Twitter has launched a new app that makes it easier than ever for businesses to start tweeting.
Described as “a powerful tool designed to help businesses connect with their customers and community,” Twitter Dashboard for iOS lets you schedule tweets, and offers analytics regarding your social media impact.
In some ways, it is a spin on the company’s recently launched Engage app, which was aimed at influential users and celebs. Dashboard has its sights set on a broader user base, including both large and small businesses alike. In fact, the latter may even stand to benefit more from its suite of tools. In Twitter’s words: “Large, dedicated teams typically have the advantage of sophisticated tools provided by Twitter ecosystem partners. Today we’re offering a free tool to give all businesses an advantage in the way they use Twitter.”
Breaking down the features of Dashboard, Twitter claims that the app lets you create a custom feed that highlights more than just mentions, allowing you to mine all the tweets related to your business, and business sector.
Like third-party Twitter clients, the app offers a tweet scheduling option, aimed at power users (which Twitter wishes we all were), and those with time restraints.
Notably, Dashboard also provides tweet ideas and suggestions. These are catered to your business, and include everything from prompts to retweet your customers, to recommendations on how to make your posts more personal. One of the examples Twitter offers is: “If you work at a restaurant, a tip like, ‘Your team is as unique as your business. Tweet a surprising fact about one of your team members,’ might remind you to share some recent recognition your chef received.”
Twitter has continuously come under fire from investors over the impenetrable nature of its platform for new users. This in turn has led to stagnant user growth, a crucial factor in the otherwise fiercely expanding social media sphere. Dashboard is evidently Twitter’s latest effort to streamline its core experience for users that could eventually become customers.
“Twitter is … a place for authentic interactions — but we know that creating these kinds of connections isn’t always easy for businesses that are time- and resource-constrained,” states Noah Pepper, Twitter product and engineering manager. “That’s why we built a brand-new app to help the busy people behind these businesses.”
Twitter Dashboard is now available to all U.S. businesses on iOS, and desktop.