Diagnosis Twitter – Listening at the Flash-Point of Need
It’s difficult to write a post about Twitter without defining it. The problem is that Twitter is a work in progress. None of these elements will be explored in this post:
- Will Twitter find a way to make money? (Apologies to Fred Wilson)
- Is Twitter useful for <insert favorite use>?
- How does Twitter <help><hurt> me <my business>?
- What the heck is Twitter anyway?
- I <hate><love><don’t care about> Twitter.
- You should not use Twitter for <insert-your-favorite-rule>.
Ignore the fail whale, the fanboys/girls, and the crowd-based do’s and don’ts. Even Captain Obvious can see that Twitter is a work in progress as evidenced by the good folks at Twitter explaining they will scale first and seek revenue second.
Suppose instead you conduct this thought experiment:
Every Person on the planet with a wireless phone or computer is a Twitter user.
And these millions of Twitter users are all talking at once all in the same room. Some in small groups and some in large. Some organized and most ad-hoc. Some talk is polite, some is rude, and most is seemingly without context.
What then becomes important when you realize these conversations, occurring in real time and possessing the possibility of crowd consensus, are about your brand?
About your industry? About something you care about? Maybe even about you personally?
What becomes important once Twitter scales?
What will matter when the discordant din from Twitterville is loud, overwhelming, and impossible to manage with the current tools?
Listening.
Not eavesdropping, but really Listening.
Listening at the flash-point of need.
Responding is an entirely different post.
But Listening is something you can start right now. This reason alone may not be compelling enough to compete for your time at this point in Twitter’s development.
Maybe there’s plenty of time and you can relax while Twitter is the rock your competitors break themselves against.
Or maybe others have the Listening part down and they’ve moved on to Responding?
Diagnosis Twitter: Relevant, not yet at scale, and ignored at the expense of your brand.
What’s your story about listening at the flash-point of need?
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