Statistics Show Expanding Use Of Twitter Search: Is This Now A Vital Advertising Resource?

New figures published recently show that searches made on Twitter are reaching a significant level. The total number of search requests made in one month now comfortably surpasses the number made on Yahoo and Bing together, although the total number of Twitter searches is still only one fifth of those made on Google. This again raises the question: with so many prospective clients apparently joining Twitter every day, should an enterprise be worried about Twitter and the other social services?

Twitter would like enterprises to believe that the service has commercial uses. Its website suggests examples where business opportunities have arisen, or ways that orders could be taken. However, within the limitations of the service, this is nothing that could not be done through other means such as a normal phone call. At best, a business presence on Twitter will only have room to create messages with a link to its normal website (which will have been tuned with search optimization strategies).

search engine optimisation is not going to have any impact on searches made inside Twitter. Then again, it is the style of searches on Twitter to be for different reasons to normal search engines. Generally, those searches will be for a person or news source to follow, not a business purpose. There are also questions arising about those figures. The figures of searches made has been published by Twitter themselves, not by an independent research company. It also does not take into consideration the fact that many service users use an interface such as TweetDeck which is continually making searches without any particular effort by the user.

Google and the other search engines are trying to include feeds from Twitter in results pages, so references to a Twitter search will get a high search engine positioning for a popular subject. However, unless your organization is especially newsworthy, probably for the wrong reasons, then there is unlikely to be anyone making a mention of your enterprise’s website. Similarly, as a lot of the messages broadcast on the service are going to be of social interest, there are going to be almost none making a mention of a specific organization.

Twitter has its uses as a way of getting information out to anyone who chooses to listen, but it is not going to be a major trading arena. Any real trade will be taking place outside the social networks. Applying search engine optimisation strategies to your enterprise’s website to reach a raised search engine positioning will still be productive. search optimization works with all normal search platforms not matter which social service is in fashion.

Eventually most users realise that life is too short to spend all day in a social service. Hundreds of thousands of new users may be registering with the service every day but nobody really knows how many are actively using the service over a long period. For any proper business activity, these users will be reverting to a normal search engine, and your organization should be using search optimization to make that search worthwhile.

The volume of searches on Twitter may have reached a significant level but it is the quality of those searches that demotes their significance. With five times the volume going through Google, gaining a good search engine positioning on non-social search engines through search engine optimisation strategies is still wise.