Edison Research just released an insightful report entitled "Twitter Usage in America: 2010".  This report is important because it cuts through the fanatical hype and provides a basis for establishing a rational decision about how much or how little your firm should incorporate such social media channels in your marketing efforts.

Many write ups I’ve read on this report have painted the findings in a negative light, emphasizing that "only" 7% of American’s actually use Twitter.  However, 7% of Americans is 17 million people and as it turns out these people appear to have many favorable characteristics for most businesses. Here are some selected findings from the report about Twitter users:

• 7% (~17 million) of Americans use Twitter; 41% (~126 million) Americans maintain a Facebook profile.
• 51% of active Twitter users follow companies, brands or products on social networks.
• Twitter users are 3 times more apt to follow brands using Twitter than other social networking services.
• Twitter users have higher than average incomes.
• 4 out of 10 Twitter users own three or more computers.
• About 1/2 of Twitter users post updates using Twitter; 70% of these same users post updates on other social networking sites like Facebook.

It’s easy to incorporate Twitter into your marketing plan

When considering if you should incorporate Twitter into your marketing efforts I think of the adage, "If it might help, it’s easy to do and won’t hurt then why not?" For those who are already publishing any sort of news or advertising communication on a regular basis it’s a no-brainer; we can put together a streamlined process so the same message is published to multiple mediums all at once. A typical scenario goes like this:

You provide your newsletter, advertisement to us. We take that message and immediately:

1. Post on your Website or Blog
2. Generate an optimized RSS feed that notifies Google and other major search services of your new article
3. Post on your business’ Facebook page
4. Tweet through your business’ Twitter account
5. Format, test and distribute in HTML email to your mailing list using an email marketing service like VerticalResponse or Constant Contact

Feel free to contact me for more information about electronic and social media marketing distribution.