Twitter A2Z Part 1 The complete course: Twitter for mobile apps Part 1 setup twitter account and page April 2014 bonus
Agenda 1. Some background 2. Twitter benefits 3. Plan your page Some use cases (visual) Our (visual) 2 cents Texts (title, description) Our (texts) 2 cents 4. Page setup (the technical stuff) 5. Social management tools ** Our next monthly bonus (May 2014) will be part 2 of the Twitter for mobile apps course and will include: Ongoing management of Twitter, dos and don ts, growing your twitter community and twitter in-app features
Some background
Facts that mobile app pros find interesting. Did you know? Twitter is now offering (on beta) app download ads (similar to Facebook install ads) Learn more here These ads require a twitter page Till now we ve only had Facebook install ads on paid social media. Twitter had also recently launched a mobile ad network to allow app publishers to monetize their apps first step is to know the media, then use it to make some money
and some more facts Twitter Cards (Twitter ads format) allow you to connect users to your app through deep linking It means you can tweet and link to a content piece taken from your app. If users don t have the app installed, they are invited to download it as part of the tweet! Read more here Important note! Deep linking in general requires unique links within the app!
Twitter is a must in Twitter is VERY dominant is some countries. If your app targets one of the territories below, Twitter should be a must! * Source: www.technologyreview.com/graphiti/522376/the-many-tongues-of-twitter/
Twitter benefits for mobile app marketers
Great value for (pocket) money 1. Great advertisement options for mobile apps (download ads, deep links) 2. Relatively low prices for paid campaigns (surely compared to Facebook and Linkedin ) 3. Huge, engaged user base in many territories 4. Growing the community organically is super easy and almost free 5. Targeting options are very advanced! 6. Affordable and friendly Twitter management tools (next slides) make the your lives a bit easier Optimally manage Twitter, and you got yourself a high quality, low cost tool for creating buzz and supporting your app s results! So let s hit the road!
Plan your Twitter page: Some visual use cases
Use case #1: CigarDojo Twitter page Check out the web and the mobile view of the page. Nice way to visualize the context (we are a free app supporting iphone) The (dark) background was designed to emphasize their (bold) icon https://twitter.com/cigardojo
Use case #2: Clash of clans Twitter page (the new twitter UX) - The rich app graphics are well presented Use case #3: Tripadvisor when you do not have a rich visual language, you just need to be more creative: an image of sand (imagine the beach)
Use case #4: Temple run - The background is the game s floor graphics, If I remember correctly, it s the central theme of the app Though page background is no longer relevant in the new twitter UX, they could use this concept in their new header. Can t wait to see their new design
Use case #5: Shazam Twitter page is simple. I have chosen to present it here because of the great hints of their context. I believe that mobile app pages should include visual elements that are emphasizing the context (mobile app, values, platforms..). Partial context appears in this top banner More over - Texts were added to the banner to support main values! (We will shortly move to the texts use cases)
Use case #6: Moovit - a free public transportation mobile app While the graphics are very coherent with the brand look and feel, the context is very much missing. I can t tell it s a mobile app, nor it s main values, platforms You get the idea
Use case #7: Runkeeper app I loved the artistic picture! Check out the logo on the right, it was positioned a bit too low and therefore was partially cut off. So the whole look becomes less professional and that is a pity! Again I am missing a bit of a context I know that you guys want to keep it clean but we, users, want it on a silver plate, so give it to us!
Use case #8: WeChat app. This is our last one : Simple, clean but still cool. The context is presented using the background, so you can tell it s an app (plus it s called @wechatapp) I would skip the patch with the version number. I tend to think that nobody cares anyway so why not use a better copy? Maybe NEW version or over 1M downloads, top rated anything concrete and appealing
So children, what have we learned? 1. Twitter s new UX leaves out the designed background. That s one headache less 2. Instead you get a Facebook style header. It s THE main element to invest in. Found this post with details on exact image specs, etc. 3. If your app comes with a rich graphical language (usually in games...), your life was made easy! 4. If you are not that lucky, just think of the Tripadvisor case: Try to visually emphasize one of your core values 5. Context context context can t repeat that enough times. Include graphical elements within your header to imply that you re an app. Make that image relate to your values and the platform(s) you support, and preferably include some hints for your hall of fame (catchy something). 6. Plan your visuals to look good on both web and mobile we will get deeper into it in the setup section
2 My visual 2 cents: If appgo2market was a mobile app 1 App marketing secrets, In your hands 3 1. Platforms 2. Patch (hall of fame, anything catchy) 3. Main value in a tag line
Plan your page: Texts (title, description)
Some important facts Contextual search on twitter is done through keywords (supported by hashtags - we will cover that in the setup section) It s a bit like anything else web or mobile, you need to pre plan your title and description to be easily found on twitter - SEO All texts, besides your user name (@appgo2market) can be edited at any time (though # of characters is limited), editing user name depends on availability Your description is prominent both in web and mobile view Web and mobile view of twitter search results: icon, title and bio
So now use cases, shall we? 1. Description includes keywords (iphone, android, app, FREE) 2. It s was better to include also a smart download link (will explain later) 3. App title is creative rather than self explanatory (e.g., social smoking app) 4. User name lacks the closing word app (cigardojo is a unique name so no need, that s right, but what if the app was called tiny flashlight or smart keyboard? )
1. Description says nothing about that face that it s an app (iphone app) obviously they don t need it these days 2. They do offer a smart download link (click from mobile and go directly to the relevant store, click from web browser and go directly to a landing page ) 3. They are so well known they need to invest little if at all to get discovered 4. Still, I would add #mobile or #app why not appear in related search results?
