The Big 4, Social Media Edition: Twitter

Apr 20, 2023

As an accountant, you have a lot to gain from joining Twitter. Besides the witty #TaxTwitter community, Twitter is an incredible place to create online relationships, which can provide real life benefits.

Forming relationships with others in the accounting profession allows you to find and receive referrals, share your ideas and get inspiration from others, get your questions answered and help other with their questions, see and share funny memes and so much more.

The benefits of joining in on the conversations taking place on Twitter can be invaluable for you and your firm.

Your Personal Twitter

As a fast-paced and conversational platform, your approach to Twitter should differ from that of other social media platforms.

Here are some Twitter best practices you can start using today:

Find and use relevant hashtags
Be conversational and relatable
Engage with others
Visit the Explore Page to find relevant trending topics
Join and participate in communities
Help others by answering their questions or providing resources when you can
Post helpful threads
Tweet multiple times a day
Be your organic self rather than a corporate persona
Post fun and engaging polls
Have your credentials (CPA, EA, etc.) and either your or your firm’s website in your bio
Schedule tweets ahead of time for days you know you won’t have time to be active on Twitter

Twitter is vastly different than other social networks you may use to market yourself and your firm. You can and should be more personal, relatable and true to yourself on Twitter. Tweets shouldn’t be overly polished. You can tweet things you wouldn’t ever dare to post to LinkedIn.

The best accounts are those that actively engage with others and put themselves out there. By joining in on Twitter conversations, you’ll build a close network that can become a great referral source and provide you with new ideas and resources to learn from—plus, I can promise that you’ll frequently find yourself laughing!

Platforms to Use

TweetDeck

Because of Twitter’s API changes, many of the third-party platforms that used to be available for monitoring and analytics don’t work anymore. Thankfully, one of my favorites, TweetDeck is still in the clear.

On TweetDeck, you can monitor keywords and phrases, hashtags, track your notifications, see what’s trending and more. Because the Twitter feed is everchanging, it’s easy to miss things that are important to you, but building a custom TweetDeck can make sure you never miss a beat. You can like, reply, retweet and follow others all within TweetDeck, making it easy to use.

Accountanalysis

There are some other free tools that can also get past Twitter’s updated API and provide useful analytics. One of them is accountanalysis, which you can use to analyze your account and competitor’s accounts. You can see things like when accounts tweet the most, hashtags they use, profiles they interact with the most, types of tweets, etc. Twitter’s own analytics platform also provides a wealth of information about your profile.

Your Company Twitter Page

Since Twitter is more conversational and less professional than other social platforms, accounting firms should change their tone to reflect this. But this doesn’t mean that accounting firms have to be boring or avoid joining in on conversations. By showing the more human side of your firm, you can easily fit in. After all, there’s always a human behind an account.

The accounts that succeed the most on Twitter are those that are lighthearted, quick to reply to others, provide helpful resources and tweet engaging content which isn’t salesy. Seems easy enough, right?

Here are some best practices for your firm’s Twitter:

Have an updated profile picture (likely your logo) and a cover image that depicts what your firm does
Have a short snippet about your firm and its contact information in your bio
Tweet at least daily Monday through Friday
Show the humans behind your firm
Use jokes, memes, gifs, etc., when fitting
Stay up to date with trending topics and Tweet about them when they relate to your audience
Engage with others by replying, retweeting and liking their tweets
Use images and videos when possible
Keep tweets short, clear and to the point
Post polls to better understand your audience
Schedule tweets ahead of time to make things easier on yourself

Twitter Released Their Algorithm…

Twitter recently became the first major social media site to publicly release its algorithm. You can read an expert’s breakdown here and Twitter’s explanation of their algorithm on their blog. Here are some key points:

The algorithm optimizes for likes and retweets
Tweets with videos and images get a slight boost
Spelling correctly is important as misspelled words are penalized
Following more accounts than follow you hurts
Twitter clusters users with similar interests into communities, so stay on brand and focus on your audience
Tweets about trending topics and news receive a slight boost
Links should be avoided when possible
Limit hashtags; try to use just one per tweet
Avoid misinformation, offensive content and other content that may lead users to mute, unfollow, block or mark your tweet as spam
Accounts with paid Twitter Blue get a boost, so it’s worthwhile if your firm spends a lot of time on Twitter and has the money to do so

That’s a wrap on The Big 4, Twitter edition. Whether you interact on Twitter as your personal profile or as your firm, if you leave this blog with one piece of advice, I hope it’s to actively engage with others on Twitter. Spending a few minutes for a couple of days each week on Twitter will help your firm catch the attention of others and magnify your marketing efforts.