Twitter - Case Study by FaberNovel

@all studying the #Twitter phenomenon
December 2009
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...
Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas
Comment this study
To comment the study, tag your messages with:

#Twitterstudy
To watch the live presentation, go to:
talk.fabernovel.com
...
Summary
What is Twitter?
What do people do with Twitter?
Why did Twitter grow so fast?
What business model for Twitter?
Who could challenge Twitter?

Conclusion
...
Meet the tweet
A tweet is a text-based message up to 140 characters

automatically delivered to the authors followers.
...
You follow people
you
your friend
Following someone means you get their tweets

as soon as they post them.
...
And people follow you

a huge fan of yours
you
your friend
Your followers get your tweets in real-time :

you become a media.
...
By default, everything is public on Twitter
Unlike Facebook, you usually dont have to know

someone to have a full access to their tweets.
Twitter is a huge base of public data.
...
Twitter interface : simple and elegant

Whats happening for you?
Write your tweet here
you
Whats happening for

your followers?
You can read that here
...
To define what Twitter is, lets see what Twitter isnt

Twitter is not a:
Is Twitter a
blog The number of characters of a post is unlimited. One

tweet is limited to 140 prints.
Twitter is not a blog
sms You can send both a tweet an a SMS from your

mobile phone. But the tweet is posted on the Internet, and
is public.
# Micro-blogging service?
# Public SMS platform?
Twitter is not a SMS
social network In a social network, your profile is private.

In Twitter, everybody can follow you, you can follow
everybody, and your profile is public.
# Public social network?
Twitter is not a social network
chat A chat conversation is private, a Twitter

conversation is public
Twitter is not a chat
# Public chat?
Twitter is the SMS of internet era.

...
Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / Atelier BNP - Paribas
10
Summary
What is Twitter?

Conclusion
...
11
Reputation: Twitter in France
Dear French Internet user, do you know...

Yes : 60%
Yes : 4%
Yes : 1%
...
Source :
pour LAtelier
12
Incredible growth !
%
%
...
Source :
pour LAtelier
13
Usages: Twitter in France
Percentage of Twitter members within our aware

internet users ?
9%
...
Source :
pour LAtelier
14
Who knows Twitter in France?
...
Source :
pour LAtelier
15
Who is the French Twitter user ?
...
Source :
pour LAtelier
16
What publication client/device do you use ?

30%
39%
Twitter.com
PC / Mac
client
31%
Smartphone client
Source : Poll launched by LAtelier

on twtpoll.com november 2009
...
17
Tweeting, yes, but for what ideal purposes ?
65%
69%
40%
Creating and sharing a friend network
Having good deals & coupons
Recruiting an employee
...
Source :
pour LAtelier
18
Tweeting, yes, but for what real purposes ?

7%
2%
13%
8%
51%
14%
Source : Poll launched by LAtelier

on twtpoll.com november 2009
3%
...
19
Useless? < Twitter < Useful?

63%
French Internet users
73%
French Twitter members
...
Source :
pour LAtelier
20
Who tweets?
Individuals
Typical user Im 31 years old, tech-savvy. And I do a lot of
things with my phone.
But 55% of users havent posted any tweet on their account!
Star Ashton Kutcher (aplusk) was the first Twitter account

to reach 1 M followers
And he chats with Demi Moore...
Blogger Pete Cashmore (mashable) has 1 M followers

Mashable is a famous blog about social media
Politician Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet frequently uses

Twitter
Minister of Forward Planning, Assessment of Public Policies and
Development of the Digital Economy in the French government,
...
21
Who tweets?
Companies & public institutions
Media CNN and the New York Times are among the first
20 most followed Twitter accounts.
But...Ashton Kutcher has more followers than CNN!
High-tech companies Google tweets to inform, Dell

tweets to sell.
Other companies The majority of Fortune 100 companies

dont really get Twitter.
50% of the Twitter accounts of Fortune 100 companies have less than 500
followers
Public Insitutions The White House, lElyse

communicate via Twitter.
LElyse plans to tweet during Copenhagen Climate Conference
Twitter users are still a minority of tech-savvy people, companies and institutions
who have prominent communication needs
...
22
What does the average user do with Twitter?

