Random Culture

Ideas for Twitter's E-Commerce Model

Earlier this week, Twitter CEO Dick Costolo announced that Twitter may not rely solely on ad revenues in the future. Rather, he suggested that Twitter might find a new model by taking a more active role in the transactions currently happening on the platform. He offered no details, and said that advertising will continue to be the dominant business model. Here are a few ideas of how Twitter could create an e-commerce business model:

Sell Cost-per-Acquisition Ads Twitter sells most of it's ads based on engagement, like followers gained, or retweets. Many advertisers, however, will sell based on the acquisition of customers, and charge a higher premium. Twitter could sell ads where advertisers only pay when an item is purchased.

Sponsored Shopping Tweets Sponsored Tweets are called out in your Twitter stream. Allow those selling goods a new "shopping" callout to identify an e-commerce related Tweet. Charge for the ability to stand out.

Tweet-to-Buy Allow people to enter payment and shipping info into Twitter or connect through a partner like Paypal or Square. Buy from verified merchants simply by Tweeting a specific keyword.

I do believe that Twitter is leaving a ton of revenue on the table right now, and that they've been slow to create their ad offering. Hopefully this is a signal that will change.

In Search of a Better Twitter Feed

It's bothered me for a while that I can't keep up with all the people I follow on Twitter. Why? Because for Twitter, chronology is king. The Tweet shows up first, and everything else gets pushed out of view. This was a great way to introduce the idea of the "real-time" web, and had a huge role in making Twitter the go-to resource for information as it unfolds. However, it doesn't provide a great way to understand the most important things you may have missed.

Facebook has seen a similar issue, and provided a solution. With an average of 130 friends, most Facebook users have trouble keeping up. Facebook's solution was to create two feeds - a "top news" feed that takes into account what's most popular, and a "most recent" feed that would seem to be chronological.

But it may not be that simple... In an article from October of last year, Thomas Weber from The Daily Beast conducted an experiment to try and figure out how Facebook determines what shows up in the feed, and it turns out, it's not that straightforward. According to the post, Weber says:

"Many users naturally assume that Most Recent contains every update from all of their friends. Not so, as our experiment showed. Even with test-subject Simonetti posting updates, links, photos, and videos several times a day, a few of our volunteers found that the items didn't appear in their Most Recent feeds. (At least, not until we took additional steps to up Phil's visibility.) If you've never tinkered with the "Edit Options" button on your Most Recent feed, this underscores why you should check it out—there's a little-used setting that caps the number of friends shown in the feed."

Clearly, what Facebook is offering is options and some settings to help users make sense of the overwhelming amount of updates from their friends. Twitter has attempted one solution with Twitter Lists. The idea is supposed to be that categorizing your followers into more "bite size" groups will help you keep up. Yet the problem is the same as it is on Facebook - no one wants to spend the time sifting through their friends and people they're following. I don't think they should have to put that time in, when technology can do it faster.

Twitter doesn't need to adopt Facebook's solution... Rather, they need to provide options for how to view the feed. There have been some third party solutions tapping into the Twitter API to try and create sense of the feed, like Key Tweet, but I think this is something Twitter should provide as core functionality.

Twitter: Endure or Flourish?

David Carr published a great opinion piece a few days ago, entitled "Why Twitter Will Endure." It's a thought-provoking read, and he hits on some really great points. Here are a few of the highlights that particularly resonated with me.

Twitter = Plumbing
Here Carr was quoting Steven Johnson, who's Time magazine article on Twitter produced a great quote:

“The history of the Internet suggests that there have been cool Web sites that go in and out of fashion and then there have been open standards that become plumbing... Twitter is looking more and more like plumbing, and plumbing is eternal.”

Twitter = Efficiency
Carr hits on an interesting idea that I find true in my daily usage of Twitter. That although it's additional layer on top of my already complicated array of tools and sites, it actually adds some simplicity into my routine.

"Instead of spending a half-hour surfing in search of illumination, I get a sense of the day’s news and how people are reacting to it in the time that it takes to wait for coffee at Starbucks."

Yet there are a few things I think David Carr has missed that are important to consider.

The Exotic 100-millionth Person?
In the article, Carr makes the following statement:

"Some time soon, the company won’t say when, the 100-millionth person will have signed on to Twitter to follow and be followed by friends and strangers. That may sound like a MySpace waiting to happen — remember MySpace? — but I’m convinced Twitter is here to stay."

100 millionth person? Even the highest estimates from ComScore, Compete and Nielsen put US Twitter visitors at 23 million tops, and all sources report that Twitter may actually be losing traffic.

Twitter vs. Facebook
Carr doesn't tackle Twitter's biggest competitor, Facebook. This same "plumbing" can essentially be found in Facebook's "status update." Many people use Facebook status updates as their Twitter updates and vice versa. There's no mistaking the fact that Twitter's numbers don't even come close. Facebook has already exceeded 100 million US users, and over 350 million worldwide.

In short, I thought David Carr hit on most of the reasons that I love Twitter, and I do think that he's made a case that Twitter will endure... but I'm not as sure about the future of Twitter.

