TradeWinds Asia: A Twitter Case Study · 2015-02-08 · 1!! TradeWinds Asia: A Twitter Case Study About TradeWinds TradeWinds is an annual mission trip to multiple countries across

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TradeWinds Asia: A Twitter Case Study

About TradeWinds

TradeWinds is an annual mission trip to multiple countries across the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region.

The goal of this 8-day conference is to help U.S. businesses establish relationships with regional and industry specific organizations in the APAC area. Companies who take part in TradeWinds Asia will

gain knowledge on how to increase profits in the growing APAC region, network with leading industry

and government officials, and meet one-on-one with top Asian business experts from U.S.

Embassies and consulates from the region.

Objective

With a month to spare, TradeWinds Asia, was looking for new ways to spread the message about the conference and mission trips. Based upon the timeline, messaging type, target audience and desired

results KoMarketing decided upon Twitter as the most viable messaging platform. Twitter is a great

place to communicate a message directly with your target audience. Since the audience is opt-in, the

community is receptive to information, notifications, sharing and interacting. Twitter is a micro-blogging platform, which allowed us to provide our targeted community anything from program

information specific to TradeWinds Asia, to high level information on Free Trade Agreements.

Our primary goal was not to drive traffic to the TradeWinds website but more to disseminate information and build a community of followers looking to learn more about international trade and more specifically what TradeWinds was all about. Twitter allowed KoMarketing to provide a heartbeat on Asia Pacific export in a method the follower could interact with and divulge in a way that best met the individual’s needs. Twitter is a great way to target and push messages, news and events to a specific audience in a timely fashion.

Problem

Though the profile had been created in the past (with roughly 11 followers), updates were few and far

between, and the majority of the profiles following TradeWinds Asia, were inactive or had no

engagement with the TradeWinds Asia account. This left a short amount of time to identify and

contact profiles of note and share information regarding TradeWinds Asia mission trips.

Solutions

KoMarketing Associates, LLC www.komarketingassociates.com (781)209-1989

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Several methods were employed in achieving the goals set out for the TradeWinds Asia Twitter

account:

Chart 1- Main solutions targeted for Twitter account management

1. Follow - One of the most helpful techniques used to acquire followers was to simply follow

them. This is the best way to let someone know you’re there. In addition, while the more followers the better, it’s also important to have the right demographic of followers. Someone

who works in marketing will probably follow you back. If they work with a client that already

has their hand in the industry, or is even thinking of entering into Asia, they could even pass

along some useful information, so they would be an ideal person to connect with. We wanted to place our focus on those who plainly stated that they wanted to be immersed in the Asian

market. We followed several kinds of profiles (preferably with a 1:1 ratio of followers and

following) which can be seen below:

Chart 1- Types of Profiles We Connected With

2. Hashtag - Searching hashtags also played a pivotal role in our network build out. For

example, #Chinachat is used every Friday at 12 PM EST to discuss current news and

information (mainly from a business perspective) on China. Searching #Chinachat will show you all conversations happening on that topic which include that keyword. From this, we

• Profiles that referenced a specialization or interest in Asia Trade

• Student profiles of those studying international trade, economics, business, or anything else referencing international involvement

• Profiles of reporters or writers who specialized in writing news on China, Japan, Korea, Singapore or Asia in general

• Those who followed profiles of the above writers and reporters

• Profiles related to other governmental establishment involved in trade such as @exportgov or @tradegov as well as the profiles of those who work for these establishments such as @UnderSecSanchez

• Profiles relating U.S. - Asian business conferences (e.g. Symposium on Asia-U.S. Partnership Opportunities (SAUPO), Asia Business Conference)

•  The profiles profiles of former and current attendees and partners of TradeWinds Asia


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could find relevant profiles that showed an interest in hot topics in China. Other hashtags we

searched to find relevant profiles on Twitter include:

Chart 2- Hashtags Searched to Find Relevant Profiles

3. Lists - Twitter lists were also a key tactic in pointing us towards profiles we wanted to connect

with. If a profile really stood out in terms of holding a particular focus on trade in Asia or

business in Asia, we would then look to see if they had created any public lists populated with profiles on a specific topic we were interested in. For example, @UnderSecSanchez had a

list entitled coreTPCC (The eight core trade promotion agencies of the U.S. government), while @RhodesNathan had a list entitled International Trade (International trade news and

tips for international trade professionals). Following these lists directed us towards profiles we knew we would have an interest in connecting with, while providing us with valuable

information.

4. Content - While finding profiles to follow and having them follow you back is important in building out your network, so is sharing valuable content. Reaching out to someone by

following them or tweeting at them is the first step in getting them to look at your profile; the

next step is showing them you have something to offer. What we wanted to offer were

resources and information about Trade Winds Asia or other governmental agencies related to trade, as well as news stories, articles and blog posts relating to Asia, exports, and/or trading.

5. Frequency - Sharing your content often is another factor to be taken into consideration.

While on other social networking platforms such as Facebook you run the risk of cannibalizing your own posts by frequent posting, Twitter is so fast paced that not posting

frequently enough can prevent followers from seeing your updates. It was important to have a

sufficient amount of content while still maintaining the integrity of those posts. In other words,

• #China, #HongKong, #HK, #Japan, #Taiwan, #Korea, #Asia Country Based

• #SAUPO Conference

Based

• #Chinachat, #asiabiz, #trade, #internationaltrade, #exports, #export

Topic Based


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we would post as often as we could, but we would never tweet sub-par content purely for the

sake of tweeting it.

