Twitter to start charging commercial customers?

Because the U.S. economy is doing amazing (obvious sarcasm), individuals as well as corporations and institutions are hurting for money.  Twitter (a microblogging service…sort of like a mini-facebook if you will) is no different.  What is strange is that even after nearly 3 years of operation, they still don’t have any revenue model.  Odd for a company that is growing and as large as Twitter has become.  A company that uses vast amounts of data, has no revenue plan whatsoever, and given the current economic times is pushing Twitter to the edge monetarily.  What are they planning to do?

In an interview between a British trade magazine, “Marketing”, Biz Stone the co-founder was quoted saying:

“We are noticing more companies using Twitter and individuals following them. We can identify ways to make this experience even more valuable and charge for commercial accounts.”

So what does it mean for individuals…nothing.  Commerical users…fees are likely to be a thing of the future if they plan on continuing to use Twitter to market their business.  Mr. Stone didn’t give any exact details as to what or how commerical Twitter users would be charged.  Obviously, it can’t be too expensive and there can’t be a million hoops to jump through or else commercial users will just move elsewhere.  Easy and cheap needs to be Twitters focus as to keep all of their current users while still adding more.  There is a very good article going through Twitter and what it needs to do to keep growing at NY Mag.  Head on over and give the article a read…it’s a good one.

Do you use Twitter as an individual or are  you promoting a business?  Talk to me.

Source: Tech Crunch, Marketing Magazine, NY Mag