I found a really interesting article on Nielson the other day which outlines the amazing growth of Twitter in just one year. In February 2008, Twitter had 475,000 users. Just one year later there is more than 7 million! That is a growth rate of 1382%!
Interestingly, the article also mentions the largest demographic (by far) is the 35-49 age range. 41% of Twitter users fall into this category. Very interesting!
To help aid the Twitter community one of our boys in the office (thanks Isaac!) put together a small document of helpful Twitter applications that you may be interested in learning about. If you have anything to add please feel free to mention them in the comments area.
Helpful Twitter Applications
http://friendorfollow.com/ Find out who’s following you
AlexKking.org, WordPress Plugins
BubbleTweet.com You can put videos inside bubbles
CustomtWitterBackGround.com Custom backgrounds $67.00
EasyTweets.com Manages trends in Twitter – see what is going on.
Hahlo.com Shows public timeline in twitter.
HappyTweets.com It is a measuring stick for how positive, or happy, a particular Tweet is. Enter the Twitter username for you or one of your buddies, click the "get happy" button, and you'll find out how happy your Tweets are.
HelloTxt.com Update your status and read your friends' status across all main
microblogging and social networks all at once...
Monitter.com It's a Twitter monitor, it lets you "monitor" the twitter world for a set of
keywords and watch what people are saying. Cool huh?
MyTweeple.com These tools are designed to help you make informed decisions when it comes to following people on Twitter.
tweet-news.com News poster of new information on your twitter.
Ping.fm Update your social networks in a snap on mobile or wherever.
ReTweetist.com Hot updates of the most retweeted URLs.
TheMattinator.com Posting to multiple twitter accounts without logging in.
Tweepler.com Process your new twitter followers. Classify them in new buckets and manage
those you don’t wish to follow by ‘ignoring’ them.
Tweet2Tweet.com See conversations between other people.
Tweet3D.com Subject tweeting (not sure about this one)
TweetBeep.com Twitter Alerts by email.
TweetBots.com Control custom twitter bots: Track, follow, auto-follow, re-tweet, feed, etc.
TweetBurner.com Shorten, share or track a URL.
TweetChat.com Live chat with someone who also has tweetchat.
TweetDeck.com Allows broader overview of tweets, messages, etc. into columns,
timeframes, etc.
TweetGrid.com Create a Twitter Search Dashboard that updates in real time.
TweetLater.com Set up alerts and track keywords in the public Twitter stream in Facebook
or other snippets in other URLs. Manage all Twitter accounts from one
console.
TweeTree.com You put your Twitter stream in a tree so you can see the posts people are replying to in context. It also pulls in lots of external content like twitpic photos, youtube videos and more, so that you can see them right in your stream without having to click through every link your friends post.
TweetRush.com It is a service based on our Rush Hour engine that aims to provide estimated stats on Twitter usage over a period of time.
TweetStats.com Graph your Twitter Stats including: Tweets/hour Tweets/month Tweet timeline Reply Statistics
Twellow.com Twellow is a service to help Twitter users find people to follow. From Accountants to Yoga, Twellow categorizes and organizes Twitter into hundreds of niches to make your searching easier. So go ahead, Connect with people who matter.
Twemes.com View Twitter Themes.
Twhirl.org twhirl is a social software desktop client, based on the Adobe AIR platform.
Many features are included. View them on the site.
Twit.tv This is where you can post videos to Twitterers.
TwitBacks.com Free Twitter backgrounds.
TwitBlogs.com Blogging on Twitter networks.
Twithority.com Search engine for authority figures.
TwitPic.com Share photos on Twitter
TwitStat.com Twitter Mobile Client to do things like “ego” searches and smart highlighting.
Twitter Berry Post Twitter updates on your Blackberry. You don’t need an SMS.
TwitterFeed.com Feed your blog to Twitter, identi.ca, HelloTxt or Ping.fm
Twitterholic.com Statistics Reader of Twitter Followers and Friends
Twitter Keys Put special keystrokes on your keyboard. There are 11 different ones.
TwitterLocal.net Filters Tweets by location.
TwitterVision.com Maps Twitter locations.
Twitter Growth Will Continue Thanks To The Mobile Phone
We are also seeing what is perhaps the first widespread web application being influenced by the mobile phone market. Yes, we all know that Smart Phones are now everywhere but until Twitter came along, the dent on internet traffic from phones was negligible. Twitter is the perfect application for phones. Quick, and easy, we can let the world know how we are feeling or what we are doing. (Why we all feel the need to do this is another question – but hey – we do!)
In January 2009 735,000 unique visitors visited Twitter from mobile phones and the average user visited 14 times and spent 7 minutes interacting with the site.
Some Practical Uses for Twitter
For those of you struggling to understand what role Twitter can play in your corporate mix you may want to check out an earlier blog; “How Twitter Fits Into Your Corporate Marketing Plan.”
on
Tweets are like SMSes-remain for public viewing.
Although Twitter has been around for a few years, it is only recently that Twitter has seen a bang in its popularity and use.
on
This is a right low-down on all the tweety twitters. One cannot sideline the importance given to twitter by big ‘G’ For businesses, particularly start ups — this provides a low-cost way to get instant Google love.
on
Yes,
Twitter is awesome when used correctly.
on
My faves include:
TweetDeck for using Twitter
PeopleBrowsr a more robust application than TweetDeck and doesn’t require Adobe Air (blocked by some firewalls) but sometimes clunky
Twitter Grader (twitter.grader.com) for finding influential twitterers on any topic in any location and for grading yourself as a twitterer
Twitalyzer even better at grading yourself as a twitterer
Mr. Tweet recommends people to follow
on
That’s a nice list of Twitter applications there. I can now spend more time in the twitter sphere. Thanks!
on
Yes, the growth of Twitter has been phenomenal indeed. Many are calling it the next best thing to happen to the internet after Google. What is interesting is that this growth comes from personal use and not from businesses queuing up to graze the social bookmarking garden. And for personal users it’s so much fun and so much easy using Twitter.
on
Tweeting is the trend and Twitter is the new buzz on the internet. Celebrities and bloggers worldwide are using this ‘little bird’ to reach out to their supporters (followers). We have a great opportunity to add our corporate profile in twitter business directory (twibs.com). People can vote and rate this business listing, and as the rating improves, our listing will automatically come up on the top listing!
on
An annual growth rate of 1382% is just phenomenal. I doubt if any other social book marking site ever recorded such a colossal growth. And, featuring a slew of user friendly applications Twitter must obviously maintain this growth tempo. It seems that Twitter is all out to pose a direct challenge to Google in the near future. Google beware.