Thanks for this follow-up.

Interesting that your data would indicate that people using API features and third-party software still have the same retention rates. I’m skeptical.. because what person goes through the research and exploration of twitter’s services, often requiring downloading extra applications, just to ABANDON the service later? Doesn’t add up to me (through my very common sense, non-research-backed POV)

Thanks for the follow-up. Really not too surprised to see the high abandon rate. After all, Twitter is dead-simple to sign up for, but much harder to figure out what to do and how to get benefit out of it. Almost guarantees a low(er) retention rate.

I wonder if FB and MySpace looked at accounts that have had no activity in the last 30, 60, 90, 120 days what their numbers would look like?

TO’B

David, I appreciate your video response, as well as the original blog post. I tend to agree with your insights, and it will be interesting to see how this all plays out in the future. I am also a little confused about the negative feedback from Twitter users, as I was under the impression that they were happier with the service “pre-Oprah.” So if a fair amount of people sign up and don’t use it, I don’t envision that as being a bad thing. In terms of the audience attention rate/Internet reach data, do you have a chart that contains the specific percentages?

[...] which says it reran its study to account for that. And… no change! From Nielsen’s blog: “As an update, we went beyond just Twitter.com, adding in more than 30 websites and [...]

Thank you for following through on our comments – I was one of the people who was a little concerned with the issue of some many people who tweet by not visiting twitter at all and how that might skew the data.

I believe your findings – as much as I have used Twitter for some time now I am growing more skeptical of it’s ability to really provide value to people as it becomes more of a mainstay. I am a much bigger fan of Yammer which allows you to create essentially a ‘intra’ version of Twitter for your company. I find it very useful because I am genuinely using as a communication device, especially with remote team members or when I am not in the office.

You don’t say specifically whether your update covered mobile apps or not, such as Tweetie or Twitterfon or Dabr — mobile is a pretty big market segment for Twitter, so I would think that could also make a large difference in the numbers.

I think it’s funny your broadcast is via youTube ;)

I also think people join Twitter to see what the “rage” is and if they don’t have or find connections on Twitter, they don’t feel connected and leave. OR, they don’t think about the concept long enough to see how THEY can benefit from “following” stock quotes, project status, the latest news, following family posts, etc.

Just last night a personal friend told me how silly Twitter is. When he moved onto the story of how his host company was down earlier for 16 hours but he and a third person that meets daily didn’t find out until … their daily meeting I TOLD HIM that if the three of them had a locked connection posting updates as they happen, he would have known immediately!

Right now, the Center of Disease Control can be using it to count and report the “swine flu” outbreak.

When I first signed up, I really struggled to ‘find a use’ for Twitter and I let my usage lapse. Around 5 months later I decided to have another go and, using Tweetdeck found it easier to use and then really helpful for finding people in businesses like mine.

I also would be surprised if those using 3rd party software had the same loyalty curve.

Rebecca

While Twitter could be a great application, it has jumped the shark IMHO. I used it for about a week then gave up on it. Why? I was tired of “hearing” the minutia most people post (i.e walked to the store to get milk, drank a glass of water, blew my nose, etc. ad nauseum).

Good that you covered all the bases, although I had assumed it was unnecessary: Focusing just on Twitter.com activity was a more than valid sample of the greater Twitterverse.

Also, my trackback didn’t make it onto the original post, but I think there’s a solid connection between Twitter retention rates and (what’s now) traditional blogging abandonment:

http://tinyurl.com/ckzx4h

Not sure that the approach of including those other apps (websites) is sufficient. There are many desktop and mobile aps (including those that TEXT to Twitter)that you would not have access to. You may say that some panel data might be available, but I’m not sold you’ve got a handle on this. A key distinction has also not been made in any of this, in that there are visitors (those that use Twitter as a RSS reader of sorts on a mobile deck) and posters.

I feel there is a much bigger exercise here that you are overlooking, and jumped prematurely to release the findings.

Twitter can’t be compared to Facebook or MySpace. It’s a completely different kind of service, with different usage models.

I would imagine that people will find ways to use Twitter on an occasional basis, as they have need. It’s the kind of service that can be there when you need it, and put aside when you don’t. I don’t think that people have really discovered its potential.

Twitter should almost be viewed as a low-level service, like e-mail. It’s proving to be most useful when tied to other services.

