Twitter is helping Westcoast to engage with customers and prospects

Sept. 1, 2011 - PRLog -- Theale, 1st September 2011: With over 200 million accounts, a billion tweets posted each day and 450,000 accounts opening daily Twitter opens up a whole array of new opportunities for businesses around the globe. Whether it’s B2B or B2C sector, Twitter has become a channel for customer service, marketing and a platform to engage with existing and potential customers.

For Westcoast Ltd, a UK based IT distributor, Twitter has become a tool to communicate with current and prospective customers as well as other people interested in the company.  Although some may say that 140 characters is not enough to start a conversation, Twitter has proven to be a highly useful marketing tool for sharing content and interacting with Westcoast‘s target audience.  

‘Twitter enables us to promote new marketing campaigns, product news and share content from third parties with many people at a time instead of one by one,’ commented Phil Bell, Marketing Manager at Westcoast.  ‘To encourage our resellers to follow us on Twitter, we are actively promoting our corporate Twitter account on the Westcoast website and through email marketing.  There is a lot of noise about Twitter becoming the replacement for email marketing.  However, this was not the reason why Westcoast joined Twitter. Our aim was to improve the way we engage with our target audiences.  Twitter works more as a personal news feed and is a very popular platform used by a number of Westcoast customers and people from the industry. At Westcoast, we listen to our customers and if they choose to communicate with us on Twitter, then we will look into reviewing the use of other communication channels and its frequency,’ concluded Bell.  

Twitter’s policy is not to be too promotional but it’s also important to focus on what your audience wants to know and a large number of Westcoast followers want to be the first ones to know about new offers and special discounts. The beauty of 140 characters is that you can get any message out there in seconds, so Westcoast followers get information in real time. In addition, many vendors incorporate Twitter into their marketing campaigns and run promotions exclusive to Twitter followers, giving resellers a chance to win some great prizes.

Approximately 40% of Twitter users access information from a mobile device.  And although at the moment only a small amount of Westcoast web traffic comes from mobile devices, Westcoast believe that not looking to embrace mobile technology can ultimately restrict any business growth.  Twitter is a great tool to communicate with users on the go.  To help the Westcoast community stay up to date with the latest IT news while on the move, Westcoast is giving away a Smartphone on a 12 month contract to one of the Westcoast_UK followers. So there are even more reasons to follow Westcoast_UK on Twitter.

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About Westcoast Ltd
Westcoast Limited is a privately owned IT and electronics distributors. Founded in 1984 it has grown to become one of the UK’s largest distributors entering on several occasions into The Times Top Track 100 Fast Growing Companies chart.

As a leading IT and electronics distributor our product portfolio spans the whole computing spectrum ranging from desktop PC and notebook products through to high end server solutions, network products, printers, peripherals, spare parts and consumables. The group sells to resellers, retailers and dealers in the UK and Ireland providing credit, marketing and logistics services to over 5,000 customers. More information on Westcoast can be found at www.westcoast.co.uk

Further information is available from:
Magda Skorek - Marketing Account Manager, Westcoast Limited
E-mail: magda.skorek@westcoast.co.uk