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What if Twitter started charging?

Updated on April 18, 2012

Twitter Micro Blogging. Would you pay?

Everybody knows what Twitter is. If you don't know what it is, shame on you. But for those of you who do not know what Twitter is all about, let me give you a basic concept of what it is.

Twitter is a micro blogging platform that allow you to write a short little bit, 140 characters to be exact, on what it is that you are doing at the moment or whatever else you may want to sum up in 140 characters. And that is basically it. Well, not even close.

Many people today are using Twitter to build large groups of followers that like the work that they do, mainly on websites and blogs, and then every now and again, they pitch them a product recommendation for them to take a look at. So, it's really an internet marketers dream site. Especially when that internet marketer has thousands if not hundreds of thousands of real followers. There are many people that are making some really good money using it. But they use it right.

Other things have come along too recently that created quite a buzz about Twitter. Amazon recently incorporated a linking tool in their associate bar that allows associates to instantly insert a link to a product into Twitter. So if that associate has thousands of visitors, it is pretty much 1 second payday.

But what if Twitter got the idea to start charging for their service. As of right now, it is 100% free to join and use and with all the benefits and publicity around it, there are many people who utilize this service daily for many reasons. Would they still continue to use Twitter and pay the monthly fee or whatever to utilize the Twitter goodness? Would that kill Twitter as an internet marketing milestone? Maybe and maybe not. Let's look at some of the reasons some people may quit using while others would continue.

First of all, like stated earlier, lots of people are making some good money with Twitter. It would be absolutely ridiculous to stop using Twitter for a small monthly fee and let all that earning potential go to waste. But, there is a flip side to this. What about all of your followers? Would they pay to use Twitter to follow you or would the majority of your followers disappear into thin air? I think you would find that most of your followers would disappear. Would you still have those faithful to the service and faithful to you and the micro information that you provide? Yes. Not everyone would stop using. But the majority would.

Another point I would like to cover is also this. How many people create an account and yet only use Twitter maybe 10 times a month? Would the amount that you actually use it outweigh the fee that you would have to pay? I guess that comes down to personal attitude and preference.

I asked many people if they would continue to use Twitter if they started charging. The resounding answer I got was NO. What we all need to keep in mind is the phrase "If they don't wanna rock, then someone else will" and what a true phrase it is. People will go somewhere else to find the service and when someone with the budget and skills finds out that everyone is leaving Twitter due to charging, they will come out with a service like Twitter for free and steal away all the visitors. Take the Facebook and Myspace battle. When Facebook launched heavy, they took away many of the faithful Myspace users. Why? They offered something better.

So to close this article, would you still use Twitter if they started charging a fee? Let me know if you would or would not. Also, let me know why. What would be your reasoning.

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