If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Nicole writes:

Is Twitter going to set up a credit based system for sending / receiving messages? A screen I saw the other day suggests so. It was from my mobile, so I did not react in time to make a copy, but it basically said to me: “Not enough credits to send message”. via Twitter to monetize by credit based system?

Twitter has yet to show signs of how they plan to make money, but I doubt it’ll be on a per message rate. This goes back to the debate on paying to send emails. If that every happens it’ll only hurt casual users and help business users as they’ll get bulk discounts and defeat the purpose anyway. If Twitter was to charge users at all, I imagine it’ll be for premium packages similar to how Google lets you buy a business version of their free email (gmail). Twitter could charge users based on how many messages they think they’ll need per month instead of per message and/or for increased reliability. Flickr follows the same model. Everyone can use the service for free, but if you want unlimited you’ve got to pay for a pro account. I know a lot of twitter folks who would be happy to pay for a Twitter pro account.

We already get nickel and dimed to death as it is, if Twitter was to charge per message I think it would kill the service instantly and put Pownce and other competitors in the perfect position to take the lead.

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, Twitter Business Model

The question of what Twitter is going to do to make money seems to come up now and then. So far, there seems to be no attempt to make money with the service. Are they waiting for critical mass? Are they holding out for a buy out? Are they going to sell the solution as a platform?

Jason Calicanis offers three business models that make Twitter a billion-dollar business in 12-24 months:

1. In feed advertising
2. SMS Advertising
3. Subscriptions

You may remember Jason was big on pushing Google into offering professional level webmail for clients. Free services with optional premium or business class versions that are on faster servers makes a lot of sense. When I worked at 451 we paid for the pro version of Akismet, a service you can get for free. I think a combination of any of these would work pretty well.

Jason’s post was in response to Allen’s Is Twitter F’ed? post. Evan, the guy behind blogger.com, odeo and others, has been known to build a tool before he has a business model for it. In fact, blogger wasn’t even the software they set out to write. They wrote that to help them in their own office while working on another project. So do they already have a business plan and it’s not just apparent yet? Or will they simply have to figure out a way to make money?

If you look at the number of tweets on the site sent via the web, I don’t see any reason they couldn’t also put some ads on the Twitter.com, like Pownce, Facebook and other services do. The people using Twitter are probably still in the top 10% of internet users, the influencer’s and I’m sure advertisers would pay a premium to get their message in front of those people.

Right now, all we can do is wait and see what they do.

Duncan over at TechChrunch asks Twitter As a Conduit For Fiction?

Last week we ran a story on figures out of Japan where half of the top ten selling works of fiction are written on mobile phones; people (not surprisingly) thought this was rather odd, but sales figures don’t lie.

What’s sad is people see this as “new”. The idea was old before the internet and once the web hit people stared sites and or sections of writing sites where users could come and contribute a line to a story. Sometimes more, of course. Most of the time this doesn’t work. Some anonymous jerk will come along and try to hijack or ruin the story. Because Twitter requires accounts it might cut down on that a little, but anyone can create an account. Someone want to set a timer? :)

If they have a little bit of moderation and editing for the finished project it could still turn out cool. Even if it doesn’t work it’s still a fun idea made new again with Twitter.

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, Twitter Fiction

1. you’ve followed a large number of people in a short amount of time
2. there is a small number of followers compared to number of people you’re following
3. the updates consist mainly of links and not personal updates
4. a large number of users blocking the profile and writing in with spam complaints

Read the rest via Chris Garrett. I think he’s right in suggesting that #4 is the real kicker here. Almost everyone does most of these from time time and as Chris mentions many of the people he follows post copious amounts of links including some pretty big blogs who use Twitter to promote their blog/posts. More than a handful of people I follow do the same.

One thing I’d add to the thought process is the context of the messages and links. If they are obviously trying to sell a product or service, especially those considered spam (viagra, make money schemes, drugs, porn, etc.) your more likely to get banned. I think it’s a combination of the content and #3 and #4.

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, Twitter Spam

Not that I need a reason, but Spiderbait gives you 10 Reasons You Should Twitter.

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks

I really wanted to go to Blog World Expo but alas, I just can’t get away. Luckily I’ll be able to follow along via Blogworld on Twitter. I’ll be there next time and maybe I’ll do some live blogging for everyone.

via Genuine

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, Blog World Expo

Oliver Gassner posts 10 things to do when you start using twitter.com and it’s sound advice for those new to Twitter. Obviously once you dig in and get into it there are all sorts of nuances to playing the social networking game, but Oliver’s post is a good place to start!

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks

According to this Forrester Report they do. Not likely. Research Recap does an excellent job of looking at the number, along with quotes from Robert Scoble. What the report actually means to say is 6% of the sample group they asked about using Twitter said they use it monthly. This is a common survey method and is a problem with all sorts of “sampling” and non more evidendent than in TV ratings. According to Scoble Twitter gets between 50,000 and 300,000 monthly users, which sounds about right.

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks

Robert Scoble and Dave Winer are asking for a “Twitter Pro” that they could pay $10 a month for to remove the 140 character limit.

Nathaniel says:

What do you call Twitter without the character limit?

A blog.

Actually, I call it Pownce and it’s better than Twitter in almost every way, save for adoption. It’s a serious threat to Twitter with it’s slick design, extra features and lack of a character limit. It’s getting more and more forum like, not blog like. With the ability to reply and reply to replies, threading, community (friends, etc.) it’s more like a forum than a blog. And Pownce has all that in spaded. The only thing Twitter has that Pownce doesn’t is more users and the SMS feature, which still has a character limit anyway making the $10 to remove the limit a moot point.

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, Twitter Pro, Pownce

Amazon Deals tweets hot deals from Amazon.com following woot’s example. There is a growing trend of companies and affiliate markerters using Twitter to promote products. While some are useful, the spam will follow.

via Nicki

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, Twitter Deals, Twitter Spam, Twitter Marketing