questions which can engage a large percentage of your followers.

5.  Engaging: In order to engage and connect with potential customers and partners in your industry, you need to add value!

  • Give people ideas or thoughts on your industry.
  • Speak about things are YOUR users would care about.
  • Offer best practices and advice.

4.  Helping: Keep a dialogue by helping people.  Try to connect without giving the hard sell. 

  • Do not be afraid to point people toward other users, companies and products. 
  • Determine the 'pain points' your business solves and seek out those who need help.

3.  Over-Following:  The amount of people you follow says something about you and your company.  Understand these tips!

  • Quality brands always have more followers than people they are following.
  • Try to keep this ratio at least at 1:1 you should try to follow about 10% less than the amount of people you are following.

2.  Timing:  Space out your tweets, using an automated service is better than acting like you only have 5 minutes each day to tweet as much as possible. 

  • Use a tool such as Pluggio or Hootsuite to schedule your tweets, this will space them over time in a digestable format for your followers.
  • Timing your tweets give you a larger reach and makes you look much more professional.
  • Blasting out 5 or 10 tweets within a minute is the fastest way to get me to unfollow you -- and it looks

1.  Have a Personality! 

  • People respond to personalities, show that there is a human behind those tweets! 
  • Have a good time and study those businesses who seem to be successful. 
  • There is a reason why some companies are truly connecting with their ambassadors and others are simply a sounding board for unhappy customers.