Do You Need to be on Twitter?

This is an important question to consider as people have less and less time and resources to do more and more. After all, Twitter can take over your life if you're not careful. Is it REALLY necessary to have a presence?

Twitter. Image: Flickr user Danilo Ramos.

In a word, yes. Why? Let's do the numbers.

First, how many people are on Twitter?

• 13% of US online adults use Twitter.
• Half of those people are accessing Twitter using their mobile phones.
• 20.6 million US adults access Twitter at least once a month.
• 460K new accounts are created each day.
• 177 million Tweets sent daily.
• 77% of the top US companies have Twitter accounts, and 72% of all US companies are on Twitter.

Your Takeaway: Simply, a huge number of people are on Twitter. If you need to reach more people, it's worth a try to start talking to them, and more importantly, to see what they are talking about.

What kind of People are on Twitter?

Statistically, the person who is most likely to use Twitter is a female Latina in her 20s who attended college, lives in a city, and earns less than $30K annually, or $50 - $75K, though all kinds of people have Twitter accounts.

Your Takeaway: This means that if your product appeals to minority audiences (African-Americans are currently adopting Twitter at higher rates than other groups), this is a great way to reach them. You'll reach people at all income levels, and fairly educated users, some low-income, but others moving up in the world. If you'd like to reach people who are looking to save money, who like to follow the news, and who are interested in pop culture, Twitter is one place to find them.

What are people doing on Twitter?

Posting their own status updates, but also keeping in touch with friends, checking the news, using it for work-related needs, and for research.  About 25% of Twitter users check their accounts several times daily, from multiple devices, including their phones.

Your Takeaway: Once you've started posting to Twitter, make sure you include content that other people want to retweet and that you're meeting the needs of your followers. Are they following your feed because it helps them with their research or work, to save money, for entertainment, for news? Keep this in mind as you craft your posts.

How do I use Twitter?
I use Twitter to keep in touch with others in my industry and small business owners who are looking for guidance on marketing. My feed is a mix of retweets, replies, links, suggestions, and references to my blog. I have a modest, but growing following (thanks all). Click here to see my profile.

Stats thanks to the generous folks at Pew Internet and Hubspot.

How do you use Twitter? Please share.