At the very basic level Twitter is a social platform that allows those that use it to update what they are doing.  Anyone can do this with a cell phone only guide is that each “tweet” or posting is limited to 140 characters.

Twitter is being used by a lot of people to communicate and the information they send out can help your accounting firm. Now is the time to get involved. Join the ongoing Twitter conversations and help shape the outcome of your online image.

To understand Twitter, let’s take a quick bird’s eye view and look at what Scientific American says.  They write, “reporters including those at ScientificAmerican.com use Twitter as a dedicated newsfeed to keep up with the competition…We also use Twitter to keep up with our readers, and to solicit ideas from them”. It is also used to report earthquakes and other disasters one of the more famous examples was flight 1549 that crashed in the Hudson that was tweeted by Janis Krum.

A blogger had good suggestions on the best ways to use Twitter such as sourcing from your friends about a good website designer,asking them for the best digital camera to buy. What this demonstrates is that people are using Twitter to source their friends in order to make more informed choices.

This form of “friend sourcing” saves people a lot of time and leverages some of what their friends know. If they are asking their friends about a good accountant to use, wouldn’t you want them to answer with your firm? How can you get this to happen?

One way is to join the ongoing Twitter conversation. By using Twitter, along with a blog and your website, you can help broaden your online platform and help shape your accounting firm’s online image and branding.

How could using Twitter work? Well once you create an account then the next task is getting people to follow what you read. That is where having a blog and an accountants website come in handy because you can link to Twitter from either of those areas.

Having information that people can use, like the type you might use in your blog, helps gain you more followers. For example, let’s say there is a new tax law that affects the clients that are with your accounting firm. You can post this on your blog with helpful information and a shorter post on Twitter with a link.

The people who are following your blog and Twitter will appreciate the information. As they tell their friends, more people will follow you on Twitter. The more people come to trust your information and your firm the more likely they are to mention you when the time is right.

Consider Twitter as not just another social platform but as a way to communicate to a group of followers. This group can help leverage credibility that can be used later to influence potential clients.

Basically, Twitter opens the potential to have your accounting firm talked about and kept in the minds of your clients and their friends.

It may just be time to take a closer look on how you can use Twitter as a tool for your firm’s image. If you are interested in how CPASiteSolutions is using this communications tool, please follow us on Twitter.