How Do We Profit From Twitter?

Twitter doesn’t make any sense on the surface:

“Some startup is paying squillions of dollars so that you can broadcast free SMS messages to your friends worldwide?

And people actually sign up to have their mobiles clogged with annoying and mundane text messages of no-more-than 140 characters?

And some venture capitalist actually paid for this to get off the ground?”

It reeks of a type of here-we-go-again - dot-com-boom - this-time-in-Web-2.0-form hysteria - and sounds (on the surface) like some venture capitalist was so eager to jump onto the Web 2.0 phenomenon that he bought the first thing that came through his door.

Or at least this is what I thought when I first heard about Twitter.

“Where’s the value in this?” I asked myself.

But the more I scratch the surface (of the Twitter riddle, not my head), the more potential value I see in it.

Twitter is Growing at an Exponential Rate

Twitter’s membership base was said to be 100,000 strong as of late March, and was doubling every three weeks, according to Technology Review

And if the Unique ID’s of the RSS feeds are anything to go by, then as of earlier tonight (when I checked it out) there were at least 4,177,800 users!

And thousands more sign up every hour!!

This is a growth rate which new Web 2.0 services dream of - They type of massive growth experienced by MySpace and YouTube.

And already fan sites are popping up – like Twitterverse – a mashup which looks at the most commonly used words on Twitter.

As Steve Rubel points out, with these sorts of vital statistics it’s only a matter of time until Twitter gets snapped up.
Twitter’s Value is in its ability to Communicate

From a user’s perspective, the real value of Twitter is in its ability to help you communicate with people.

In that way, it’s just like a blog.

If you’re running an internet business, you probably already know the value of a blog: The more you communicate with people, the more likely it is that they will think of you and want to buy from you.

Twitter is just the same – although it has its own strengths and weaknesses.

On the downside, you can only send messages of up to 140 characters.

On the upside, people can receive your messages straight to their mobile phone – meaning you can access them in their daily lives in places where blogs, e-mail and other web technologies can’t reach.

And Twitter foots the bill for you!

What’s more, people WANT to hear about the mundane stuff that happens in your life.

Check out the Twitter account of 2008 U.S. Presidential hopeful, John Edwards - he already has over 2,000 people signed up to find out what he’s doing on a particular day.

Check it out:

(from staff): 1st quarter fundraising deadline is tomorrow…Sen. Edwards will be in KY, IN, OH, and FL today for the final push.

Riveting! :P

So what’s in it for Twitter? How does Twitter benefit from all of this?
Twitter’s Value is also in Its Huge Database

But from a business perspective (ie - from Twitter’s point of view) the real value in Twitter is in the size of its database.

SMS marketing companies pay millions to build their databases.

Twitter already has a database of millions of users.

If I had this sort of database, I know what I’d do.

* I’d start collecting demographic data from people (as they signed up, or next time they accessed their account). Age, gender, location – and perhaps some interests;

* I’d then start profiling the database, looking for what people are interested in / what they do. For example, a quick scan of the Twitterverse shows coffee is used often;

* Then, I’d look for companies who wanted to market to these people, by targeting their demographics or certain keywords.

Imagine it - Starbucks sends a broadcast out via Twitter to all users who had ever mentioned the word “coffee”, who lived in an area close to a Starbucks coffee house advertising their latest frappe – and offering people a free upsize if they show this SMS when they order!

Something like:

Try Starbucks new Lychee Frappe: Get yours upsized for free if you show this message when ordering. Today Only At Starbucks.

And you still have characters to spare! ;)

This is all well and good - but it doesn’t answer the question:
How Can You Profit From Twitter?

Ever since Ed Dale posed the question on his blog, making money out of Twitter is something I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about and researching.

I plan on talking about more in a few days time (so if you’re not subscribed to my RSS feed, then I recommend you hook yourself up right away).

Here’s just one idea – Woot (the site that sells one thing every day) is using Twitter to let people know about their daily specials – and already they have 2054 people signed up!

(Sorry John Edwards - more people are interested in hearing about cheap LCD TV’s than your 2008 Presidential Campaign. ;))

So how do you plan on cashing in from Twitter? What are your ideas and strategies?

Let’s get the conversation started

(brenthodgson)

How to promote website use Twitter?

The main way is:
+ You build relationships
+ Add people up
+ Build either a following or follow someones twits.

Then you earn from finding job or freelance opportunities that you will not find quickly enough or in time via normal methods. And you can also get insider info on prospective jobs and prospects. When you see someone twit: "Having a hard time with so and so ..." you can start offering your services cheap!
Some people blurt out job requirements - so that helps too. Someone upgrades to 4Gb RAM and you know you can get 2 1Gb sticks cheap! Tama ba?

Prepare for earning by Twitter: Plugins for WordPress

Want to enhance your blogging experience by integrating Twitter feeds or Twitter tweets with your WordPress blog? Just check the following WordPress plugins. I am sure that you will find a suitable one for your requirements.

