Maybe I’m qualifying myself as an old fogie here, but having been through my fair share of technology flashes in the pan I’m anxious to label Twitter as a fad of obscene proportions. Not only does it have a huge subscriber churn rate (I believe I read somewhere Twitter only has a 40% retention rate over 3 months) but for me the true sign of how superficial and short-lived ‘the next hip thing’ is how quickly both the marketing and mass media sectors jump on board. The Twitter media lovefest of the past few months tells me the ship has already sailed on this innovation, and it’s a ship named Titanic.

Twitter does have the ability to foster brand loyalty among consumers – or stop people from becoming disloyal. If Tropicana hadn’t listened to their customers then maybe some of those folk wouldn’t be Tropicana customers anymore. Twitter possibly prevented a consumer mutiny.

As the Twitter community grows it will be interesting to see if companies are expected to have a Twitter presence. Perhaps NOT having a Twitter account will affect consumer perceptions of their brand.