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Frankly, I believe that Twitter is already great. They have an enormous user base and the participation is off the charts. The problem is, I cannot for the li

Frankly, I believe that Twitter is already great. They have an enormous user base and the participation is off the charts. The problem is, I cannot for the life of me see how this platform is able to monetize itself into a viable, hugely profitable business. Granted, Twitter now is a profitable business, but my understanding that a significant part of their revenue comes from search agreements from Google. So, how does Twitter expect to drive significant PROFIT growth on a foundation defined by 160 character sentences?

SpikeGronim 15y ago
Purchasing a 50% random sample of all tweets in real time is reported to be $360,000 per year [1]. Apparently you can get the 100% feed for a negotiated price. If they can sell many licenses for those feeds, which I think that they can, they have the potential for real profit growth. I too was very skeptical of Twitter's profit potential until this service launched. 1. http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/twitter_to_sell_50_of_all_tweets_for_360kyear_thro.php http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/twitter_to_sell_50_of_a...
- tptacek 15y ago
  Do the math on this in your head --- many/most? of the Global 2k don't need a full Twitter feed; what's US Gypsum gonna do with it? --- and you're left with a total addressable market that doesn't come close to justifying their purported valuation. I'm not being down on Twitter. Just, whatever the monetization plan is, this can't be it.
michaelpinto 15y ago
The real money is in targeted advertising — you could pitch ads based upon the keywords of the tweetstream. The trouble is that next to Facebook Twitter hasn't really worked at this. On facebook within 24 hours I can be running an ad campaign with highly sophisticated tools on a budget of $25. If I only have $25 Twitter doesn't seem to care that I exist, in fact they only start to care if you've got $60k a year to invest in ads: http://business.twitter.com/advertise/start http://business.twitter.com/advertise/start

SpikeGronim 15y ago

Purchasing a 50% random sample of all tweets in real time is reported to be $360,000 per year [1]. Apparently you can get the 100% feed for a negotiated price. If they can sell many licenses for those feeds, which I think that they can, they have the potential for real profit growth. I too was very skeptical of Twitter's profit potential until this service launched. 1. http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/twitter_to_sell_50_of_all_tweets_for_360kyear_thro.php http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/twitter_to_sell_50_of_a...

tptacek 15y ago
Do the math on this in your head --- many/most? of the Global 2k don't need a full Twitter feed; what's US Gypsum gonna do with it? --- and you're left with a total addressable market that doesn't come close to justifying their purported valuation. I'm not being down on Twitter. Just, whatever the monetization plan is, this can't be it.

michaelpinto 15y ago

The real money is in targeted advertising — you could pitch ads based upon the keywords of the tweetstream. The trouble is that next to Facebook Twitter hasn't really worked at this. On facebook within 24 hours I can be running an ad campaign with highly sophisticated tools on a budget of $25. If I only have $25 Twitter doesn't seem to care that I exist, in fact they only start to care if you've got $60k a year to invest in ads: http://business.twitter.com/advertise/start http://business.twitter.com/advertise/start