Shazam: Huge brand so little to worry about discovery. Unique name so no need to worry about multiple results. I think it s better to always use a download link (as most of the traffic comes from mobile); web clicks could still bring to the website) Moovit smartly chosen to use @moovitapp as their username. Look how many results (even to their local pages) :
1. Prepare main keywords Some takeaways 2. Plan ahead your username (@xxxxxx), it s changeable only if available later on! 3. Consider your user name and title based on local pages strategy (Twitter does not support one page for multiple languages and content, so sadly, local communities require separate pages) 4. If your app isn t a huge brand yet, insist on the context in your copy (ios, Android, mobile, app, Free, download, install etc.) 5. Down to earth value explanation. We are a kids educational mobile game app on ios and Android- click to download 6. Use smart link- identifying mobile browser and directing users to the relevant app download page with one click we in the mobile app industry have a privilege our landing pages are the download pages one looks for all, just like a uniform, we just need to make sure to use them smartly
1 My textual 2 cents: If appgo2market was a mobile app appgo2market @appgo2marketapp Insights worth sharing from the FREE ios & Android #mobile app providing prof. training, templates & more. Anything app marketing. Click to download: link.link/link 2 1. Used appgo2market in the title and the app in the user name, to manage local pages later on and to hint that I am an app. When my brand will be known I plan to edit the title (title edit is possible) to mobile app marketing. 2. I managed to include: FREE, app, mobile, ios, Android, my values and a smart download link
Setup account and page
Setup your account So now you should hopefully be ready with your visuals and texts Unlike Facebook LinkedIn or Google+, and sadly so, Twitter does not support setting up a product/company page via your personal account (as an admin) So you must sign up the same as any other user. A whole new sign up process Preferably define a dedicated email to this account Don t be too obsessed, you can make changes any time
Upload texts and images Once the account is activated, the rest is very easy and accessible: Click on the me tab to edit profile
After clicking on Edit profile: Another option is to navigate from the top settings icon > settings, to edit profile and also view additional options
Twitter mobile app Once done, you should download Twitter mobile app (If not already installed on your device). If already installed: Special bonus!! - while multiple accounts management is not supported using Twitter s website, the app does support adding accounts (yeiiii ) To do it, search for settings within the app> and choose add account
That s it- you are good to go! We are not done yet, next slide will offer some useful management tools for you to look at (I can t do without these tools) You should now start sharing valuable content and buildup your social community (using twitter, external tools and leveraging your already published app). Next bonus will perfectly solve all related challenges so stay tuned meanwhile investigate the tools suggested in the next slides
Twitter Management Tools
HootSuite Does being active on multiple social networks mean crazy work around distribution of posts / tweets all day? No. of course not. HootSuite (that s the one I am using, there are many others ) allows you to: Distribute your content in multiple networks with one click Schedule your content to be sent in the optimal time Create analysis reports And more. And it s FREE for up to 5 social networks (e.g., Twitter, Google+, Facebook, LinkedIn personal account and the app s page) In short- share content through all your social networks in one click
How does it work? Setup can be a bit time consuming.. here is a good video tutorial to get you started Once you ve set your account, you should be able to view and manage your personal web dashboard. It looks like that: Note that you need to define the streams you want to be included in your dashboard
Publishing a post using HootSuite In the top part of the dashboard you have a box to start composing your post/message Your networks are selected by default (top, on the right, adjacent to the compose message box). Manually exclude networks you do not want this post to be published in, by clicking their icons:
More of HootSuite Click the icons to schedule, add links, photos and so forth Install HootSuite mobile app to manage your social activity on the go Use the web widget, and the mobile sharing option to make your life as easy as possible Use HootSuite add-on to easily share content via the web Use the native sharing options of your phone to click on HootSuite
JustUnfollow How do you grow your community? Well, that s in the next bonus but for now, I am using Justunfollow.com to unfollow Twitter users that are not following me, and by that I manage to grow my community. Same here, use the web and the mobile app JustUnfollow is free up to 100 unfollowing actions every 24 hours. To make that option unlimited you need to purchase the premium version Useful tip: While the premium payment is based on a monthly fee, you can do it through your mobile app to get a special price. I had paid only $5 for a yearly license, via Google Play!
THANK YOU! Don t miss next month s bonus (May 2014) where we will focus on community buildup and ongoing Twitter management