3 Ways to Use Twitter Ads to Grow Your Business and Personal Brand Used correctly, the micro-blogging platform is a great promotional tool.

When Twitter announced at the beginning of the month that its ad platform was now available in more than 200 countries and territories, it opened up endless possibilities for entrepreneurs to market their businesses as well as grow their personal brands.

Through my online marketing and search-engine optimization consulting I've encountered two types of people that have experience with Twitter ads: those that have tried to launch campaigns and failed miserably, and those that have found success -- it's one or the other.

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It's a great promotional tool when used correctly -- Twitter's dashboard is easy to navigate and its analytics provide the information required to optimize and scale campaigns. Here are three ways you can grow your business and personal brand using this social-advertising platform:

1. Grow followers.

Twitter isn't the best social network to push direct offers. What it is great for is building personal and brand recognition by sharing information and engaging with your audience, without jamming offers down their throats.

I like to mix in a lot of my own blog's content, some of my content on other websites, solid industry content, some inspirational quotes, a bit of comedy and then an occasional offer to join my newsletter or online community.

If you want to jump-start your follower count, you can target potential followers that would likely be interested in what you tweet about. The targeting options are extensive -- and you simply select a price that you are willing to pay for each new follower you gain via the campaign.

2. Drive website traffic and tweet engagement.

Running a sponsored tweet campaign is great for attracting engagement and putting your content directly in front of your target audience. Promoting a blog post or free ebook download is a great way to drive targeted traffic to your website -- and if your content does its job correctly, you can gain email subscribers, leads, sales and new followers.

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The price you pay for each engagement will vary depending on your targeting, For example, a recent campaign I set up for a client cost about $3.50 per click. It was slightly more than the client's AdWords average cost per click, but the traffic converted at a much higher rate.

It's important that you don't solely focus on the cost per click. Run a test and figure out what your cost per conversion is. When it comes down to it, that's the number you need to focus on.

3. Build a targeted list.

I'm a huge fan of using Twitter lead-generation cards -- it's my favorite way to build a targeted email list using paid advertising. You can sync the campaign up with your favorite email program, such as Mailchimp, Salesforce, Infusionsoft, etc., and every lead you generate will automatically be imported into your list.

Twitter makes it very simple for its users to accept your offer -- it takes a single click and confirmation for them to submit their email addresses to your list. Twitter automatically passes the email address associated with the users account, so you know you are receiving a valid email every single time. Free downloadable guides, white papers, ebooks and coupons perform very well.

Have you had success using Twitter ads? Share your experience in the comments section below.

Related: Tweet Them Right: 3 Steps to Increasing Customer Loyalty Via Twitter