One of the most common questions we get asked is: do I need a personal and a business Twitter account? Or should I only use one?
This is a really great question and it’s a dilemma many business owners face. In fact, it’s a question I had when I launched my first business. The reality is, everyone is going to be different. This article is going to discuss the pros and cons of having a personal and business twitter account. By the end, you’ll be able to decide what is best for you and your business.
Using Your Personal Twitter Account
Let me just get this out there: Everyone should have a personal Twitter account. I don’t care whether you’re a business owner or not. We live in an age where it’s remarkably easy for anyone to starting building their personal brand online.
Personal branding is a term that’s used in the business world, but even if you’re not an entrepreneur, I’m guessing you have some sort of project or message that represents your passions? Twitter gives you the opportunity to have a voice.
One man who has used social media to build his businesses is Gary Vaynerchuk. He’s massive on Twitter and has around 1.2 million followers at the time of writing. He argues that we should all be using personal Twitter accounts:
“You’re going to evolve. A lot. You’ll learn new things, start new companies or websites. And when you do, why would you want to leave all the amazing work you put in behind? The following you’ve built up, the readership, the expertise; you can keep it all, if you stick to your name.”
What Gary is saying here is that you’re probably going to change direction at some point in your life. But even if you do, you will always have your personal Twitter audience. However, if you were to solely have a business account, you’d have to start from scratch.
Having a personal Twitter account is hugely important if you’re to have any sort of voice in the 21st century. But that’s not to say business accounts are useless. In fact, they can be really useful if used in the right way.
Using a Business Twitter Account
It’s still important for businesses to have a presence on Twitter. People are still going to be searching for you and with Twitter being one of the most powerful search engines on the internet, do you really want to be left out of that? If you’re not being found online, people will simply go to your competitors.
That raises the question: “How do I manage both accounts?”
Well here’s what I do…
I use my personal Twitter account for general engagement with people. I’ll get involved with conversations, tweet about business and personal interests and I generally spend most of my ‘Twitter time’ on it. With my business account, I only share things that are relating to the business and social media. In fact, our business Twitter account is largely automated. I know that’s not going to be popular with many social media ‘gurus’, but it works for us and it means I can focus all my energy on growing my personal account.
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I’ll also follow brands on my business account, but I won’t on my personal one. I choose to only follow ‘real people’ on my personal account. At the end of the day, people like engaging with people (rather than brands) and so it makes sense to split it up.
You can use tools such as Buffer and SocialOomph to schedule your content. This will save you a lot of time. But as always, with scheduling, please make sure you’re there to reply to people that do engage with you. When I say our account is largely automated, the content scheduling side of things is, but I’m always there to have the conversation with people when they engage with us.
Another great thing about Twitter for business, is their advertising platform. You can learn more about that here.
*14th March 2018 Update*
When I first wrote this Twitter article, I used my personal @mrgavinbell account AND a business account. Since then, I decided to scrap the business account to focus purely on my personal one.
Why?
I found I got much more engagement on my personal Twitter account and the business one wasn’t really doing anything. It was there, posting content, but I never had any meaningful conversations on it. I’ve since scrapped my business website and purely use this website as well.
Personally, it feels a lot more natural operating my Twitter, website and other social media channels under my personal brand as opposed to my business one.
How to Create a Twitter Business Account
You create a Twitter account for business the exact same way you’d create a personal Twitter account.
1. To create an account, click here. You’ll be taken to this page.
2. Go through the steps like entering your username, photo (in this case, you might want to choose your logo)
3. Once you’ve entered all that information and gone through their smooth onboarding process, you’re taken to your feed. You then want to go to your profile and edit it, adding in all the relevant information that your potential customers might want to know.
And that’s you! Go ahead and start following people and tweeting!
To summarise
My personal feeling is that it’s important to have both a personal and a business Twitter account. Use your personal account for your day to day interactions with people and use your business account to share news about your company, helpful tips, your content, and just general updates showing an insight to the business.
Thanks for taking the time to read this article. If you’d like to learn more about social media and how to make it work for you and your business, sign up to our free social media course by entering your email below!
Gavin
