Twitter Feedback

After my post on Twitter last week, a handful of readers commented and emailed me regarding their feelings towards Twitter’s potential longevity, or lack there of.  In my opinion, a common misconception people have is that their business model will be solely focused on advertising and corporate sponsorship.  With web ventures this is often the first assumption of a business model, but Twitter is a different case.  They can take their revenue generation in different, more creative direction.

The first time I spoke about Twitter’s advertising strategy was with David Park, who quickly pointed out to me me that if Twitter starts shoving advertising down our throats, gangs of prominent Tweeters will be quick to hop ship to the next ad-free micro-blog service. “That’s just how the Internet works” he told me.  Twitter understands that ads don’t belong in their service.  If it’s forced, forced advertising will tank their usability.  Users would be drained instantly.

Twitter is still relatively niche.  Some think it’s just noise without payback, others are pondering it’s utilization in academia.  It’s received validation from O’Reilly and Kawasaki.  Last time I checked, Twitter hosted about 6 million users, with only a small percentage of them Tweeting regularly (the Pareto principle probably applies here).  With that being said, they have the potential to go more mainstream than they already are.  In January 2008, they was a 16 fold growth in Twitter users.  Post-election, their growth has slowed, but I believe their acceptance will continue to take off Internet users become more acclimated to micro-blogging.

The reason I see value in Twitter is because it tips into public life, emotion and productivity.  Of course there is unavoidable aimless chatter, but the majority of user conversations I have observed taking place are actively communicating value to one another.  Because of this value-add culture, the longevity and profitability of Twitter lies within their underlying data feed.

The first thing to consider is that this data is only as valuable as the underlying users that are communicating it.  Ryan has argued that this a dangerous selective bias, because there is only a certain type of personality type that uses Twitter.  Is it relevant what a group of Twitter users think?  Do Twitter users represent a small slice of a niche demographic?  Possibly.

I’d agree with his argument, for now.  But, if and when Twitter tips, the underlying data will become increasingly powerful.  Currently, the majority of Twitter users are in the early adapter 18-34 age range, which is a prime demographic for marketers.  You can really dive into what people are thinking, feeling and communicating at, any given time, assuming these are the type of people you want to focus on.  My thesis is that Twitter will tip, which is setting up an interesting risk vs. reward scenario for a business model based around Twitter’s data and longevity.

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