Cart (0)
business newsTwitter Conference '09: Tweets from the Frontline
By
Laurie Petersen Jun 01, 2009 2:45 pm
Companies, entrepreneurs voice satisfaction at first-ever TWTRCON.
PRINT
 |
|
No shortage of big brands were represented, including: Virgin America, Intuit (INTU), Wells Fargo (WFC), Comcast (CMCSA), eBay (EBAY), Dell (DELL), and Cisco (CSCO). All are using the micro-blogging platform in some form as an extension of their communications and customer-service strategies.
It was a highly social crowd, skewing older - just like the demographic of Twitter users. Rapper MC Hammer posed for photos and talked about how he communicates with his 700,000-plus followers. Entrepreneur/VC Guy Kawasaki, whose latest venture is Alltop, had a book signing.
Even if Twitter itself has yet to make money, the 140-character communication channel is spawning an industry of businesses capitalizing on how to harness the power of the real-time thought stream of 30 million people. On exhibit were tools for CRM and data-mining, Twitter content-management, and other classic business back-end support functions.
“Not having a business model is the new business model,” quipped Kawasaki. “You can say General Motors doesn’t have a business model.” He said charging all third-party application developers and employing a text-messaging/SMS model are 2 ways Twitter could monetize the business.
The one-time Apple (AAPL) evangelist suggested Yahoo (YHOO) is positioned to build a Twitter-like platform just as it built Yahoo Buzz to compete with Digg. He saw Yahoo as a more likely partner than Google (GOOG).
MC Hammer said he does all his own tweeting and uses it as a way to “remove the velvet rope” and get feedback from his fans while taking direct control of his personal brand. Hammer sees Twitter as eventually circumventing agents and offering a way for performers to tweet out their own multimedia releases.
The marketers who spoke about their experiences using Twitter to generate sales -- Carl’s Jr., Dell Outlet, and Kobi BBQ -- said they're all making money using the tool to amplify their marketing and corporate-communication strategy.
One of the most intriguing parts of the day was development of an interactive future of Twitter led by Steve Rubel, SVP and director of insight for Edelman Digital. He sees an eventual integration of Twitter into others’ websites and applications, and an opportunity to generate revenue with an “Intel inside” kind of approach.
Led by Rubel, the room created a list of logical Twitter acquirers - technology and media companies as well as the social platform, Facebook. On the IT side, Salesforce (CRM), Oracle (ORCL) and Microsoft (MSFT) were put forth as likely suitors. Disney (DIS), Google, Comcast (CMCSA), Yahoo and Amazon (AMZN) rounded out the list.
Among the threats to the business Rubel identified, were churn and boredom. Opinion was split as to whether Twitter will be subsumed by the next big thing in a few years.
Futurist Paul Saffo, a visiting scholar from Stanford Media X, likened the impact of Twitter to the introduction of television in the 1950s.
He predicted that once the devices catch up -- very, very smart phones and next-generation display tablets -- the shift from mass media to personal media will be complete. Twitter, he noted, comes to where we actually live our lives.
No positions in stocks mentioned.
The information on this website solely reflects the analysis of or opinion about the performance of securities and financial markets by the writers whose articles appear on the site. The views expressed by the writers are not necessarily the views of Minyanville Media, Inc. or members of its management. Nothing contained on the website is intended to constitute a recommendation or advice addressed to an individual investor or category of investors to purchase, sell or hold any security, or to take any action with respect to the prospective movement of the securities markets or to solicit the purchase or sale of any security. Any investment decisions must be made by the reader either individually or in consultation with his or her investment professional. Minyanville writers and staff may trade or hold positions in securities that are discussed in articles appearing on the website. Writers of articles are required to disclose whether they have a position in any stock or fund discussed in an article, but are not permitted to disclose the size or direction of the position. Nothing on this website is intended to solicit business of any kind for a writer's business or fund. Minyanville management and staff as well as contributing writers will not respond to emails or other communications requesting investment advice.
Copyright 2011 Minyanville Media, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Copyright 2011 Minyanville Media, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