Follow and discuss news or
live events
41% of URLs tweeted are news.
A majority of users use Twitter as a news aggregator.
Strategic Intelligence
Users follow mainly people who have the same kind of
business
Gossip
Asthon Kutcher, Britney Spears and Ellen DeGeneres
are the 3 most followed Twitter accounts
Compared to other communitydriven websites (facebook,

MySpace, etc.)
Twitter is more business and
gossip oriented.
...
23
What do bloggers do with Twitter?

They increase the ranking of
their blogs
Twitter has become one of the main sources of

traffic (eg : 10% of TechCrunch traffic ).
Being on Twitter increases your Google ranking.
They carry on a continuous

relationship with their readers
Followers get directly informed when a new post / a
new tweet is published.
They do link journalism

Bloggers use Twitter to analyze events in real time
Bloggers use Twitter to rapidly pinpoint interesting links
Twitter is a way, for bloggers,

to explore new editorial areas,
mainly link journalism & real
time analysis
...
24
How do companies use Twitter?

They monitor in real-time
competitors, reputation and
improve business intelligence
To evaluate consumer
satisfaction and take into
account their feedback
Crowd sourcing innovation to users (Zakos)
Conducting surveys on existing products (GM)
Gathering feedback on experimental products (Dunkin
Donuts)
Customer service (@MicrosoftHelps )
They sell and market their

products
New sales channel (Dell)
New marketing channel (Pizza Hut)
Twitter is an efficient marketing

tool, both for companies and
customers:
good knowledge of customers
& free marketing opt-in channel
...
25
How do public institutions use Twitter?

Emergencies
Police
Eg: @SF-311 for emergencies in SF
Eg: West Midlands Police (UK)
Governments
Eg : Downing Street (UK)
Twitter is an efficient
communication and reporting
tool for public institutions
...
26
Who is the most followed on Twitter?

Ashton Kutcher
3.9M
CNN 2.8M
Barack Obama
2.7M
Dell Outlet
1.4M
TechCrunch
1.1M
Number of
followers
Majority
of
accounts
< 50
Twitter is much more a one-way communication channel

than a social media network
...
27
Twitter usage is similar to wikipedia
90% of the content is

produced by 15% of users
90% of the content is

produced by 10% of users
More unidirectionnal than

peer to peer communication
Few contributors, many
readers
A community lead by
hyperactive users
Few actual tweople
The more followers you
have, the more you tweet
A typical power law distribution applies to Twitter content creation

...
28
Summary
What is Twitter?

Conclusion
...
29
What is the history of Twitter?

2006
launch
Twitter is publicly
launched.
2007
fame
Twitter won the blog

price at SXSW
Interactive*
2008
development
Twitter raises $22M

and opens its API,
developers create
Twitter applications.
2009
success
Twitter raises $35M

and has a growth of
1,300% in a year**
Twitters growth is amazing:

in 2009, Twitter is the fastest community driven growing-site.
...
* South by Southwest Interactive is one of the best festival in the world for creative technologies
** Feb 08- Feb 09
30
Twitter benefited from the rise of mobile Internet

The number of US mobile Internet users grew by
170% in two years*
The rise of mobile Internet users was a tremendous accelerator for Twitter
The 140-char format is adapted to mobile situations

People were already used to SMS
People can also tweet and be followed by using SMS.
...
* Feb 07- Feb 09 (Nielsen)
31
Thanks to an early adoption by celebrities and media,

Twitter reached a big audience rapidly
Celebrities
Most-followed accounts ever :
Twitter star system and verified accounts have spurred its adoption by a non-geeky audience
Media
Media coverage on Twitter before

other major medias
Ideal tool to cover live event in
real time
difficult to censor
Twitter became THE real time news channel

...
32
As a generic platform, Twitters growth has been

user-driven
API (opened in 2008)
developers
New uses: #, @, RT, etc.
New applications
users
New functions : RT, lists, etc.
...
33
A strong community of developers
It is very difficult to compete with Twitter, because a new-comer has to create

a more powerful network than Twitters one.
Picture by Thenextweb.Com
...
34
What are the prospects for Twitter?
By the end of 2009
By the end of 2013
25 million users
1 billion users
Q3 2009 : $400 000

Q4 2009 : $4 000 000
$1.54 billion in revenue,

$111 million in net earnings
How?
Whereas Twitter grows very fast,

its business model remains unpredictable
...
Source: TechCrunch, July 09
35
Summary
What is Twitter?

