Simply Aggregating Tweets is Not Marketing
I’m seeing a growing number of sites that pull in tweets about a particular topic, and that’s…about…it…
The sites have a nice skin, they’re moderately entertaining for about 10 seconds, and then…boorrrrring. Why would I as the user ever come back to that site? Cool, you’re aggregating tweets about hardwood flooring, nice. I’ll be sure to make that my homepage. If aggregating tweets is accompanied by a larger concept, I think it can be rad.
Take for example Twistori or We Feel Fine. Both aggregate tweets; however both do it in a visually compelling way, and both sites make me stop and think. They’re worth going back to, they’re worth telling friends about. They inspire me. I still remember their name a year+ later.
Those sites aggregate tweets within a larger concept…a bigger idea, and that’s what makes them work. Of course, these aren’t brand websites, and that’s where I see these experiments popping up, so perhaps that’s an unfair comparison. And I realize some sites make it work, after all, you could argue skittles.com is doing well if you’re simply measuring buzz.
All I’m saying is that merely pulling in keywords from search.twitter.com without something that inspires or provokes thought seems like marketing driven by tools, rather than tools driven by marketing.
