Twitter can now help you sell more sticks and tix.

In the January 22, 2015 blog post, I mentioned how organic use of Twitter does not allow you to see the reach of your tweets.  Well, now you can.  Twitter app users with iOS devices can easily see how every native tweet performed.  Open or expand your tweet and near the bottom, tap "view tweet activity".

You will see how many people saw your tweet and how many engaged with your tweet.  You can also see this information on the Twitter web-based app by going to http://analytics.twitter.com and login with your Twitter account.

For many of you, this will show you how ineffective your organic content marketing on Twitter is.  See symptoms of OSM at Hockey Science & Technology.  However, with paid or promoted social media, you can reach thousands of people in your market.  Twitter has just launched Quick Promote to make it easy for you to reach beyond your followers with your tweets.

Twitter also has a deeper targeting ad platform so you can sell more sticks or tix.  Hockey Science & Technology can help you manage your advertising and content.

Dean Sprung,

Stick Business Editor

Stick Business is the official magazine of Hockey Science & Technology.  News, information, products and services to develop and operate your business.  Connect with Stick Business on Linkedin, Twitter and StickBusiness.net.

Is your business suffering from Twitter OSM?

OSM is  Organic Social Media. 

Here are the symptoms of OSM using Twitter:

• % of Followers to number of tweets is low.
• Your tweets have very few retweets, favourites and result in no new Followers.
• You spend a lot of time trying to get more Followers with no success.
• Number of Following is stuck at 2,001.
• You use hashtag #FF.
• You sent a tweet but have no indication how many people saw it.
• Your activity has not increased your sales.
• Every month, about 2% of your Followers stop using Twitter.

You really want your time and efforts using Twitter to look like this:

Learn more about Twitter OSM and what changing it can do to greatly improve your business here.  

Stick Business is the official magazine of Hockey Science & Technology.  News, information, products and services to develop and operate your business.  Connect with Stick Business on Linkedin, Twitter and StickBusiness.net.

Ignite your social presence or be left behind.

2% of the accounts that you follow on Twitter become inactive each month.  Our research looked at 10 accounts and found on average that 2% of the accounts they followed were inactive over 90 days.  Meaning, those accounts had not posted a tweet in that period.

Why is this important to you?

1. Your message is going out to people or companies that you follow who have become unsocial.
2. Twitter limits the number of accounts that you can follow at 2,000 unless you have a high ratio of followers.  You need to clean out the inactive accounts and replace them with live accounts.  With organic growth, many of those accounts will follow you back.  Over time, you will break through the follow limit.

Are you one of those inactive accounts?  You have either gone out of business or don't know the full potential of social media.

1. Social media is an excellent customer service tool.  Customers no longer just use email to ask questions, complain or compliment.  Messaging through Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin is a business tool you should have.
2. Your customers or fans will remove you from their following list because you have become unsocial.

Your competition is using social media.  Many customers would rather engage with a brand through social media than a static website.  Smart businesses are using the advertising platforms on Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin to reach a market sometimes 100x greater than the number of fans they have on their social media accounts.

There are companies that can help you with your social media management.  We have published our own guides to help businesses get the most out of Linkedin and Twitter.

Article sponsored by Hockey Science & Technology's retail solutions.

Stick Business is for Player Performance Professionals who want to discover new information, products and services to develop and operate their business.  Stick Business is published by Hockey Science & Technology.

Connect with Stick Business on Linkedin, Twitter and StickBusiness.net

Scheduled Tweets

Got something to share but forgot to tweet it?  Try scheduling your tweets to share store hours, promotions, brand features, event details, product specs and more.

This is a great tool to plan your sales month, communicate with your customers while you are doing other tasks or on vacation from your work or your computer.

You will need to create a Twitter Ads account at https://ads.twitter.com using your Twitter login details.  Click on the blue tweet button in the top right corner to compose your first scheduled tweet.

For more details, read:
Now available: Scheduled Tweets | Twitter Blogs

Stick Business is for Player Performance Professionals involved in sports with sticks who want to discover new information about developing and operating their business.  Stick Business is published by Hockey Science & Technology.

Connect with Stick Business on Linkedin and Twitter.

Podium Promotions

17 days of Olympic events will happen in February with hockey (and curling) as the only stick sports.  Your customers will be getting in the spirit now and so should your business.  Here's a few ideas to get you involved.








Podium Promotions for Retailers:

1. Medal Draw - Select items in your store that are eligible for discounts.  The percentage of discount is determined by the type of medal the customer draws from a container.
• Purchase 100 poker chips or painted wood coins from your local dollar store.
• Divide and designate them as 20 gold, 35 silver and 45 bronze.
• Determine what discount each medal represents (example: 25% gold, 15% silver, 10% bronze).
• Place the medals into an opaque jar or container.
• The customer reaches into the jar and draws one medal to determine their discount on the item that they are purchasing.
2. Medal Merchandise - Attach printed tags to items that are eligible for discounts.
• Design gold, silver and bronze tags on your computer or have your local print shop do this.
• Display what discount applies for each medal tag.
3. Medal Finish - Select items in your store that are eligible for discounts.  The percentage of discount is determined by your country's outcome in an event.
• Identify an item or items and associate them to one of the events in the games.
• Determine and display the percentage of discount for a gold, silver or bronze medal finish by your country.  A gold medal finish could be a 50% discount.  A silver medal finish could be a 25% discount. No medal finish means no discount.  Honour the discount if someone purchases the item prior to the outcome of an event.
• Make the discounts eligible until the end of February.

Podium Promotions for Skill Centres:

1. Run mini-challenges in your facility or rented facility.  This is a good way to bring in players and their parents who have not had a chance to experience your program.
• Create skill challenges such as fastest skater, hardest shooter, most saves, most accurate shooter.
• Determine your gold, silver and bronze medal winners for each.
• Award prizes, discounts to your camps or have other businesses donate items to your event.

Don't forget to announce and share the activity on your social networks.

Remember to put the rules and regulations of your promotion in writing so that there is no confusion about the offer.  Be considerate of trademarks and the sponsors of the Olympics.  Do not use trademark logos or market your promotion as a sanctioned event.

Stick Business is for Player Performance Professionals involved in sports with sticks who want to discover new information about developing their business.

Connect with Stick Business on Linkedin and Twitter.

How to Twitter for Hockey.

Stick Business: How to Twitter for Hockey

A guide for hockey companies on some best practices when using Twitter.Learn how to set up your profile, who you should follow and what you should tweet about.Discover tools to maximize your Twitter presence.