Have you ever stood at the podium delivering what you think is the best presentation ever, but felt that no one was listening?

That’s how it can feel on Twitter.

You set up your new account, and you even change the look-and-feel to match your company brand.

And you tweet…….. and you tweet…….

But……

No one can hear you.

At Eastwick we talk a lot about ‘breaking through the noise’ – but this is not exclusively to gain media and analyst attention.

An equally important piece if the puzzle is engaging with your online channels effectively, too.

So, using our friend who’s just set up a new Twitter account as an example, here are a few items for your to-do list:

1.)    Find and follow key influencers – These can be anyone from journalists to bloggers to publications to industry associations. Fellow Twitterers will see you following someone they hold in high regard and often decide to follow you, too. You may have heard of the new service, ExecTweets.com, but we recommend holding off on that and sticking to people important to you and your business.

2.)    The power of the auto-follow – There have been some rumored changes in how and if Twitter is going to allow auto-follow to continue, but you can use free services such as TweetLater.com to automatically follow those that are following you. This has been long-held etiquette on Twitter, so it’s best to start off on the right foot, and allow the advantage of influencers automatically following others benefit you, too.

3.)    Engage in the conversation – Now that you’re following all of these brilliant influencers, don’t forget the most important part – listening in on what they have to say and replying to them when you have something to add or comment on. Twitter is the ultimate dinner party, don’t be a wall flower, get out there and mingle!

4.)    Keywords, keywords, keywords! – You know (or have heard about) the power of keywords in terms of search engine optimization (SEO), but they are really helpful in terms of cutting through the noise and finding your voice on Twitter. You can use a variety of services, but, as mentioned before, TweetLater.com’s free service allows you to set up keyword digests sent at various hourly or daily intervals. This gives you a chance to see what people are saying about your company, your industry and your vertical markets.

5.)    Automate and conquer – Have a great blog or social media newsroom… anything of interest with an RSS feed? Feed it into Twitter! Services like TwitterFeed.com make it free and easy.

There is an expanded and comprehensive laundry list of other recommendations and techniques we counsel our clients on and provide training for, but this is a great place to start.

As in anything, it takes a little time and commitment to make an impact – but what an impact the effective use of Twitter has the potential to make.