6. The 80/20 Rule - We followed the rule of only sharing self-promotional content 20% of the

time. While the goal was to spread the word about Trade Winds Asia, appearing too

self-promotional is a good way to drive away current and potential followers. Therefore, along with trusted news outlets provided by the Department of Commerce, we found reliable and

valuable sources for content that could be used for tweeting relevant news stories and blogs

on the Asian business landscape.

7. Retweets - Retweeting also plays a pivotal role on the content sharing side of Twitter. Social

networks are all about sharing, and many use Twitter in particular as a method of sharing

information. We selected profiles we knew would share valuable content that our network

would want to read. Government affiliated profiles were largely the focus because they would often offer blogs written by officials, statistical information, and more importantly, they were

credible sources. When retweeting, you are affiliating yourself with that profile and essentially

putting yourself in their good company. It was important to make sure that we retweeted

those we held to a high standard, with hopes that our followers would hold us to an equally high standard.

8. Sharable Content - We can monitor how many people click the links that we tweet (via

HootSuite), and while it's desirable to see that number increase as well as see people ‘favorite’ our posts, the best thing is to get a retweet. Therefore, when sharing any post, not

only do we think of how valuable our followers will find the post, but also how valuable their

followers may find it. If a profile retweets your post, their followers will first look at your post

and then hopefully look at the source of that post (you). Essentially, we wanted to tweet to our followers’ followers.


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Results

1. Follower Growth

Graph 1- Total followers number each day from Apr. 9 to Apr. 30

We were able to grow our network by connecting with relevant users/profiles at an

exponential rate. The ideal target profile would already have a voice in the space, helping us spread our message, so it was essential to find and connect with those profiles. An example

would be @JanJekielek, Epoch Time Website General Manager. This profile has over 7,000

followers and is linked to a major news outlet. Connecting with profiles such as this one is

beneficial as it opens us up to an entire network of prospective followers and resources.

2. The Ability to Connect

Graph 2- Daily Retweets from Apr. 10 to Apr. 30

The greatest opportunity that Twitter offers is the ability to connect and interact with so many people.

One way to measure that interaction is through retweets. When a profile retweets your content, they

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366

0 100 200 300 400

4/9/2013

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Follower Growth

0 2 4 6 8

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Daily Retweets


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are sharing with their entire network, not only your content, but also your profile. One profile of note

to share our content was the U.S. Commercial Service Thailand.

Receiving a “Follow Friday” or #ff is another way a profile can interact with you. By doing this they are essentially telling all their followers that the profile they have #ff’d is worthy of connecting with. We

received one of our most notable Follow Fridays from the International Trade Association.

Interaction with prominent government profiles both in the U.S. and abroad include:

Chart 3- Prominent Government Profiles

@ITA - the International Trade Administration, @IBPExport – the International Buyer Program,

@usembassymanila – The U.S. Embassy Manila, @UnderSecSanchez – Under Secretary of

Commerce for International Trade, @usembassyseoul – The U.S. Embassy Seoul, @USTDA – United States Trade and Development Agency.

@ITA @UnderSecSanchez

@IBPExpo

rt

@USTDA

@usembassym

anila

@usembassy

seoul


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3. Generated 50 referrals (HootSuite clicks)

Graph 3- Referrals number each day from Apr. 10 to Apr. 30

Another way to gauge interaction is to see how many referrals are being sent back to a website. We

used a tool called Hootsuite, which will track how many time a link generated from our Twitter profile

has been clicked. Looking at these numbers in conjunction with retweets and other forms of

interaction is optimal, as it will show you how many people found your content so compelling that they wanted to know more.

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 4/10/2013

4/17/2013

4/24/2013

Daily Referrals


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Conclusion:

With a limited timeline from launch to event date, the TradeWinds Asia Twitter profile was successful

on multiple levels from adoption to interaction. During the course of this program, we were able to identify the need for a structured program in the future, as well as create an established outline and

strategy capable of building social influence and equity for similar programs going forward.

Should a similar program be adopted, this same method of reaching out to connect and inform those not yet acquainted with said program can be implemented. We would recommend creating an

overarching strategy that encompasses the International Trade Administration of the U.S.

Department of Commerce message in its entirety, with programs/missions highlighted when

available. This would allow the community to sustain and build organically without losing the brand equity any time an event comes to its conclusion.

This Twitter following is extremely valuable and would be a similar target audience for a multitude of

service offerings. Our recommendation would be the continued nurture and build out of the Trade


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Winds community. The foundation has been built, so consistent utilization of this medium as a

communication outlet has substantial value. The abandonment of your followers until your next event would be detrimental to the base and will essentially require a start from scratch approach for the

next event.


Documents

TradeWinds Asia: A Twitter Case Study · 2015-02-08 · 1!! TradeWinds Asia: A Twitter Case Study About TradeWinds TradeWinds is an annual mission trip to multiple countries across