I used to watch twitter from the sidelines, but have now found it somewhere I have to go every day, almost religiously. I’m wondering which of the three criteria in the headline I fall into – maybe all of them.
How can a company of thirty people, with virtually no logical revenue strategy have captivated the world like this? Twitter now has 360 million search results on Google, God has 450 million. Give it a month. The jury though, is still out on how twitter will emerge as a business tool, particularly here in Asia. Interestingly, Dell claims they have already made US$1 million of sales last month on twitter (yes, twitter). That pales in comparison against their US$46 billion annual turnover, but don’t lose sight of the marketing costs (zero) for this effort. Already travel agents and hotels are getting on board the ‘twitter ship’ in the US with such tweets reading: Trip to Hawaii this Friday for US$499 *Click here*
Many agencies are experimenting with the medium. WPP (http://twitter.com/wpponline) is dumping press releases. Mindshare (http://twitter.com/MindshareGlobal) is talking about research, albeit slowly. Right now however, tweets are relatively public – so if you’re going to jump in, jump in and do it properly. DDB China’s profile page (http://twitter.com/ddbchinagroup) was deserted two months ago, but now has 100 followers. Two months is a lifetime in twitter-years thus to all twitters out there, please keep it relevant. I recently stopped following a PR agency CEO in Beijing when he sent three tweets about “preparing for haircut”, “getting haircut” and “finished haircut”. Not the sort of insight into the market I expected, especially given my follicle challenges. If you’re a marketer, figure out for yourself how you or your agency can use it to seed relevant information. Test the waters and do a trial run. It’s also crucial in this whole approach that you build in metrics as there are so many add-ons in place to measure results.
Remember that leading marketers right now have recognised their role as a connector, not an advertiser. One example would be Glam Media, an online-ad network and lifestyle web site, that explored the potentials of twitter as a communication platform during the Academy Awards in February. The skin-care brand Aveeno, which is owned by Johnson & Johnson, sponsored a widget, or small software application, on Glam’s web site that highlighted tweets about the Oscars. Among the tweets from users: “I want to know how all those actresses stay so skinny.”
Sarah Milstein, who has written a book on twitter notes, “The biggest mistake a company can make is thinking this is a great place to push out information about itself. It turns out it isn’t a great place to do that at all.” Twitter, she warned, isn’t advertising, it’s an opt-in medium. Rather, she said, companies should see the service as a way to have conversations with current and potential customers. If you’re an agency, its a great recruitment vehicle and also a great way of engaging feedback within a network (if you protect your followers). We’ve seen this already for a number of networks trying to get more instant feedback.
Finally, twitter has huge research potential, not yet tapped; instant feedback to a link or an instant chance to enter a contest in exchange for database information. There are many angles that haven’t been thought through yet but offer plenty of potential for the fast and the nimble here. If you must know, I find it one of the most interesting newsfeeds on the web. Too damn much is happening in China right now to just rely on standard news. Kaiser Kuo, a Chinese-American writer, guitarist, tech watcher and father of two in Beijing always has his finger on the pulse – http://twitter.com/kaiserkuo. Maggie Rauch http://twitter.com/rauch22, a sports, business and travel writer in Beijing tells me more about sport than I could ever read. The WSJ China Journal always has a fresh perspective – http://twitter.com/ChinaJournal and for men (and women) who cannot live by business alone, humor can come in 140 characters – http://twitter.com/TheOnion Twitter isn’t going to go away. Go online and try it out, but please, keep your haircut secrets to yourself.