stuart piazza .blog

Though no one knows what Twitter’s business model is, there are still new sites every day that are built solely on the Twitter API. Why? Because people can profit themselves from the platform right now, and only hope for good things for the future. However, if Twitter were to shut down there servers tomorrow, there would be thousands of sites rendered useless. What keeps them going, and why shouold you get into the action? New to Twitter?

To easily answer that question, check out this graph. It’s based on Twitter’s traffic for the past six months.

Though the graph fluctuates and dips every few months, it is continually rising. In fact, Twitter has continued to surpass sites almost every month that are ranked under 100 in Alexa, and that takes a lot of increased traffic. Sure, Alexa isn’t totally accurate, but it’s the closest thing we have to officially ranking sites. Twitter’s traffic may even be greater than what Alexa picks up, but only the company and their investors know.  Either way, we can see that Twitter is continuing to rise per month, and if you wait around too long, there may not be room for your Twitter-based App.

So what should you do? Purchase a Twitter domain…now. Think of something, preferably with Tweet or Twit, bird, or Twitter in it, and purchase the domain.  Buogo, Inc. is sitting on a number of Twitter domains only to be used for with our own apps or sell them in the future. We have already launched our first Twitter-based site, TweetMyLink, and there will be more to come.

You may be asking “Aren’t you creating competition for yourself by encouraging people to create Twitter-based sites?” Yup, and we love it. Twitter needs sites like these to continue to grow and hopefully in the future profit. Sites like these need competition to improve on their game and offer more to the internet than they ever did before. Competition, especially on the web, is a good thing.

If you are indeed worried that Twitter may go out of business and your site will go with them, then come up with something that can still be used afterward. Perhaps loosely base it around the API, or create something that is marketed towards Twitter users but everyone can use it. Like TinyURL, yFrog, TwitPic, eggURL, or any other web app that is beneficial to both someone using Twitter and those who are missing out.

I predict that now is the best time to start on your tweet-action.  Whether it’s a highly followed account, an app based on the Twitter API, or something mobile that you have in mind, get a start on it. If you are a web developer I highly recommend that you get into this game. You’ll love it, you’re users will love it, and in the long run, Twitter will love it because you are improving the power and publicity of their platform. Oh, now I see what their business model is.