Conclusion
...
36
Make the bird lay golden eggs: hypothesis for

Twitters business model
Market research
Companies pay to do market research on
Twitter, Twitter selects the panels and
analyses the results
Couponing and/or SMS advertising

Ads and/or coupons to opt-in Twitter accounts.
Prospects selected by geolocation or by Twitter
Contextual ads (Google Adwords like)

Freemium
You have to pay to get pro access to Twitter
Contextual ads on Twitter search and during

tweeting
...
37
When should Twitter begin to monetize?

1) Now
Advantages
Risks
Twitter has high and

short-term financial
expectations, Twitter
should monetize fast
to keep VC happy.
Twitter would pay all

the testing costs to
find the appropriate
business model
Twitter would acquire

a real business
experience.
Twitter could engage

in a wrong business
model.
...
38
When should Twitter begin to monetize?

2) Later
Advantages
Risks
Twitter has such a big community, that it could start its monetization by testing various
business models at a small-scale.
...
39
Summary
What is Twitter?

Conclusion
...
40
...
41
facebook?
The ox that wants to be the frog
facebook is a
giant compared to Twitter
350M users
approx 20M users
facebook looks more and more like Twitter since the acquisition of friendfeed :
facebook wants to go public
?
...
42
facebook?
Twitter competes with facebook on contextual ads, real-time search and CRM
Business purposes
Personal activities
Users are more reluctant to have ads on facebook 20M

than on
Twitter.
users
Tweets have a larger public than facebook updates.
Private real-time information
Public real-time information
More information is available on Twitter than on facebook, making

real-time search more accurate.
Unless facebook succeeds in becoming public, Twitter has a better position.

...
43
...
44
Google?
Twitter & Google cooperate in the field of real time search
Old news
Steady content
The webs long term
memory
Page rank
Real time news

Dynamic content
The webs short term
memory 20M users
Retweet rank ?
Need Twitters real time

content
Need access to Twitter
firehose to rank tweets
Need Google search

technology & traffic
In October 2009, they reached an agreement to include

Twitter content in Google search results
...
45
Google?
pushes initiatives towards a fragmented real-time content market...
Google Wave could become a universal real-time conversation

platform
Google will index the whole real-time web thanks to PubSubHubbub, a realtime protocol
In December 2009 Google struck formal partnerships with Facebook,
mySpace and Twitter to index their live updates
=> The new version of the Google search engine, Caffeine, will emphasize
real-time search results including tweets, blog items, news articles and social
networking updates
...and a monopolistic real-time search market

...
46
...
47
Spam?
A threat for Twitter
Spammers use Twitter for two purposes :
Tweetomercials
Cons
Though Twitter is making progress on blocking spam (they introduced a

report spam function on October), spam could reflect as badly on Twitter as
it reflected on Myspace.
...
48
Other micro-blogging services ?
open source, no character limitation.

belongs to Google
=> Google didnt build a large enough community to compete with
Twitter
Niche market : enterprise microblogging

Has a business model
internal company information
=> Popular but doesnt directly compete with Twitter
For the time being, no other micro blogging platform is in position to

compete with Twitter : Twitter rules them all!
...
49
Summary
What is Twitter?

Conclusion
...
50
Worst case scenario:

Twitter may be asphyxiated by competition on all of its potential markets
Social
Network
Information
analysis
New protocols may

enable broadcasting
quicker, free and
less proprietary realtime content
All social networks

foster real-time
status broadcasting,
and compete with
Twitter on features
and privacy
As real-time streams
grow from various
sources, the real
business model may
belong to companies
able to filter the
information.
Companies duplicate
Twitter interface but
specialize efficiently
on vertical markets
Eg : PubsHubbub
protocol as a pushnotification RSS may
offer real-time
broadcast to all
Eg : Facebook as a
Twitter based on
real-life social
network
Eg : Google Caffeine
as a competitor on
real-time search
Eg : Yammer creates
a B2B Twitter with
specific distribution,
features and
business model
Real-time
protocol
Specialized
Business tool
By willing to maintain a wide-open pulse of the world, Twitter may be

overwhelmed by businesses grounded in reality
...
51
Best case scenario:

