Twitter has kept its traffic and usage statistics close to its chest for quite a while now much to many peoples frustration.

The fact that it didn’t release many twitter facts, figures and statistics led quite a few commentators to debate that Twitter was in fact starting to stumble and its demise was near.

The figures released at at the “Chirp” conference have in fact  revealed an astonishing level of continuing growth that will have many pundits putting away the obituary preparatory notes in the bottom draw.

I use a twitter tool (bit.ly) that enables me to measure what percentage of tweeters are clicking on twitter links from my blog from each country and what I have found happening is that subscribers from countries outside of the USA were  starting to really get on board the Twitter train and and this has only happened in the last few months. In February (only 2 months ago) the USA was generating well over 50% of the the clicks, today in mid April the number from the United States has dropped to only 38%. This indicates that the rest of the world is starting to Tweet. So the official figures revealed in the last couple of days have indeed confirmed that this is indeed the case.

The other fact I find elevated beyond expectation is the total number of users at 105 million, 12 months ago that number was 8 million.. that is a growth rate of over 1300% . The other number that stands out is the 180 million unique visitors a month. So here are some numbers for those of you that have a facts and figures fetish.

1. Twitter has 105,779,710 registered users
2. 300,000 new users sign up per day
3. Approximately 60% of them are coming from outside the U.S
4. Twitter receives 180 million unique visitors per month
5. 75% of Twitter traffic comes from third-party applications
6. 60% of all tweets come from third-party apps
7. Since the new Blackberry application was launched, it has accounted for 7 to 8% of new sign
8. There are 600 million search queries on Twitter per day
9. There are over 100,000 Twitter applications
10. Twitter gets 3 billion requests a day through its API
11. 37% of active Twitter users use their phone to tweet

The other statistic to watch is the use of Twitter on mobile which comes in at a headline rate of 37%, which is a trend that all marketers should keep in mind as they develop strategies for reaching out to to clients on the Web, don’t dismiss the mobile market .. it is getting serious.

So do these facts and figures surprise you?

This debate continues to rage and will continue for a while yet.

Do you automate some of your messages on Twitter or not? How much automation should you be using, if any at all?

There are essentially three camps.

1. Yes, Why Not
2. Absolutely Not
3. Sometimes

Twitter is great for promotion, whether it be of your own posts,other bloggers content, or information at other websites whether that be a post, video or a link to content in all its different mediums.

Twitter runs on several channels such as:

• The general stream or public stream for all to see
• The DM (Direct Message) channel  – only between 2 people on the private channel
• The @stream or RT that still is public but is collected in that persons feed
• # for aggregating Twitter updates at one location whether it be for an event or a hot topic or a sector

I use the public stream of  Twitter for a broadcasting marketing tool for my blog posts both current and past as well as other bloggers posts that I think are worth Tweeting. I also use it for communicating in public where appropriate.

The tool I use to automate the distribution of my posts is socialoomph.com (previously known as tweetlater.com) which allows me to automate two functions.

1. Auto follow – where I just say “Thanks for following me, I look forward to following your tweets” which appears in the DM of the follower.
2. Auto scheduling -  for distributing my blog posts headlines and links so that it can be seen in the public Twitter stream while I work and sleep

Another tool I use is twitterfeed.com where I can automate sending out other bloggers new posts that I know always deliver top content in the social media space whenever they post a new blog post.

So what are the views of some other top bloggers?

Guy Kawasaki’s take on this topic is essentially that Twitter is a great marketing tool and should be used as such. In a post “What Do You Use Twitter For? New Twitter Power Poll Survey” I quoted  a recent interview of  Guy’s comments (who is one of the top “Non Celebrity” users of Twitter).

Question: ”You currently have over 160,000 followers on Twitter (@guykawasaki) and are one of the top 5 users according to Twitter Grader (wow!). In what ways do you use and derive the most value from Twitter? What advice can you give marketers starting out on Twitter to inspire them that it’s worth investing their time?”

Answer: “Not everyone agrees with my use of Twitter. I approach it as a broadcast marketing tool to help me make Alltop successful. There is no right or wrong with Twitter. Like other large platforms, it’s a tool.”

Rober Scobelizer has another view in a recent post titled “Yo @chrisbrogan you’re doing Twitter wrong” where he discusses Chris Brogans use of Twitter and says

“So, Brogan, can you do the same thing? Give me JUST YOU in one feed and all your conversations in another (I do like that too).”

John Haydon put out a video post post titled “Twitter Techniques I Shouldn’t Be Showing You” that offers another aspect on this topic.

So what is your view?  “Vote Now” Have your say.

I have enjoyed and toyed with Twitter since I first signed up in December 2008, not expecting the journey to be so transformational.

