By Liz Lutz

Many businesses understand the value and importance of utilizing social media to engage with potential and current customers. However, creating and keeping up with said social media can be daunting.

From my experience, the real hold-up in employing a successful social media strategy is figuring out how to best manage all of the available tools while keeping up with your day-to-day responsibilities. Running campaigns and simply being ‘active’ can take up a lot of your time.

This is where Twilert.com comes in. Obviously intended for Twitter, this free Web app is similar to Google Alerts and will send regular email updates of tweets containing any words – brand name, product name, keywords and more – you signed up for.

Once you’ve linked your Twitter account to Twilert, you can set up updates for keywords of interest twilertwithin a chosen mile radius of any zip code.

Here are some examples of what you can monitor:

  • Your dealership name
  • The services your provide
  • Industry and brand news

So let’s say you have an update set up for the keyword “oil change” and someone within the dealership’s radius tweets about needing one or how he or she has been putting it off. You’ll know about it because you will receive an email update and then can respond to that tweet about how your dealership offers excellent service or is currently running an oil change special.

Another idea is to leverage the growing popularity of Foursquare. If you have Twilert set up to monitor mentions of your dealership name, you can reach out to customers that have checked in and thank them for visiting your dealership.

Interested? Here’s how to get started.

Step 1: Connect to Twilert with either your Twitter account or Google account.

Step 2: After creating your account you will end up on a page that prompts you to “Create Twilert.” I recommend clicking on the “Advanced Search Options” link to best maximize Twilert’s capabilities and radius option.

create twilert

Step 3: Using the advance search options, fill out what to search for, how often you would like to receive email updates and designate a search radius.

twilert search options

When selecting keywords, be sure to use as many combinations you can think of. Don’t be afraid to include hashtags either. (Note: You may want to do a few searches on Twitter to see if or how people are using these terms.)

Step 4: Manage your alerts. Once a Twilert is set up, it can be edited or even turned on or off with a click of a button. Also, you can always add more.

Voila! You have set up you Twilert!

There are other free apps out there, such as TweetBeep and TweetAlarm, but they don’t offer the ability to set your location. New apps are created all the time so be sure to be on the lookout for tools that help to enhance your social media strategy.

About the Author

PCG Digital Marketing is an award winning digital agency headquartered in Eatontown, NJ. We help our clients get found online through innovative search, social and online advertising campaigns.