Twitter - Business Integration - Case Study Example

Name: Course: Institution: Professor: Date: Executive summary Twitter is a company that offers services of micro blogging and social networking through the internet. These services allow users of twitter to both send and receive text messages other wise known as tweets (Balanarayan, 2009). Twitter’s scope is global created in 2006, with Evan William being its founder. Twitter’s services gained global popularity from the time it was launched. The number of users increased day by day and with every new feature introduced into the site (Jack, 2008). Over the years twitter website has become one among the top ten websites that are most visited on the internet. It is not restrictive as people who are not yet registered can as well read tweets with those individuals who are registered being able to post texts through the interface of the website. This paper seeks to give an explanation as to the twitter company has been able to maintain its position of competitiveness in the market place, an assessment of the sustainability of twitter’s business model as well as its competitive advantage, a discussion of the company’s strategic leadership approach as well as its ability of being able to address strategic that the company faces and some recommendations for the management of the company for change Is as far as better performance of the company in the path to success and greater sustainability. Table of Contents Executive summary 2 Table of Contents 3 Introduction 4 Twitter’s competitiveness in the market 5 The sustainability of twitter’s business model and competitive advantage 6 Twitter’s strategic leadership approach 8 Recommendations 10 Twitter Discover Tab 10 Consistency across Platforms 11 Twitter Acquisitions 11 Conclusion 12 References 13 Introduction It is in 2006 when twitter introduced a micro-blogging service which gave its users the ability to both spread and share tweets otherwise known as short messages of up to 140 characters. This was in a bid to make strangers and friends of a user to be in a position to subscribe and follow whatever was communicated by the user making them to be regarded as followers. In this case it would be easier for them to know what is happening from anywhere in the globe (Chris, 2009). Twitter allows for information exposure. This is built on the idea that people like connecting with others. Interactions are the only way through which connections may be reinforce and is this is what twitters offers. People who use social media are many a time interested in what is being done by other people or rather what others are thinking. Their main aim is gathering as more as possible about other people, organizations and groups. Twitter satisfies this need hence its popularity globally. Any given company or organization must have a framework through which it wishes to achieve it desired goals and objectives. The same case applies to twitter in that the company is able to achieve its objectives through a concept known as real-time dispersal of information that is provided to the user (Biz, 2007). Twitter is Brand Company that constitutes services for which all people in the world are in dire of need of in their day to day activities. The company bears greater importance acting as a social tool through which people from all corners of the world can interact. It does not discriminate but rather enhances relationships between people of all races. Being a tech powerhouse twitter is demonstrates what technology can do. Through twitter a lot of things are made possible such as eased communication making people to embrace technological advancements with a positive outlook. Twitter’s competitiveness in the market Twitter began as a bright idea from its founders that has over the year’s undergone development into a business opportunity or rather an entrepreneurial venture. Competition is an aspect that attracts quite a great deal of attention as far as twitter’s competitiveness in the market is concerned. Competition has the ability of enabling a company to continue surviving in the market or rather kick it out of the market. It is therefore very important for any given company to assess the marketplace in a bid to identify areas of potential competition. In this case the company would be able to develop strategies through it can be able to counter competition assuring itself survival in market and maintaining or even gaining a bigger market share (Saul, 2009). So far the company is still very competitive in the market in relation to the services and products that it provides to the users. Its ability to maintain a high market share in the market is contributed by some various reasons. In connection to this Twitter being a trendy social tool has been to been seen as to uphold the idea that there is need to recognize how important their services are to their users. Additionally the company has had in place endless possibilities arising in relation to how it can capitalize on enhancing its popularity through coming up with a technologically expressed knowledge and a wide interested foundation with users being the central point of focus. This is what has enhanced the company’s competitiveness providing a highly interactively site as well as achieving high attention levels as well as reach. Most importantly the company has been able to maintain quite a good share of the market through its marketing approach. It has done so through marketing approaches such as the word of mouth as well as media coverage that has been quite extensive. Competitiveness by Twitter Company has also been propelled by its expansion through efforts of branding and marketing. This basically means increased publicity by simply the implementation of digital, interactive and community marketing. The sustainability