Hype + more hype = Twitter. You hear it and see it on every news outlet and it would feel nothing short of irresponsible to not really question if Twitter is simply a byproduct of hype or if it’s really here to stay. Having spoken with the Twitter folks, I’m quite impressed with their vision and their clear success of breaking thru the clutter with a service that has piqued all of our curiosity. But aside from the hype, there is a school of thought that believes the recent Twitter wave will soon feel like the conversations we all had years back about the idea of buying real estate in Second Life – mostly hype, little reality. The following story I came across says… “According to Quantcast, 72% of Twitter visitors stop by once and don’t come back. Only 1% of the Twitter audience visits daily and this group of ‘addicts’ accounts for 35% of all visits. These numbers compare unfavorably to other social networks.” The story goes on to say, “60% fail to return for a second month. This number holds true, even accounting for the websites and applications that feed into the Twitter community.” Wow.
My favorite piece of data though is…”In the March 2009 Nielsen Netview, Twitter has an index of 40 against the demographic of kids 12-17, and below-average index against full-time students. The highest indexing demographic group on Twitter is Males 35-49 (167). I question the youthfulness and hipness of any media that Sarah Palin & Senator Claire McCaskill have embraced before our interns.” LOL!
It’s easy to find coverage on how fabulous it is but I thought I would share the view of a few naysayers. Eventually a strategy for driving revenue will have to emerge and I think at that point we will begin to see a clearer path of where Twitter will land in our daily life.
