Whither Twitter?

Twitter has grown rapidly to become a key part of the international news scene, but at the same time, due to its lack of strategic focus, is clearly unsustainable: in short, many subscribers no longer understand what it can do for them, and even find it intimidating.

Despite its apparent dynamism, Twitter isn’t growing, it isn’t attracting new users, and increasingly only makes sense to businesses, organizations or celebrities interested in getting their message out there.

This is a particularly bad time for a company not to be growing: investors are becoming worried, sending share prices down, while its business model looks decidedly shaky: without a large number of loyal users at the base of the pyramid, the value proposition of its advertising could fall apart.

There is a paradox here: Twitter is ideal for quickly finding out about what is going on in the world, it’s perfect for quickly replying to customers, it’s marvelous for creating two-directional communication channels that bring people closer to those who inspire them, and is indispensable for building knowledge contexts based on people or even to sound out the collective opinion… despite all of which, it still hasn’t really found its place. The question we need to ask is: where is Twitter going? Twitter may not be falling apart just yet, but it is slowly and steadily losing active users. In the two years that have passed since it went public, the company has lost almost 40 percent of its value.

Twitter’s problem is a lack of strategic focus. The company started out as a way for friends and family to keep in touch, but soon changed into something very different, responding to the zeitgeist of “we are what we share”. From the moment Twitter moved from asking: “What are you doing?” to “What’s going on?”, it made a lot more sense for businesses, the media, celebrities, and organizations, but lost much of its meaning to ordinary folks, who still saw it in terms of “What are you doing?”

No organization or celebrity that understands the social networks questions the use of Twitter, seeing it as a highly effective two-way communication tool. But as fewer and fewer people bother replying, it is in danger of turning into a one-way street.

I wouldn’t say Twitter has problems with its business model: its advertising provides value without being intrusive, and companies will learn how to appreciate its value. But if it stops growing and loses its appeal to the general public, it will soon have big problems: it is still able to mobilize large numbers of people to participate in bringing about political or social change, but is in the midst of an identity crisis that has no easy answer.

(En español, aquí)