The Tweet Experience – Twitter and Your Customers

I’ve been an early adopter of Twitter.  But from a business perspective, does Twitter make sense as a tool for enhancing customer experiences?

Finally, we are getting some data to help us answer that question.  Thanks to the first-ever survey that exclusively examines Twitter users conducted by Pew Research it appears that only 8% of online adults say they use Twitter, with 2% doing so on a typical day. This survey also showed that 74% of American adults are Internet users, factoring that into the equation that leaves us with 6% of the entire adult population available through Twitter.

According to the study, some of the groups who have relatively high levels of Twitter use include:

·      Young adults: Internet users ages 18-29 are significantly more likely to use Twitter than are older adults

·      African-Americans and Latinos: Minority internet users are more than twice as likely to use Twitter as are white internet users

·      Urbanites: Urban residents are roughly twice as likely to use Twitter as rural dwellers

·      Women and the college-educated are also slightly more likely than average to use the service

Twitter users are nearly equally divided between those who check the site on a daily basis (or multiple times per day) and those who check the site infrequently or never. .

Here are some final conclusions from the Pew data to consider, when you are determining if Twitter fits your social experience strategy:

·      72% of Twitter users say that they post updates related to their personal life, activities or interests. 19% say they post personal updates once a day or more

·      62% said they post updates related to their work life, activities or interests, with 12% doing so on a daily basis

·      55% of users share links to news stories. 12% do this at least once a day

·      54% of these Twitter users say they post humorous or philosophical observations about life in general, with 16% doing so on a daily basis

·      53% of users use Twitter to retweet material posted by others, with 18% doing so on a daily basis

·      52% of these users send direct messages to other users, with 11% doing so on a daily basis

·      40% use Twitter to share photos with others, with 12% going so at least once a day

·      28% use Twitter to share videos with others. 8% of Twitter users do this once a day or more

·      24% use the service to tweet their location, with 7% of users doing so on a daily basis

Twitter is simply a tool that avails access to a desired target market.  Like any tool, success depends on its relevant and targeted use.

How relevant is Twitter to your desired on-line customer experience?  Are your customers there?