The easiest way to understand the potential of Twitter as a plaftform for business to understand the economics and history of the SMS – after all Twitter is just the simple idea of merging SMS with the Web – and then explore how people use Twitter today.
For example, there was an interesting interview in the LA Times last year with the inventor of SMS. In the interview Friedhelm Hillebrand outlines why there are 160 characters (e.g. Back then postcards often contained fewer than 150 characters), why the creators of Twitter capped the length of a tweet at 140 characters (i.e. the extra 20 characters are for the user’s unique address) and how today SMS generates 64% of all global mobile network activity but only 15% of its revenues.
People use SMS to keep in contact with friends and family while they are on the move. The chart below reveals a similar story for Twitter users.
People also use social networks to connect with People they already know and to follow celebrities and other “Heroes”. Again Twitter is no different.
What this chart tells us is the key to understanding the potential of Twitter as a Business platform today is to embrace the emerging cult of the Twilebrity.
Today the Business of Twitter isn’t about putting ads on the menu (or in this case the real time feed) its all about how Brands work with society’s Heroes and Influencers to provide customers with the online friendships and peer recognition they are seeking.
In the end this message is nothing new to experienced advertising and marketing professionals. After all a generation of Teenagers didn’t want to be friends with Nike but they did want to be friends with Michael Jordan.
At the moment Twitter is under utilised as a business referral platform. We know that Twitter users spend only 10% of their time following companies or brands. We also know that they only spend 4% of their time sending out Tweets about product or service recommendations and it would appear that most of these Tweets are broadcasting negative messages. So clearly Twitter is not a platform where companies can build brands, service customers and conduct e-commerce today.
Tomorrow things may be different but today Twitter is about following personalities. Not Products, Services or Brands.
Posted on April 14, 2010
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