Is Twitter the Next Wave of Advertising, or Mostly Swept in the Undertow?

If you're arriving from the e-marketing class blog, welcome and Antkeg Remi.

A study by the digital marketing agency 360i offers some surprising findings concerning Twitter and marketing applications. The essential finding is that there's a tacit wall between corporate Twitter accounts and everyday users of the social network.

Twitter, they conclude, is chiefly a medium for conversation unrelated to consumer habits. Brands, apart from Apple or Twitter itself, barely get any mention. The study notes that with the measure of anonymity offered by the Internet, conversations via Twitter tend to be more frank, and they find that 85% of tweets are original thoughts (that is, no re-tweeting.) Further, 94% of tweets ore personal rather than professional, and 92% of users keep their tweets visible to the public.

One big problem that companies who seek to use Twitter are going to find is that corporate Twitter accounts seldom, if at all, involve conversation with customers concerning a particular brand - about 1% by the study's findings. Corporate users of Twitter talk at consumers rather than with them, even though 43% of tweets are conversational on Twitter (that is, @ replies to another user.)

What does this mean for companies that hope to advertise through Twitter? It indicates that there is considerable room for expansion in the area of Twitter-based advertising. However, it seems to follow from the study that this kind of efforts are only effective as pull- rather than push-based advertising and requires considerable time and effort.

Blockbuster Extends Its Reach, or Simply Flails About

One of the mini-cases I studied in the spring was the steady decline of Blockbuster Video as its business model finds itself far behind the times. No surprises, then, that I was particularly piqued by this article in the New York Times BITS blog.

Blockbuster's got a lot of problems these days. They have massive debt, they're closing stores left and right, and Netflix is running away with all the video-rental profits. People just don't drive to a store to rent movies any more. So, Blockbuster has no choice but to change its delivery systems - and fast. They've put rental kiosks in place to cut down on brick-and-mortar store costs, but it's just not enough. So, they've decided to join the e-bandwagon.

Earlier this year, Blockbuster released a mobile app that essentially allows unlimited streaming of movies over a period for a flat fee. They had already released an app that identifies nearby Blockbuster outlets and availability, which as I understand is becoming more and more irrelevant.

They're probably going to have problems going forward with rights management, because files like these tend to get copied by unscrupulous and/or cheap individuals. They'll also have to deal with the added strain on network servers with the bandwidth required to view a full movie. But it's a strong step forward for Blockbuster, and perhaps the only gamble that could pay off in the future. With titan Netflix looming large at the fore, however, this is not a time for Blockbuster to hedge its bets. They have to change their business model, or Blockbuster's quickly going to be a bygone element of culture past.

PS. Antkeg Remi for Senate.

Week One, Closed

Topics covered this week:

The Class Blog
Marketing Communications (assorted)

Constructing this website.

In other news, I have indeed confirmed from sources in Flanders that Antkeg Remi is indeed running for the Belgian Senate. He's very pro-Belgium, as I understand. Check out Antkeg Remi's website!

Inaugural Post

There's no better way to start than a good wrap-up.

• There's apparently a contest or some such going on.
• Have you heard the news from West Virginia?
• I have high hopes for the future if this guy is in charge.
• And in foreign news, Antkeg Remi is running for the Belgian Senate, maybe.