* MyTwitter : MyTwitter allows users to display their recent Twitter status updates (tweets) on their Wordpress site and update their status through the Options page. Includes customization options including number of recent twitters to display, formatting options, and stylesheets. It can be called as a function or used as a widget.
* Twitter Widget Pro : A widget that properly handles twitter feeds, including @username and link parsing. Feeds can be for a single user, or can include all their friends’ tweets as well (like their Twitter home page does). It supports displaying profiles images, and even lets you control whether to display the time and date of a tweet or how log ago it happened.
* Twitter for Wordpress : A simple plugin that displays yours latest tweets in your WordPress blog. Twitter for WordPress has several configurable options. If you use WordPress widgets, just drag the widget into your sidebar and configure. And if you are not using widgets, just add a simple code to your theme.
* Twitter This : This plugin adds a simple “Twitter This” button to your blog posts, that allows your readers to share your blog post at Twitter. In order to share, the user must login to Twitter.
* SimpleTwitter : This plugin allows Wordpress blog owners to add Twitter messages to their templates. After installation, you need to call it by adding a piece of code to your blog theme. There’s no formatting. It returns the most recent Twitter post found for the configured Twitter user. The message will be cached for the configured number of minutes. After this time, the plugin checks Twitter for new messages.
* Twitpress : Submits a user definable tweet to your twitter account notifying any twitter followers or friends that a new blog entry has been published on your blog (or an existing published entry has been edited). Supports inclusion of a permalink to your blog posting in the tweet.
* Twitter Tools : This plugin creates an integration between your WordPress blog and your Twitter account. It enables you to pull your tweets into your blog and create new tweets on blog posts and from within WordPress.

Six ways Twitter can make money

A web 2.0-sized boatload of buzz has surrounded Twitter, the addictive service that allows its users to answer one simple question: what are you doing? The service has made appearances in everything from your friend's blog to the New York Times, and everyone seems jazzed about how fun tweeting is. While we're all having a good time, however, its creators, Obvious, keep hinting at how many practical uses they have up their sleeve for Twitter. Even though they haven't revealed any of their cards just yet, the rest of us are left wondering: how is such a seemingly frivolous service going to make money?

As a user who has taken the Twitter pill hook, line and sinker, I've been mulling this question for some time now. I came up with a few strategies, but then I figured: why not run them by the Twitter crew themselves? The least they could say was 'no comment,' but fortunately Evan Williams, one of Obvious and Twitter's founders, responded with a few of his own. Read on for my attempts at making Twitter some money (I'm waiting for my job offer Ev), as well as some choice words and ideas of his own from Evan.

* Twitter Pro - This is one obvious move. Twitter Pro could be a paid service that offers more features, unlimited tweets vs. a 'standard' account that receive a daily/weekly limit. It could also include a mobile phone/Windows Mobile/BlackBerry client with more robust tweeting/following tools that use the web to transmit tweets, avoiding those nasty SMS charges. It could also allow tweeting pics and videos from around the web with a Tumblr-like K.I.S.S. philosophy.
* Merchandise - A while back (though I admittedly can't find a link right now), Evan said merch was a big revenue generator for Blogger, and Twitter has worlds more buzz surrounding it right now. Heck, they even rolled out a small batch of shirts for SXSW, over which users seemed to be pretty excited. As ready as we may be to plunk down some cash for the privilege of using a t-shirt to tell people where we waste most of our time, Ev directly replied to this one: "RE: merchandise - It was, at one time, a noticeable part of Blogger's revenue, but that's when Blogger was just me, scraping by; my guess is it wouldn't make a blip in Twitter's costs today. Unless we figured out how to be a trendy new apparel brand." Sorry everyone, but it sounds like apparel isn't exactly on their list of features to roll out in the next update.
* Twitter for Business a lá Google Apps - Customized, secure software that businesses can run on their own intranet. BlackBerry and WinMo clients are a more apparent option here. Obviously, this could become tremendously useful if Twitter built in some hooks that work like Stikkit and Google Calendar, allowing employees to easily tweet appointments and tasks to a centralized PIM system, and automatically be subscribed to their team's tweets without any extra effort on their part.
* Twitter Forums, ad-supported - Finally, an innovation brought to the aging discussion forum format. Sort of a Twitter approach to Yahoo! Answers, allowing users to post questions and follow threads they're interested in, with the Twitter format forcing everyone to keep things simple and on-topic. Instead of ads, this could also possibly be just for Pro customers. One of the catches here is that Twitter users only see tweets from people they are following. When submitting a question to a Twitter Forum, you would be able to see all replies to the question, even the ones from users you've never met and aren't following.

Evan didn't let me have all the fun with brainstorming, however, and he offered two of his own ideas which I would assume are a good bet the company is working on, since he shared them with this lowly blogger:

Two more-straightforward ideas: 1) Ads on the site. We have a little AdSense on there now, but we haven't really tried. As the traffic grows, some tasteful sponsorships might be sellable. 2) Charging companies who are using it for marketing or other commercial purposes. If an organization finds Twitter to be a valuable communication tool with their customers/constituents/etc -- especially if we're sending lots of SMS's for them, which cost us money -- it seems viable to make an offering around that.

So there you have it: six ways Twitter can make money, two of which are straight from the lion's mouth. Judging from the sheer magnitude of buzz surrounding the recently-incorporated company, I wouldn't be surprised if these six are but a drop in the bucket. There's good news for those who fear change, however: no matter which way Twitter decides to start paying their exponentially growing bandwidth bills, Evan assured me that: "Our top concern when it comes to monetization will be to do so in a way that does not negatively impact users." Good show guys; your users will appreciate being able to spend their time tweeting about how they're spending their time, with the least amount of distraction.