Why You don’t get Twitter and Why you Should

PART 1: WHY YOU DON’T GET TWITTER

When I say “You” I am talking about the every day Internet user. The person who uses the Internet, but is not part of the small, insular group of the technorati that seem to salivate at the mere mention of Twitter.

Recent reports have suggested that Twitter’s growth is slowing aggressively. This was put into stark context when December 2009 figures showed that a Facebook game called “Farmville” had 69m active users compared with Twitters comparatively measly 18m.

So why is there such a disparity between the hype and the reality… very simple… the average Internet user simply doesn’t get Twitter.

Note: Before I go any further I must say, that I actually think Twitter is a great service and can add a lot of value to people’s lives, as long as it is used in the right way. We get onto this in the second part of the Blog.

So why don’t you get it? For two very simple reasons:

1. The People promoting Twitter use it in a way normal people can’t

Stephen Fry thinks Twitter is bloody marvellous! And he won’t stop telling us how amazing it is… but he would wouldn’t he? He sits on his backside and types 140 characters of nonsense and millions of people hang on his every word. For the rest of us that’s absolutely no use. No one is going to care what I had for breakfast, nor should they. So, from the outset, most people are confused as to why they would use Twitter when they already have Facebook.

2. Twitter’s positioning:

Twitter began life by asking user’s to answer a simple question “What are you doing?”. That was of relative interest to a few people but as it grew Facebook implemented a similar feature. This meant that using Twitter as a way to update friends was now redundant as we do that on Facebook. So to the average user it became even more irrelevant.

Obviously to the rest of us who understand Twitter, it provides lots of value as a collaboration tool and a way to keep up to date with our favourite topics, people and what’s going on in the world.

Twitter realised this and are trying to re-position themselves but are clearly failing to do so in the minds of the average Internet user. For example they changed the introductory question to “What’s happening?” and they changed their tagline to “Share and discover what’s happening right now, anywhere in the world.” Finally they changed the homepage to a search box to suggest to users that Twitter was a place buzzing with interesting conversations.

But they changed little else…

If you search for something in Twitter you get useless results. Take the below search results for Tiger Woods as an example. Completely useless:

And when you sign up and answer the question “What’s happening?” your ‘Tweet’ goes nowhere. In fact even after you follow a few of the suggested users it still takes  a long time before the community accepts you as a member and engages in a conversation with you.

But and this is a big BUT… Twitter, when used in the right way, can be an incredible tool. Let’s look at how we can get value from Twitter as normal internet users.

PART 2: WHY YOU SHOULD USE TWITTER

There are 3 use cases for Twitter:

1. The Celebrity or business who wants to create a more engaged relationship with their fans / customers

If you fall into this category you are likely to have a large group of fans who want to keep up to date with you. So go into Twitter, let them follow you and engage in a conversation with them. Don’t simply tell them what you are doing, share opinions, share breaking news, share anything that makes them feel connected with you.

For example I use my “betweenthenotes” Twitter account to let people who are interested in my music and book, keep up to date with it.

2. The Consumer

If, on the other hand, you have absolutely no fans and little of interest to say, then simply go into twitter and follow a whole load of interesting people. Forget about ever typing in a tweet. Simply use it as a way to consume information. Maybe you want to follow a journalist who breaks interesting stories or maybe you follow a celebrity like our old pal Mr Fry.

I use my “shanemurfy” account to follow journalists breaking stories in the online space.

3. The Collaborators

Everyone in life has some group outside their friends they align and associate themselves with. Maybe you love to talk about football, maybe your passion is guitar playing, maybe it is discussing Star Trek. Whatever the topic, you can find like-minded people on Twitter. You can share opinions, tips and  keep right at the forefront of thinking on your chosen topic. If you are one of these people then go into twitter and do a search for the topic that interests you. You will find a bunch of people talking about that topic. Look through them and read some of their tweets. If they look interesting, follow them and start a conversation with them. Also have a look at the new feature “Lists”. Any user can create a “List” and add people to it around a given topic. My “betweenthenotes” account has been added to 22 different lists all based around writing and music. Find lists on other people’s profiles and follow the ones you are interested in.

I also use my “shanemurfy” account to get advice and engage in discussions with people in the online industry.

CONCLUSION

There is clearly a lot of confusion around Twitter and this is having a direct impact on their usage stats.

I believe there is a lot they can do with their User Interface to make it even more clear to users how they should use it. They also have a lot of work to do before it really can be used as a real time search engine.

In the mean time if you use Twitter in the right way there is lots you can get from it.