of twitter’s business model and competitive advantage The twitter company’s business model has occasionally been questioned as what it really represents. An in-depth assessment of twitter’s business models indicates that it has been able to sustain the company’s existence as well as enabling it gain competitive advantage. A company’s business model should always be framed in such a way that it is aligned with the company’s goal and objectives. The business model adopted by the twitter is regarded as money making business model. It is demonstrates that it centrally focuses on ensuring that the company makes as much profits as possible as much as it is in operation (Amanda, 2011). This model may be understood to be a revenue model whose strategy is but to shift concerns to commercial accounts through which it would be able to capture this as a faster way of making money. Additionally the model also encompasses the idea of targeting the corporate and celebrity users whereby they are to be charged more. This strategic approach is quite sustainable and beneficial in line with the company gaining competitive advantage. Basically twitter has it aim not only on being a micro-blogging service but also at capturing a billion users by the year 2013. Basically the money making business is demonstrated top also encompass broader aspects of e-commerce, business-to-business as well as advertising. Through the model the company would be able to offer employment 5200 individuals by the year 2013 as well as have increased revenue. Competition is a common phenomenon within any given business environment. In respect to twitter company it has gained competitive advantage through a unique of trying to be different from its major competitors who are facebook and Google. In connection this twitter identifies that facebook is but a social network and Google a search engine. To be different from the two and to be able to gain competitive advantage twitter presents itself as being a site where people are able to discover and share current happenings (Amanda, 2011). It also bring out the aspect of being the most varied network as far as communication is concerned having introduced a new way through which people can communicate in the world. Twitter Company is as well presented to be an avenue where one can subscribe to the thoughts of a friend. This differentiation of the company undoubtedly is a major contributing factor towards the company’s ability of gaining competitive advantage against its competitors. Through the emphasis by the company upon information and news strategy shifted its status of updates what is really happening from what you are doing. This approach enables the company to be more informative to its users by taking the initiative of providing information even before they ask for it. This is quite an appealing aspect of the company that enables it retain users and even attract more users (Amanda, 2011). The Creators of Twitter Company on the idea of competitive advantage noticed that openness can be a roadmap through such advantage may be gained. This is connected to the advantage that emanates from having the most diverse and largest ecosystem of applications in relation to software under a single platform. This is regarded as being a cooperative advantage. Twitter’s strategic leadership approach Strategic leadership approach is a vital aspect that needs to be considered if a company is to achieve its set goals and objectives. Good leadership for any given translates to goo performance. Such leadership is exercised by the top management of the company whose responsibility to extend the vision, mission, values and a company’s plans in the entire company. The same case applies in regards to the twitter company. The top management team is able to ensure that its activities are well aligned with the company’s prospective goals and objectives which are bound to accelerate the company’s growth (Brian, 2010). The top management of the twitter company constitutes a team of members who have vital responsibilities that they carry out which include executive, functional and leadership. The top management team in Twitter Company is capable of combining various other activities with managing operations, serving in the executive team as well as fulfilling leadership responsibilities and roles in the company. So far this strategic approach by the twitter company top management has yielded success. The top management in Twitter Company uniquely approaches the aspect of leadership by focusing on both strategy and planning. Over the years since twitter was launched the top management has always set milestones as to what they wish to be achieved in the company after a certain number of years. Such planning has always made to direct all its efforts towards ensuring that the company achieves the set goal within the time frame specified. The team is able to manage the company’s daily activities in a manner that it directs its operations on focusing on its set future strategies. Members of the team function as a team as well as leaders whose main aim is to see that the company attains growth (Andy, 2009). The team of leaders in Twitter Company presents a big image of the company that reflects the company’s growth. The top management of any company should be capable of addressing strategic challenges that may be faced by the company. Twitter’s top management team is able to come up with new perspectives and knowledge that enable them to meet the company’s challenges in an effective and efficient way. They are able to reflect on new images of the company and what they wish to see of the company in future. The top management is required to hold clear stands at all times which allow for easy implementing of what the company ahs planned to achieve as well as shaping