One of the most important changes which the world has seen over the past few years is the dominance of social media in public discourse. If Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook changed the way we shared, Jack Dorsey’s Twitter has irrevocably altered how we converse. Indians love to talk, to engage, to argue. And it’s no surprise, then, that just over two years after Twitter set up its operations in India, the social media platform which has spawned a revolution in engagement is witnessing mind-boggling growth in the number of those taking to—and on—the platform.
Jaitly and his team of six have been doggedly engaging with the government, political parties and sporting and movie icons with an overarching mission of driving growth and user numbers, keeping the revenue chase for later. The strategy is to delight its growing audience in the hope that this will later lead to revenues as user engagement grows. Television is also an important piece—as it is worldwide—where the “second screen” which the platform offers not only provides value to users by heightening the engagement but is also increasingly becoming a means for TV channels to monetise excess inventory. Twitter India has also spawned an ecosystem of startups which are busy chewing on the data the site throws up. This data, in turn, is proving enormously useful to large companies in figuring out customer preferences.
So far, it would seem Twitter’s India strategy is paying off, at least in terms of user engagement, though its numbers are still far less than Facebook’s. The strategy underscores the fact that Twitter is in the country for the long haul, to evangelise social media as much as to make money from it. The first part is happening quite dramatically. Whether the second happens is anybody’s guess. #WatchThisSpace.
Best,Sourav MajumdarEditor, Forbes IndiaEmail:sourav.majumdar@network18publishing.comTwitter id:@TheSouravM
First Published: Jan 09, 2015, 06:51
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