In my last Twitter University post (9 Reasons Why EntrepreneursShould Be On Twitter – Twitter University) I discussed why it was important for business owners to get involved with Twitter. Today I wanted to showcase a few examples of entrepreneurs who are active on Twitter and were able to generate significant traffic increases to their websites.

On EvanCarmichael.com, Twitter has recently become the number four source of traffic. It’s Google, then Yahoo!, then AOL, and then Twitter. Twitter sends more traffic to my site than Ask, Bing / MSN, Wikipedia, Digg, and Facebook. What’s also interesting is that Twitter visitors view 40% more pages and spend 73% more time on my site than visitors from Google. I don’t have any numbers on how well the traffic converts, which is typically a problem for social media referrals, but the growth in the Twitter numbers is impressive nonetheless.

I also wanted to share with the results that other bloggers are experiencing. Let’s start with one of the most popular blogs in the world, TechCrunch. TechCrunch recently released their traffic numbers (For TechCrunch, Twitter = Traffic (A Statistical Breakdown)) and Twitter is the number two referring website after Google. Twitter accounts for 9.7% of TechCrunch traffic, up from 1.8% six months ago, out of millions of visitors. According to TechCrunch writer Erick Schonfeld:

“Some people use it to share their daily thoughts and observation. But it is increasingly becoming clear that one of the most common ways people use Twitter is as a social information filter and link distributor. Twitter is not just about micro-media. The most powerful Tweets are those which point elsewhere. Or to put it another way, the shortened link may just be the most powerful type of micro-media there is. Those retweeted links are turning Twitter into a social broadcast media that rivals any other on the Web. “

Another popular blogger who has been on Twitter is Jeremy Shoemaker, a.k.a. ShoeMoney. Shoemaker has been on Twitter for almost one year and it is also the second largest referral of traffic after Google (For Those Who Still Don’t Get Twitter). Twitter sends him over 25,000 visitors every month and, similar to results on my website, Twitter visitors look at more pages and spend more time on his site than Google visitors. According to Shoemaker:

“You would probably be surprised to learn that less then 5% of the twitter traffic came from my tweets. Just engaging in the twittosphere has been amazingly rewarding. But if you still “don’t get it” its cool. Less competition.”

Chris Brogan, a community and social media blogger, recently shared how he has managed to double the traffic to his website using Twitter (How I Use Twitter to Promote My Blog). According to Brogan:

“Since I started using Twitter, I have more than doubled my blog traffic over the last several months, and I can tell you how. I ask my following in Twitter for love three times: once when I post the blog, again if it takes off well in the comments section, and sometimes a third time if I want to really amp the traffic via StumbleUpon. I mix these requests in liberally with all the various ways I help others using Twitter, and so it doesn’t come off like I’m perpetually pitching my own stuff. My current monthly rate of pitching others vs. promoting my own site is 75 / 25 in other people’s favor. That sounds fair, right?”

You also don’t need to be a top blogger to get results from Twitter. A great example is Daily SEO Blog, a website run by Mani Karthik, a self-proclaimed “Internet Enthusiast.” Karthik currently gets 25% of his traffic from Twitter and again, Twitter is the number two source of referring traffic, after Google (How much traffic can Twitter give ?). According to Karthik:

“For those of you still not convinced about what Twitter can give to your website, think again. Most of the sites, Twitter is already giving 1/3rd – 1/4th of its total traffic – those who have embraced the power of Twitter that is. DSB gets a nice 1/4th of its traffic from Twitter too, that is indeed a nice thing. What’s important is that 99% of the traffic is from other people’s tweets. So if you haven’t yet embraced Twitter, try it out this time around.”

My top nine reasons for why entrepreneurs should be on Twitter were:

1. It’s where your customers are
2. It’s where your customers will be
3. Twitter can drive targeted traffic to your website
4. People are talking about you
5. Connect with people you want to get in front of
6. Add credibility to your business
7. Stay on top of trends in your industry
8. Rank higher in search engines
9. Leverage the work you’re already doing

Hopefully today’s post has given you solid evidence for how Twitter can drive targeted traffic to your website and helps bring home some of the benefits of getting involved.

How are you using Twitter for your business? What kind of traffic results are you seeing?