For the first few months I sent the occasional tweet and connected with a few friends and watched the stream pass by. In March 2009 I started my blog inspired by the content, search engine optimisation, social media inspiration and evangelism provided by Hubspot. I then waded in a bit deeper and started to use tools and apps like TweetDeck and Bit.ly, Social Oomph, Hootsuite and Ping.fm to integrate with Twitter.

I discovered Guy Kawasaki and Alltop. I played with Klout and Mentionmap and started to think that Twitter was the best marketing tool for a global domination since the Beatles.

Twitter has connected and communicated my content to people from places as diverse as New York, Memphis, Miami and Lithuania. In fact, using my Bit.ly app,  I can see that in the last 30 days my blog tweets have been clicked on in 98 countries by 34,264 people.

I have had face to face meetings initiated by a Tweet. Next week  I am meeting a Social Media contact on his trip downunder from the United Kingdom arrangde via Twitter and have been invited to speak on panels and boardrooms because I tweet (and blog).

If I want to get intimate, close and personal then I change channels and communicate via DM followed by an exchange of phone numbers or email adresses.

Next a meeting  could be set up by telephone or email, followed by a face to face meeting.

If I want to write something that really engages with my audience, then it’s my blog. 140 characters is cheap and cheerful (and efficient) and points people in the right direction  but at the end of the day if I want to get intimate and provide in depth communication I change channels.

When H&R Block launched an ambitious social-media outreach campaign in 2008, it followed some textbook advice: fish where the fish are. So it went on Twitter looking for frustrated taxpayers, offering them help. Instead, the company found reticence among potential customers who didn’t want to air their problems on Twitter.

The next step was that they realized that they had to change, abandoning one-on-one Twitter contact in favor of building a Q&A community site, Get It Right (an enhanced blog), which replaced a more standard blog the company did last year. The Get It Right site required H&R Block’s social-media team to recruit and train 1,000 tax pros to answer questions. It looked to local managers to nominate tax preparers to participate. Early results are promising: Get It Right has signed up 65,000 members and answered 50,000 questions.

Zena Weist ..the Social Media Director  for the Company said that they are using Twitter and Facebook mostly as broadcast vehicles, hoping customers who have come to Get It Right, then tell their networks they were helped.

So if you want to be intimate, Twitter is good for the first date but you need to have a bit more substance, like a blog to go the distance.

So are you all a Twitter or is a blog in your asset portfolio planning?

Twitter has been around for a couple of years now and is now receiving over 50 Million unique visitors a month. It’s use as a tool for business has never been seen before in the history of the web. Twitters credibility has increased in recent months as it has struck deals with Bing (Microsoft’s search engine) as well as Google to provide real time search feeds. In this video we look at ten different ways you can use Twitter for business to increase revenue and traffic, improve service and reduce costs.

Note: I have also summarised the video’s content below in text format so that those who can’t view it due to slow internet connections or prefer reading to viewing can do so.

10 Reasons Why Twitter Is Great For Business

1. You can monitor real time conversation about your brand that can assist your marketing and management teams to see what is really being about your company today (not tomorrow or next week  as would be normal on Google or with Media and the Press) and modify marketing campaigns based on the monitoring.
2. Perform real time searches about your industry including your monitoring your competitors and seeing what is being said on Twitter about them. Some tools that can be used for this are Tweetdeck (columns can be set up for each type of keyword or phrase) and Google alert amongst many
3. Broadcast links and headlines that can drive traffic to your website, blog, landing pages and YouTube channels
4. Improve customer service  (A good case study on this is “ Zappos” an online shoe retailer)  by picking up conversations about your company that you might not be aware of and respond quickly to shut down any impending service or potentially damaging PR disasters.
5. Communicate and engage within your buinesses marketplace, sector or niche through direct messages commenting on their blogs via twitter and retweeting their tweets (You will be surprised how easily it can be to connect with someone that would not take a phone call or respond to an email).  
6. Run special deals and promotions on Twitter that you can use to drive traffic or move slow moving stock (exanple Dell)
7. Build your your company’s and or personal brand through positioning yourself as a thought leader through posting great tweets and embedded links leading back to your blog or website
8. Share your ideas internally in a very efficient manner through the latest feature from Twitter called lists that can be private or open
9. It can be used to humanise a faceless conglomerate  (see David Meerman Scotts Video at General Motors) and remove the company ivory tower persona by Tweeting about  the real issues and responding to  other people’s tweets within your industry.
10. Connect to leaders in your industry through following other thought leaders and commenting on their tweets (Twitter etiquette usually means if you follow someone they follow you back)

So how are you using Twitter for business?

Some interesting Twitter facts and figures have come out of  reports and research over the past few weeks and it reveals some expected results and also some surprises.

