A few weeks ago I launched GoodMogul, a mobile geolocation game and have been posed with the dilemma of building an engaging Twitter presence as well as building the actual company (software, designing, strategy, etc.) As of now, I don’t have the money to hire a company to run the twitter feed. I also can’t find the adequate time to deliver interesting articles, tips and quirky jokes with GoodMogul’s followers.
I created two goals for GoodMogul—each of which demand high levels of interaction and everything that goes with it:
- Acquire new followers
- Stay engaged with them by being engaging (I know that is a horrible sentence)
I am still experimenting with how to actually conquer these two goals, but I have created an interesting recipe using (the awesome) Bufferapp to automate tweets using a queue, and Google Reader as a discovery engine for engaging content. It’s very simple, I chose three different levels of interaction for the GoodMogul tweets:
- Industry specific news or content
- Related but non-specific content
- Non-related but still related content (focused on the GoodMogul user demographic)
With this method, it is much easier to find single chunks of time throughout the day to build my queue in Bufferapp with the Google Reader articles. After something has been added to the queue, it gets tweeted throughout the day during designated times (8am, 12pm, 5pm, etc.) This limits the need to physically update the GoodMogul Twitter feed every few hours. It’s automatic!
Right now, my Google Reader subscriptions include design articles from Fast Company (love the infographic of the day), technology updates from the likes of Engadget and Techcrunch, gaming updates from IGN, and then non-industry specific content—but still is focused on the GoodMogul user demographic—such as Cute Overload and Design Milk.
This is obviously only one layer to running a Twitter account. But, unfortunately, running two startups (the other being the mobile design + development shop, VOKAL Interactive) limits the time I can focus on social media as a marketing tool. I would love to hear of any other busy startup founders (hustlers) tricks to building an engaging social media presence for multiple companies.
