Business owners and operators who are using Twitter to help market their small businesses will soon have a new set of features to help them get their tweet on.

In addition to rolling out new business verified accounts and the ability to allow multiple contributors to share/access an account, Twitter will now soon feature an improved ability to direct message people:

Perhaps the most game-changing of Twitter’s business features is the ability to accept direct messages from anyone as opposed to just those you follow. Once enabled, that means that customers will no longer have to send @replies – which are public – to contact you on Twitter. You’ll then be able to reply to them via direct message, meaning your replies no longer need to be public – and hence visible to everyone – on your Twitter account. This stands to significantly change the way businesses interact with customers on Twitter.

Read more on these changes at the American Express OPEN Forum.