Welcome

By now, the global tech community is addicted to Twitter. Twitter handles are appearing on business cards and in email signatures, and “what’s you Twitter?” is replacing “what’s your email?” as the default way to get in touch with someone. It’s great for a number of reasons, but it’s a very strange brand, and not withtout it’s faults.

The Good

First things first, Twitter is a lovely site. From a design point of view, they’ve done everything right — created a distinct style of art direction, colour schemes, and typography. They’ve created a solid logo that works at various sizes and even as the abbreviated “t” version. And they have the dubious honour of showcasing illustrations that fit in line with their other design elements.

Also, Twitter has created a sort of internal language and culture. Neologisms like “tweetup” and “microblogging” appeared virtually overnight, and becoming familiar with the brand means you’ll learn the jive in no time. This approach to language and phraseology has been successful for brands like Starbucks and In-and-Out Burger, where users learning to interface with brand helps reinforce the tribal nature of brands. In a good way.

The name itself is well-chosen. Considering the landscape of abusrd Web 2.0 brand names, Twitter is easy-to-spell, pronounce, and remember. Aside from the slight confusion-by-association with Leo Laporte’s TWiT Network, they’ve really set themselves apart in the very difficult realm of Internet naming. (I still persist that Yahoo! is a terrible name; Google isn’t much better. Then again, anything sounds silly if you say it too many times.)

And like any good Web 2.0 company, Twitter has released it’s API and thus welcomed in a flood of Twitter-related apps and sites. It’s like how there is now an entire industry dedicated to making iPod accessories. That’s one acid test for a successful brand.

The Bad

There doesn’t seem to be any communication from Twitter itself. Yes, it’s a website and has a blog for announcements, etc., but I don’t feel as if I understand how the brand communicates. Creating a tone of voice is incredibly important for any brand, but for a service that exists to communicate, I’d expect to see some witty copywriting here and there.

The trouble with Twitter, initially, is explaining the overall concept and why a new user should sign up. Remember the first time someone told you about Netflix or Google Earth? You probably said something like “wow, brilliant!”; the first time someone told you about Twitter, you probably snickered with a WTF look upon your face. This goes back to the previous point about communication — Twitter need to perfect their ‘elevator pitch’ and get the community to do so as well. Considering the many uses for Twitter that have emerged (e.g. creating meetups, promoting blog posts, saving yourself from an Egyptian prison), this can be quite a challenge. Unfortunately, I don’t feel like they’re trying to overcome this problem. The fact that it took a third party to make “Twitter: in plain English” is a bad sign.

One potential pitfall for Twitter is that they are a huge target. Yes, they pioneered a very unique new niche on the internet. Competitors like Pownce, Jaicu, and Plurk have appear, but these challengers have yet to de-throne Twitter. But if someone else can come along and solve these problems, and somehow attract people to switch, Twitter will become the next Friendster, so to speak.

The Ugly

Twitter is one of the most unreliable brands I’ve ever seen or heard of. In my experience, some feature of the site (or the entire site altogether), goes offline about one time out of three. Seriously. Imagine if your car only started 1/3 of the time. Imagine if your pizza arrived 1/3 of the time with no cheese. Imagine if FedEx failed to deliver 1/3 of their packages. They’d be out of business by lunch! But Twitter, for it’s addicting nature, has survived the obvious troubles and parried the screams and paper bullets from the tech community. In fact, the community has even gone so far as to parody these troubles with some endearment. It won’t be long until you hear people using the phrase “I’m stressing out a bit right now” with some irony.

From a branding point of view, Twitter is another abusive brand. Not quite as bad as the airlines or phone companies, Twitter has caused its faithful users more headaches and anxiety than any web company in recent memory. I, for one, have actually screamed out loud with the continued downtime when I seemed to need it. With MySpace, we all became fed-up, and simply left, but with Twitter we find it too addicting and useful — but just so unreliable.

I’m trying to think of an analogy for a person who acts like Twitter: Your father who always forgets to pick you up? Your frat brother who gets the keg, but no tap? That geeky kid in your company who’s a genius but dresses like a soup sandwich? You get the point.

So, yes, there’s much to think about regardin Twitter the brand. Maybe you should use the “TwitThis” button below to tell your friends.

Also worth noting…

Twitter is one of the few online spaces where users instinctively choose their actual name for a username, and use a true photo of his or herself for the avatar. Yes, there are a few “chubbylover53″-type names, but generally, you can find someone by searching for their actual name. Why is it that with Twitter we desire such transparency? Interesting.

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