I have to agree with Rebecca on this. At first I signed up and could not find a use for it. Then i found out about tweetdeck and real-time search to connect with what I am interested in. Then I built an application that runs on twitter’s API, I’m sold on it, its great for finding pertinent information…in real time.

Mike

I’ve been a faithful twitterer for nearly a year. True. . . my usage jumps up and down as my interest and my REAL LIFE intervene, but I have found much interesting & useful information and many many many brilliant people there also.

I’d love to hear more of your thoughts about the Twitter community being able to “drive media talking points”… it seems to me that the community is mined for information but rarely given credit in the mainstream mediaverse. Thoughts?

I think you data is spot on. On April 19th I wrote on my blog at length about my own experiences on Twitter (I’ve been a user since Nov 2008). I explain my primary reason why I decided that putting a lot of energy into Twitter is actually having a negative ROI on my time (which would be better spent on other, proven networking methods). I called it my “Twitter Experiment.”

Blogs have always had high abandonment rates.

That hasn’t stopped blogs from becoming a game-changer for businesses and media.

Honestly, I think Twitter usage may not fit comfortably into the way you measure things. When I first signed up I also took a couple of months to really figure out how to use it. And during that time I had long periods of inactivity. I think it would be better to check a 6 month to 6 month period.

I’m not so surprised. As a trailing Boomer (nearly 50), I’m already an outlier for my age group. The signal to noise ratio is never great. Even in targeted threads at events (meetings, conferences, etc.) most of the tweets are lame status updates. I’ve really liked Twitter as a back channel in sessions or as a broadcast system to call people to really great sessions. Thats not nearly enough to keep me online every day. Facebook, LinkedIn, and RSS feeds provide me with a pretty good information landscape with filtering (social stuff from FB/work stuff from LI). I don’t see much use for Twitter except as a backup channels for specific events.

I’m about ready to quit because so many members use it so badly. When someone I’m following posts a dozen tweets in a row to thank new followers, that’s obnoxious. Others repeatedly promote websites or other products and services through their tweets. I select people to follow based on their relevance to my life.Tell me something that makes a difference to me.

Twitter is something of an acquired taste. One doesn’t leap in and instantly embrace it. Mostly, one jumps in, furrows one’s brow, and thinks, “this is stupid.”

I quit Twitter after my first month.

I came back after 3 months or so.

I’ve been using Twitter for a year and three quarters.

This is not unusual for many Twitter fans. That many people quit after a month or so is hardly a surprise.

I support what Calysta Rose said. And I think that this effect is exaggerated by people (and I suspect even more so companies) staking a claim to their name/keyword. Given all the recent hype, it’s fair to assume that I lot of people will have compared it to the www phenomenon and wanted to grab the best usernames. Cybersquatters eyes must have lit up when they read about CNN having to do a deal to get control of cnnbrk. But there are also lots of companies out there that have heard that Twitter is the next big thing and even though they can’t think of a use for it yet, want to reserve the right to change their minds. I know that’s true, it applies to several of my customers.

It seems like many heavy Twitter users are offended by the notion that others don’t love Twitter as much as they do and would even stop using it.

I use Twitter via an app (my own, Yoono) but w/o an app I doubt I’d go back to twitter.com frequently. I know the crux of the argument for many here is that most people don’t go back to the site and that’s why the data is flawed, but here at Yoono we know it’s a challenge to get mainstream consumers to download an app in the first place.

Many Oprah followers simply will not download Twirl or Tweetdeck or anything else… they start off curious b/c of the buzz and from there Twitter either sticks or it doesn’t. If it sticks they’ll find something to make it easier but my wife uses Yoono and I still can’t get her to use Twitter. She doesn’t get it and doesn’t care.

I highly doubt that Twitter has jumped the shark, it’s just not for everybody. If they get 200M users and maintain 40% active rate I’m sure everyone will be very happy.

I think it will be interesting to learn how many of those quitting their account – reactivated it. I have a felling we will find a significant return rate. Worth checking out!

I agree with Regan -who are the 40% who stay? How are they using it? That is as equally interesting as the 60% who drop off. I think the media was looking for a way to calm the masses who don’t understand Twitter.

One of the key reasons that I’ve heard (and are reflected in the comments above) are that people don’t know how to use it or access the right information. Reading lame tweets of all the boring parts of a person’s day would make me tune out as well. On the other hand, learning what’s new in a particular sector can be incredibly valuable.