Endure doesn't mean flourish. 

Twitter: Endure or Flourish?

David Carr published a great opinion piece a few days ago, entitled "Why Twitter Will Endure." It's a thought-provoking read, and he hits on some really great points. Here are a few of the highlights that particularly resonated with me.

Twitter = Plumbing
Here Carr was quoting Steven Johnson, who's Time magazine article on Twitter produced a great quote:

“The history of the Internet suggests that there have been cool Web
sites that go in and out of fashion and then there have been open
standards that become plumbing... Twitter is looking more and more like plumbing, and plumbing is eternal.”

Twitter = Efficiency
Carr hits on an interesting idea that I find true in my daily usage of Twitter. That although it's additional layer on top of my already complicated array of tools and sites, it actually adds some simplicity into my routine.

"Instead of spending a half-hour surfing in search of illumination, I
get a sense of the day’s news and how people are reacting to it in the
time that it takes to wait for coffee at Starbucks."

Yet there are a few things I think David Carr has missed that are important to consider.

The Exotic 100-millionth Person?
In the article, Carr makes the following statement:

"Some time soon, the company won’t say when, the 100-millionth person
will have signed on to Twitter to follow and be followed by friends and
strangers. That may sound like a MySpace waiting to happen — remember MySpace? — but I’m convinced Twitter is here to stay."

100 millionth person? Even the highest estimates from ComScore, Compete and Nielsen put US Twitter visitors at 23 million tops, and all sources report that Twitter may actually be losing traffic.

Twitter vs. Facebook
Carr doesn't tackle Twitter's biggest competitor, Facebook. This same "plumbing" can essentially be found in Facebook's "status update." Many people use Facebook status updates as their Twitter updates and vice versa. There's no mistaking the fact that Twitter's numbers don't even come close. Facebook has already exceeded 100 million US users, and over 350 million worldwide.

In short, I thought David Carr hit on most of the reasons that I love Twitter, and I do think that he's made a case that Twitter will endure... but I'm not as sure about the future of Twitter.

Endure doesn't mean flourish. 

Quick Links: November 20, 2009

Twitter Traffic Declining
ComScore, Compete and Nielsen all report traffic to Twitter.com declining, after months of continuous growth. Has Twitter reached it's plateau of users?

Video Game Marketers Use Social Media
Great insights into how social media is providing value to video game marketers, not just in reaching players, but understanding them.

More Mobile Commerce: REI
Yet another retailer is enabling mobile commerce. REI has now added the ability to buy through their iPhone app.

Quick Links: November 20, 2009

Twitter Traffic Declining
ComScore, Compete and Nielsen all report traffic to Twitter.com declining, after months of continuous growth. Has Twitter reached it's plateau of users?

Video Game Marketers Use Social Media
Great insights into how social media is providing value to video game marketers, not just in reaching players, but understanding them.

More Mobile Commerce: REI
Yet another retailer is enabling mobile commerce. REI has now added the ability to buy through their iPhone app.

Introducing Twitter Lists

My latest post on the Click Here Blog is an introduction to Twitter Lists, and showcases a few of the more notable examples. Here's an excerpt:

"There are several ways that Twitter Lists are being used. We’ll look at two very important differences in how people can utilize Twitter Lists, private and public.

Private Twitter Lists
Private Twitter Lists are used to organize the people you’re already following. For many people, this may be as simple as dividing up co-workers and personal contacts. However, lists can be as granular as you’d like them to be. Perhaps you’d like to split your followers into west-coast and east-coast co-workers, or family, friends, co-workers and celebrities. Quite simply, lists allow you to organize these folks in any way you wish. Once you’ve organized them, you will see tweets from all the folks in the list on one page.

Public Twitter Lists
Public Twitter Lists are more about shaping how others follow groups on Twitter. We’ve only just scratched the surface of how these public Twitter Lists can be used, but here are several key uses we’ve seen so far:"

Continue reading the whole Post, "Introducing Twitter Lists", on the Click Here blog.

Introducing Twitter Lists

My latest post on the Click Here Blog is an introduction to Twitter Lists, and showcases a few of the more notable examples. Here's an excerpt:

"There are several ways that Twitter Lists are being used. We’ll look
at two very important differences in how people can utilize Twitter
Lists, private and public.

Private Twitter Lists

Private Twitter Lists are used to organize the people you’re already
following. For many people, this may be as simple as dividing up
co-workers and personal contacts. However, lists can be as granular as
you’d like them to be. Perhaps you’d like to split your followers into
west-coast and east-coast co-workers, or family, friends, co-workers
and celebrities. Quite simply, lists allow you to organize these folks
in any way you wish. Once you’ve organized them, you will see tweets
from all the folks in the list on one page.

Public Twitter Lists

Public Twitter Lists are more about shaping how others follow groups on
Twitter. We’ve only just scratched the surface of how these public
Twitter Lists can be used, but here are several key uses we’ve seen so
far:"

Continue reading the whole Post, "Introducing Twitter Lists", on the Click Here blog.