How Twitter signatures help business
“Our business is about technology, yes. But it’s also about customer relationships,” says Michael Dell. The same is true with Twitter. Twitter is a technological breakthrough which hinges upon the creation of relationships. It works for Dell: they made $2 million off sales from Twitter. So how does a brand on Twitter establish relationships? One answer: sig your tweets.
“Sig” is a term borrowed from email culture, which is short for “signature.” Just as in email, sigs identify the human at the end of a message. A sig takes only three of a tweet’s 140 characters. Here’s an example:
Sigs are especially useful if multiple people tweet for a particular brand profile. They create organizational accountability and help manage workflow. A sig allows one to know who sent a tweet and when it was sent. Inclusion of sigs also values transparency, a high-value attribute on the Internet. Conversation becomes more natural when customers know who they’re talking to.
Sigs are simple to add on your own. For those who tweet often on multiple-editor profiles, HootSuite has made it even easier. One of our long-running features is autosigging, where sigs are automatically inserted into tweets. If you autosig, there’s no need to manually type it in every tweet. Most importantly, nobody in an organization will forget to add their sig — since it’s already there!
Update: A few people have asked when we implemented this feature. HootSuite has featured autosigging since December, 2008. It was part of our first version. We hope you continue to enjoy this feature!
I don’t see any benefits. Especially when adding a signature just eats into an already stupidly small character allowance.
If someone wants to know more about me, all the have to do is click on my username.
Doesn’t support three character initials.
Kiran Max Weber
Forget Computers
312 602.5345
MEMBER: Apple Consultants Network
SPONSOR: AIGA Chicago
Celebrating 11 years: 1998-2009
I definitely see the value in this feature, and would use it without hesitation if it allowed three-character initials.
To me, multi-person feeds defeat both the functional benefit of an opt-in system and dehumanize Twitter’s ’spirit.’
The absolute wrong way to solve this problem.
I love the sigs – We have been using it for our company account for awhile…We like it because it identifies who is posting the tweets since we have several editors.
Looks like a nice desktop client for nice people who have nice businesses.
I’ll give this some thought, thanks
I can see the value, but the cost [3 characters i.e. ^EP] is too prohibitive. Twitter needs to allow this without being part of the 140 characters.
Ed Podowski
digiGENICS, LLC
(410) 821-1025 ext. 100
Need FOUR character initials please. Our whole business runs on initials. Even three initials gives us too many ambiguities. The problem is that initials aren’t something we can choose when people join us ! So when James David Michael Smith, John Matthew Dylan Surtees and Jonathan David Martin-Stephens join us… well, we have to pick and choose the initials that are both unambiguous AND keep everyone happy.
Four initials makes our life a lot easier.
Thanks.
^ISY
I like the signature idea, but I havn’t really hashed out a strict policy yet.
I’m doing social media work for @kiva and its tough to manage with so many people potentially tweeting under the same account.
So far I’ve been signing them “~Evan” , but I’m wondering if I shouldn’t sign them with my personal twitter account “~ @evbart”
Also, this needs to get more mainstream so people really understand it.
since i started using T that is something that was very OBVIOUS and came natural to me! We live in such a fast paced, impersonal world, and to add the personal human element has let me begin some real relationships. There are people who have begun to trust me, ask serious questions, ask for prayer, share personal info though a DM, all because I have tried to MAKE my presence PERSONAL! After 21 years of running a Pro-Life Printing Company, the one thing that we have ALWAYS been complimented for is the PERSONAL touch and service! So; I think it is a hands down A++ way to Tweet!
Have a good day and God Bless!
Jerry Kohlbrand
@jerrykohl on T!
As the great tweeter, Guy Kawasaki, says, when his ghost tweet for him, they add the initials at the end of each tweet, so you know he did not tweet it. When his tweets do not contain initials at the end, you know its from him directly.
In that case, tweeting with initials or tweeting sigs work best. But for the small guy like me, just building a following, sigs serve no purpose. Only when I start outsourcing and delegating ghost will I need to demand of my ghost to use initials or sigs.
Great idea for organizations using there brand and no one individual(s) tweeting under that brand. http://twitter.com/StanCarterJr
A convenient feature for Twitter teams! And as a user, I appreciate it when a multi-author Twitter account (like @cbcspark – the account for my favourite radio program) adds each person’s initials to let us know which personality is behind any particular tweet – a great way to help personalize any organization’s “official” Twitter account.
If Guy Kawasaki does it, I’ll do the opposite. I don’t need lessons in how to get away with spamming.
Useful, but should be Twitter account specific. If you manage multiple Twitter account, chances are at least one will be a personal account, where the sig is entirely pointless, while it’s great help for Twitter accounts with multiple contributors.
Thanks for the advice.
The information you have provided seems really beneficial to us. I’ll try to use the knowledge in my concerning works. Hope to get more tips from you.
Thank you
David Davis
Marketing Associate
Recovery Bull Software
It would be nice if we could enable this on a profile by profile basis. I don’t need initials on my personal profile, but it would be nice on my company profile.
If it really helps to enhance the business, I am definitely going to adapt it at the earliest.
I can see the value in signatures, but surprised they are not more prevalent, is it me or are they very, very seldom used on Twitter? Maybe it’s selective perception. ANyhow, Out of 10 Hootsuite accounts I run, I’d definitely use sigs for at least three of them. Great idea.
I dont agree that using Initials will help other then restrict the length of the msg. The fact that the message is being tweeted by you under your ID should be enough to give credibility to the tweet. If it does not then you’re just spamming.
Thats my 2 cents.
I open to all ideas and I thank you for the post. I think there maybe some value but branding to show there is a human on the other end, I am not buying into that. Now as far as one twitter account with multiple editors sigs make a lot of sense.
Fascinating discussion as I’m struggling with multiple personalities plus launching a new membership web site (2 actually) and how to deal with multiple online identities. Glad to see I’m not alone.
Super-Duper site! I am loving it! Will come back again –
Thanks for sharing the information. I also use them and have found them quite beneficial.
Dell made $2 million off sales from Twitter – that’s quite a news! There is much more to building the relationship with thier customers handing over $2M to them than just twitter sigs. Interesting add to Twitte, tho, thanks for sharing!
Hey there, just thought I’d take a minute to say I thinks it’s great. I just signed up for an account. I have a 5 person office and this will be perfect for seeing who’s tweeting what. I like the whole HootSuite in general and think it will be a useful tool for us (love the feature to schedule tweets). Thanks!