Let’s hear more about the 40%!

Thankfully, people drop off twitter which has too many people trying to develop a following. Like the caterpillar, twitter will transform itself over time leaving only the best communicators. Whether that is enough to pay for the service is another story. Good luck to twitter.

How about explaining the methods used to perform the analysis of non-web usage?
For example – web site usage of the download site for Tweetdesk will possibly give an indication of the number of downloads but will not necessarily help with determining who is active … because subsequent tweets do not go through the Tweetdesk web site. Same sort of story for the other popular downloaded clients (desktop or phone).

Even going through the recent tweets and then checking the first tweet date does not necessarily work – because it is possible that some users (especially recent joiners who are simply following celebrities) might be just reading and never writing.

However, I would expect a high attrition rate amoung the people who signed up simply because they heard or saw a popular celebrity mention it on radio or TV.

Did anyone think to look at how maybe the slowness of the service, the constant downtime, and the Facebook-like mistakes being made (like the recent @reply changes) might be a healthy part of this?

I mean, when I first signed up with Twitter, I found it to be useful and have only stuck around because I enjoy the people I’ve followed that I would otherwise not have found. However, the constant drops of service, outages, etc. are extremely annoying.

[...] personally think Twitter is a ridiculous fad that will die out quickly (in fact, a recent Nielsen study shows that 60% of Twitter users abandon the service after one month). But in spite of the data, I [...]

Since there are no exit polls for Twitter users I am not sure how you quantified your data. Nonetheless, compiling data is part of what you do. So, I imagine you had valid data. From all the debate back and forth on the topics, it seems that limited factors are being associated to Twitter’s dismal retention rate; which some do not want to accept. One of those is that some people are just too clueless to get it; and another is that Twitter is too difficult for some people to grasp; or a combination thereof.

From what I have seen, I see other issues factoring in to the large number of Twitter Quitters. First and maybe foremost, if you do have an issue, Twitter simply does not provide support. There biggest support feature is a forum. However, support from Twitter is essentially non-existent. Twitter users may complain of the same issues for months and those complaints are virtually ignored, or in some instances, they simply say the issue has been resolved. From a customer service standpoint, you simply cannot ignore customer issues and expect them to go away. Let me clarify that.. you cannot expect the issues to go away. You can expect the customers to go away. Another negative is that Twitter appears to be a breeding ground for MLM programs with some incredible claims; of which, some cannot be supported, or are clearly false, or will get your account deleted by using some of their tools. Without regulating the dissemination of this type of content, what happens is that Twitter users are inundated with hundreds of repetitive MLM-hype tweets. I imagine that some people simply get tired of it. I have also seen complaints about receiving unwanted porn. There is a process to unfollow someone. You can select to block another user. However, processes do not always work; and sometimes basic functions do not work for random users. There appears to be no fix for these issues. When these processes and functions do not work properly, Twitter fails miserably on addressing these type of customer complaints. Allowing itself to be exploited and failing to handle customer issues will only continue to contribute to high Twitter Quitter rates; consistent with your projections about the unlikelihood of Twitter’s long term sustainability.

I believe that if MySpace were to add a similar method of mobile messaging they would recover from their 31 point dive and blow Twitter out of the water.

[...] Nielsen Online claims a 60% abandonment rate [...]

[...] feed into the Twitter community. David Martin, Vice President, Primary Research, Nielsen Online says the results from testing third-party Twitter app were similar with about 60% abandoning Twitter after a month. [...]

[...] the day they created their accounts. You can compare this with the 60 percent abandonment rate claimed by Nielsen. But even these may not be the true abandonment rates. Just because you are not Tweeting does not [...]

[...] useless. The retention rates (60% of Twitter users do not return after a month) are the consequences. I’m also pretty sure [...]

[...] networking pie, but will the client craving be quelled sooner than expected? According to recent Nielsen Online findings, approximately 60% of those that sign-up for the popular Twitter service abandon it after only one [...]

[...] this is only the first inning of micro-search. Twitter has an incredibly high abandonment rate (60%), so we’ll see if another company turns Twitter into Friendster. I have a feeling the [...]

You can count me in the group that joined, left, joined, left, and joined again. I agree there is this huge disconnect between "pop culture" understanding of twitter, and how those of us who find it useful use the site.

Matt Heisler
Northborough MA Home Sales