Facebook: Consumers locked into technology ?
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"It's something
that feeds on itself," Comscore director Andrew
Lipsman said. "The more people who come into the
network, the more connected they become to each
other and there actually becomes a greater cost
to leaving the network." "At some point it
becomes a critical mass," he said. "It becomes so
strong that its difficult to unlock and I think
Facebook has reached that point."
Keep in mind that even though Facebook is the
number one social media site it's still ruled by
its audience. Last year Facebook tried to make
some changes to their site only to have users
rebel forcing them to go back to previous
versions of the portal page. As a marketer it
seemed likely to me that one social media site
would grow and thrive while others declined or
focused on niche audiences like LinkedIn.
Is this the end of Twitter? No, of course not.
Those of us who know how to use Twitter find it a
very valuable business tool to stay on top of
industry news and trends. Some businesses are
using Twitter to excel at customer service and in
an era of instant gratification takes too long
it's a great way to reach out and extend brand
equity.
So why has Twitter growth leveled off?
1.
People don't understand how to use it:
You
probably don't want to read Tweets about what
people had for lunch of saw at the movies last
night and it takes time to determine which
Tweeters add value in your terms such as business
news or new tech trends.
2.
You follow too many people:
Have
a cup of coffee and go online and you could find
that you have hundreds of unread Tweets. It's bad
enough to sort through your eMail and RSS reader
who has time to read all these Tweets? People
need to be very selective about who they follow
and drop people who Tweet irrelevant information
because today speed of knowledge is power.
3.
You don't have access to
Twitter: A lot of
companies are restricting use of Twitter at work
as the lawyers try and determine who is
responsible for Tweets you post.
4.
OK, I get technology lock-in but Twitter really
has changed in like forever !
After a test
roll-out last week, Twitter's just added a new
system that displays the Tweet trends that are
most relevant to your particular location. It's
an experiment in location-based news discovery,
and it could make Twitter very powerful indeed.
But in an age when we are more likely to feel
connected to someone who thinks and feels like us
hundreds or thousand of miles away this feature
may not be what users want.
5.
140 Character posts have limitations:
Short attention
spans and instant gratification go hand-in-hand
but let's face it sometimes you want to say more
that 140 characters will allow. Sure there are
services like Twitlonger and image services but
they require someone to perform an action to get
to the information and today time is the new
currency with people working harder just to keep
their jobs.
Does Facebook have anything to worry about ? They
sure do. The product life cycle on the Internet
is very short just ask Yahoo and AOL. The
challenge they have is to continue to make
Facebook a relevant part of our lives while not
alienating users who are used to the format. This
means that traditional advertisers should not use
Facebook to interrupt us but give us the option
to raise our hand and say "I want to engage with
you".
The winner in this race is going to be consumers;
they have the power to make or break social media
platforms through their power of the mouse.