Expected

1. USA Twitter share is ranked number one with 62%
2. Most of the largest cities that use Twitter are in the USA
3. English speaking countries dominate
4. The UK is ranked second as a Twitter nation
5. The majority of iPhone owners using Twitter are located in the U.S. 
6. 65% of all users are under 25
7. Tuesday is the most popular day for Twitter activity, accounting for 15.7% and you Tweet from 11am to 3pm (of course this was expected, who wants to tweet on Monday)

Surprising

1. Australia’s share is 4th on the list with  nearly 3% despite having a population of  only  just over 20 million
2. Brazil ranks 5th despite not being English speaking
3. Women outnumber men  
4. 5% of users account for 75% of all activity
5. More than half of twitter users use something other than Twitter to tweet, monitor and manage their tweeting (TweetDeck has the largest market share with 19.7%)
6. 1 out of every 350 visits to a Website comes from Twitter as a source
7. Barely 5% of Twitter users go to an online retail service from Twitter. Google UK sends 365 times more traffic to shopping websites than Twitter

Summary: So what can we determine from theses figures is  that tThe typical profile of a Twitter user is

• You will live in the US
• Be a Woman
• Hate shopping online… what !!!!
• Young (under 25)
• Own an iPhone
• Enjoy Social Networking 
• Don’t like music

Note: Don’t take this too seriously 

Some of the rest of the findings after analyzing 11.5 million Twitters accounts, Sysomos.com (you can read their full report here)  discovered that:

• 72.5% of all users joining during the first five months of 2009.
• 85.3% of all Twitter users post less than one update/day
• 21% of users have never posted a Tweet
• 93.6% of users have less than 100 followers, while 92.4% follow less than 100 people.
• 5% of Twitter users account for 75% of all activity
• New York has the most Twitters users, followed by Los Angeles, Toronto, San Francisco and Boston; while Detroit was the fast-growing city over the first five months of 2009
• More than 50% of all updates are published using tools – mobile and Web-based – other than Twitter.com. TweetDeck is the most popular non-Twitter.com tool with 19.7% market share.
• There are more women on Twitter (53%) than men (47%)
• Of people who identify themselves as PR professionals, 65.5% have never posted an update
• Of the people who identify themselves as PR professionals, 15% follow more than 2,000 people.
• This compares with 0.29% of overall Twitter users who follow more than 2,000 people.

“We wanted to take an extensive snapshot of Twitter that goes far beyond anything done to document Twitter’s growth and demographics,” said Nick Koudas, Sysomos’ co-founder and chief executive. “While Twitter’s growth has been well documented, we wanted to put the spotlight on how people use Twitter, as well as identify many of the key trends in their backgrounds, demographics and activity. Our study, based on the most comprehensive dataset of Twitter users, provides a wealth of information for anyone interested in getting in-depth details about Twitter.”

On the other hand Hitwise’s Research Shows 

• 1 out of every 350 website visits in the UK comes from Twitter as a source
• It’s the 30th biggest source of traffic in the UK
• 55.9% of all website referrals go to a social network, entertainment website, or blog
• Twitpic receives 1 out of every 13 UK Twitter visitors, making it the biggest 3rd party site on Twitter
• Barely 5% of Twitter users go to an online retail service from Twitter. Google UK sends 365x more traffic to shopping websites than Twitter

Summary from Hitwise:

UK Twitter users love CNN, tech blogs, and Facebook. They’re not very interested in retail, music, education, sports, travel, or business and finance websites. While it’s probably different for Twitter as a whole, we’d be surprised if retail websites fared that much better with U.S. users.

So Internet marketers, how can you use these findings to help your clients use Twitter more effectively?

I have been using “TweetDeck” a lot recently, because as my followers on Twitter have grown, communicating as well as filtering the “noise” more efficiently has become a priority to save time and keep me sane.

Also, as I have spent more time on Twitter, being able to update my Facebook page in the one location is a great time saver.

As a tool it has lot more to offer once you learn how to use it and some of the features that I find useful are.

• Lets me update my Facebook as well as do a tweet in one convenient location
• I can also shorten a URL and send it with the Tweet and the Facebook update
• Create Groups that I can track, like Social Media “Gurus”, Top Bloggers and Friends in an easy to view column format
• It provides a feed from my Facebook page so I can see what is happening with my friends on Facebook
• I can retweet from within Tweetdeck
• I can update my favourites
• Send a direct message
• Add Twitpics to my Tweets
• You can even email the tweet from TweetDeck

There are many other features and functions that are very useful, and I am sure as this software tool develops that it may become one of the premier Twitter tools on the market.

A good Video Tutorial I have seen on using “TweetDeck that I would highly recommend is by Christopher Hughes.