All About... Microblogging

Microblogging site Twitter has been described as one of the 10 most asinine trends online.

Since that description, Twitter has grown five-fold to nearly two million users, moved onto a range of platforms and spawned competitors such as Tumblr, Pownce and Jaiku. In China, microblogging site Fanfou has emerged.

In fact, it is arguably in China that the real potential of microblogging for the media industry has become apparent.

During the recent Tibet protests, several blogs aggregated and translated posts from within the region to discover what was going on.

And after the Sichuan earthquake, Twitter was used by professional journalists to source and interview English-speakers near the epicentre.

So is Twitter still asinine, or are we looking at an important new communications tool?

1 Microblogging merges the one-to-many broadcast model of blogging with an immersive network model like Facebook.
It allows users to stay in touch with a large number of friends, but avoids information overload by limiting the size of each update. In Twitter’s case, this is 140 characters, or just a little bit less than a SMS.

2 The biggest criticism of Twitter has been that 140 characters is not enough to be useful, but advertisers, of all people, should know how much you can cram into a line.

Amazon uses it to announce their deal of the day, including a link (truncated using tinyurl.com).

US presidential candidate Barack Obama can squeeze even more: In North Las Vegas. Addressed our housing crisis. In Las Vegas, one out of every 44 households is facing foreclosure. It is time for a change.

3 Why so short when there are no technical constraints? It’s all about the trade-off.

The short length means that updates are easier to write and more likely to be read.

And because you can only squeeze limited information into one update, it encourages users to post updates frequently - which means spending more time on the site and more time reading others’ updates.
It also means that users can read updates from more people, in a very timely manner.

4 This is a medium for constant engagement and attention. The proof lies in the popularity of Twitter applications.

Twitter is available as a Facebook application, as a Mozilla plug-in, as integrated instant-messaging customers and as a mobile application.

5 For marketers it can act as a direct channel to potential customers - people who are interested in your brand can subscribe to its Twitter account and receive regular updates.

And the relationship goes both ways.

A brand can then follow consumers’ updates, giving it an honest first-hand view of their response.

6 It can be used to generate buzz. Since many users are constantly on Twitter, when one excited user broadcasts an update about your brand, all of their friends will receive and read the update instantly.

Unlike e-mail, microblogging is passive and unintrusive, so users won’t feel like they’re spamming their friends.

The effect is particularly potent when the offer is urgent, since Twitter can spread a (short) message faster and more widely than most other medium.

7 The buzz it generates is a great boost to your search engine rankings.

Individual mentions show up on Google, and if there are links to a brand’s site as well, then its Google ranking will skyrocket overnight.

8 The paradox of microblogging is that it is intimate but impersonal.

Users write about details in their lives and immediate thoughts and feelings, but are well aware that they are broadcasting these thoughts to the world.

You can get close to your audience and stay connected, but unlike e-mail or social networks, this is a public space, so marketers don’t have to cajole their way into it.

This provides a safe opportunity for them to operate transparently, without the risk of a consumer backlash from intruding on online users’ private space.

What it means for…

Consumers
- Microblogging is quick, easy and free. It allows web users to keep in touch with what is happening in the lives of their friends and colleagues.

- And because it is so simple, it can be plugged into a variety of platforms.

Media owners
- One obvious use for microblogging is as a distribu tion channel for content. Readers can follow a Twitter feed in the same way that they can sign up to an e-mail newsletter. Several newspapers in the US already have Twitter feeds.

Marketers
- As with media owners, distribution of content is one of the key benefits of microblogging. As online marketing shifts toward branded content, this is a powerful new way of making sure it is seen.

- It can also be a great promotional tool for time-limited offers, though being transparent and respectful of the audience’s time is paramount.

- In terms of research and development, microblogging can be a great way of monitoring consumer reaction to new products.

- It can even be used within controlled groups to research new concepts over time.