Twitter may become....
Real-time
protocol
The most trusted
source for real-time
data
Social
Network
Information
analysis
Specialized
Business tool
The first mode of

communication
between individuals
Robust platform for

analyzing massive
amounts of real time
data and behavior
Ensure customer
satisfaction and
loyalty, while
providing targeted,
geolocalized ads
Geolocation
Services
Friend
updates
Media
Contact mgmt
Celebrities
Social Search
$$
Real time
analytics
CRM
Human
behavior
E-commerce
Data
aggregation
Real time
feedback
$$
$$$
a standard of real-time information, data, and communication

between individuals and businesses. Twitter can be the leading
communication platform for commerce and people.
...
52
The Innovation Agency
faberNovel, founded in 2003, specializes in designing and realizing innovative

projects.
Based in Paris and San Francisco, faberNovel builds on emerging technologies,
methodologies or practices to create new products.
faberNovels team combines the necessary talents and passion to turn their clients
wishes into market realities: Idea > concept > prototype > product > success!
References: Avis, Groupe Suez, JCDecaux, LOral, Orange, Pages Jaunes, RATP,
SFR, SNCF, Vinci, etc.
See our strategic studies on:
http://www.fabernovel.com/en/analyze/realisation/strategic-studies-and-surveys
...
53
Tracking and sharing innovation : since its beginning in 1978 in Paris, LAtelier has
been helping executive committee in such fields as innovation and internet strategy.
L'Atelier teams have been actively involved in technology for years, acquiring solid
expertise and an impressive network of contacts. Strategic and operational insights
from L'Atelier experts have earned a reputation for both vision and provocative
thinking. A respected observer of developments in France, LAtelier opened a San
Francisco office in 2006 and one in Shanghai in 2007.
http://www.atelier.fr | http://www.atelier-us.com | http://asie.atelier.fr
...
54
17, rue du fbg du Temple 75010 Paris

Tl. : +33 1 42 72 20 04
Fax. : +33 1 42 72 20 03
www.fabernovel.com
Contact presse:
Sabrina Distinguin
sabrina.distinguin@fabernovel.com
16 rue de Hanovre 75002 Paris

Tl. : +33 1 43 16 92 00
Fax. : +33 1 43 16 91 00
http://www.atelier.fr/
Contact presse Rumeur Publique:
Thomas Boullonnois
thomas@rumeurpublique.fr
...
55

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@all studying the #Twitter phenomenon

This work is licensed by faberNovel and LAtelier under the

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

Comment this study

To comment the study, tag your messages with:

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

Who could challenge Twitter?

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

Meet the tweet

A tweet is a text-based message up to 140 characters

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

You follow people

Following someone means you get their tweets

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

And people follow you

Your followers get your tweets in real-time :

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

By default, everything is public on Twitter

Unlike Facebook, you usually dont have to know

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

Twitter interface : simple and elegant

Whats happening for

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

To define what Twitter is, lets see what Twitter isnt

blog The number of characters of a post is unlimited. One

sms You can send both a tweet an a SMS from your

# Public SMS platform?

Twitter is not a SMS

social network In a social network, your profile is private.

# Public social network?

Twitter is not a social network

chat A chat conversation is private, a Twitter

Twitter is the SMS of internet era.

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / Atelier BNP - Paribas

Who could challenge Twitter?

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

Reputation: Twitter in France

Dear French Internet user, do you know...

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

Reputation: Twitter in France

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

Usages: Twitter in France

Percentage of Twitter members within our aware

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

Reputation: Twitter in France

Who knows Twitter in France?

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

Usages: Twitter in France

Who is the French Twitter user ?

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

Usages: Twitter in France

What publication client/device do you use ?

Source : Poll launched by LAtelier

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

Usages: Twitter in France

Tweeting, yes, but for what ideal purposes ?

Creating and sharing a friend network

Having good deals & coupons

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

Usages: Twitter in France

Tweeting, yes, but for what real purposes ?

Source : Poll launched by LAtelier

Twitter Study December 09 faberNovel / LAtelier de BNP - Paribas

Usages: Twitter in France