by Curt Mercadante
We were fortunate to do a small, online lead generation project last year for a company called K9Cuisine.com — online purveyors of premium and organic pet food.
This is a great, family-run company based in rural Southern Illinois — started by pet owners who saw a lagging niche market and built a very successful and profitable company.
They use a variety of online media as part of their overall content strategy — and Anthony Holloway, the company’s co-founder and president, manages the company’s Twitter account.
What we admire most about Anthony’s use of Twitter is how he doesn’t look for the hard-sell or robotically tweet coupons and discounts. Instead, he provides tips and advice for pet owners (much of it not even related to their pet food products) and fields customer service and other questions. Anthony tells us that Twitter is one of the leading sources of traffic to his company’s Web site which, for a company based on e-commerce is obviously important.
Anthony explained it best in an email to us the other day:
“I think the most important insight is this is not a sales tool for K9 Cuisine. We never pimp coupons or specials. It is a branding tool and an excellent form of two way communication. The real beauty is the transparency. Anyone can see how we handle problems or respond to customer feedback. It makes helping people very easy.
The benefits are tied to the tips and insights in a way. This really helps us raise the profile of a small company. I have also made some incredible contacts. I regularly converse with journalist from major media outlets and influencers in the pet food industry. Our new team of bloggers are all professionals. They all came from Twitter contacts. They are now cheerleaders for K9 Cuisine. There would no economical way for to have this reach otherwise. It is completely opt in and generally followers welcome we I have to say.”
Different companies, organizations and individuals use Twitter in different ways for a variety of goals. What we admire most about Anthony’s use of Twitter is how he uses it as a conversation tool.
Conversation first. Sales second.
Kudos to Anthony. He’s providing a good example for other businesses to follow.