the thoughts of employees in upholding the value of the company and to have a positive outlook of its better performance in the future (Andy, 2009). For instance by the top management of the company rejecting facebook’s offer to purchase the company it demonstrated that they had hope that the company has a future and the have to take part and see to it that the company grows and turns out to be a sustainable one. The founders of twitter wanted to make sure there were enough finances in place for continued building of the company as well as offering support to millions of people in use of the service. This is quite strategic as it ensures the company’s sustainability even with increased competition. In view of the same the team identified that there is need to strategically approach the problem of securing funds for the company to enjoy enduring value (Alex and Mark 2009). This is indicated to have been quite a very big challenge for the company. In a bid to address the issue the top management saw great importance in finding partners whom they can invest with. This meant looking for those investors who shared the vision as the company’s management which is but to build and secure the company’s value and sustainability. Twitter’s top management team demonstrates how a company should confront situations in that for a company to be able to address challenges its leaders have to be committed. With twitter’s case the leaders were committed towards building a company that offers the best products as well as technology that gives the users an opportunity to explore news ideas and gain knowledge from a much wider scope of interactions. There a variety of challenges seen to impact on twitter’s ability to maintain its competitive advantage status (Amanda 2011). They are in relation to the services that the company offers. It is quite important for the company to understand that its rivals are in the search of new ideas and gaps where they would be able to nail down the company and kick it out of the market. This calls for the exercise of strategic leadership to identify areas of improvements and implementation of new services that would increase the company’s popularity. Recommendations There are quite a number of recommendations that are deemed vital for the management in relation to what the company should focus upon and implement in future. It is important for the company’s top management team to develop the desire of seeking improvement for the site and its applications geared towards making it more efficient as well as simple to ease interactions with the user. Some of the various changes recommended to the management for future expansion of the company include; Twitter Discover Tab The Twitter Discover Tab is a recommendation for the idea of change to the management in relation to the services offered within the site. This is a way through which twitter can filter contents for its users in a bid to make it easier finding information as well as followers who seem to be of greater relevance to each and every user. A discover tab would be a site where the company would have an opportunity to present articles as well as post them to users whom they seem to be more relevant to. The tab would also show articles by individuals as well as whom people follow. The main aim is for users to have more personalized accounts. Consistency across Platforms Consistency across Platforms is another important recommended idea change. Ensuring that there is consistence across platforms such as computers, tablets and smart phones is another change that the management should adopt. Such change within platforms crates hope for making the company services more uniform in all manners, ways or avenues of accessibility. The new designs would enable users to easily use twitter interactively in their tablets or phones. Twitter Acquisitions Additionally the management can also capitalize on Twitter Acquisitions as well for a positive change within the company. Acquisitions decided upon by the management would enable them to have more clues at their disposal as to the direction that the company’s website is headed. Such acquisitions such as posterous being a site for blogging would enable users to have ease with blogging even from their cell phones (Chris, 2009). It would as well be possible for the users of twitter to attach their pictures, videos and music into the site. With such an acquisition the company would definitely turn out to be easy to use in all platforms through which it can be accessed. With the implementation of the outlined recommendations twitter will with no doubt turn out to be quite a reliable, attractive and more popular site. Conclusion Twitter is useful in quite a variety of ways globally to industries, business organizations and people. It enhances globalizations and interactions between people from all parts of the world such that they can have access at any time under any platform to information that interest them regarding thought of other people. By the company management changing focus and deciding to apply greater emphasis on information and news networking as their strategy the company has indicated desirable growth through increased popularity as well as meeting directly the needs of individuals. The strategic leadership of Twitter Company reflects how leaders should be within any given organization supporting all courses of action that aim at ensuring the company not only realizes success but attains sustainability in the future. It is the desire of the company’s management for twitter to be a social media that is most visited by people. There is hope that greater improvements and innovations would be made to the site all for the good of the company and for its users as well. Twitter has proved to have quite a great potential of being able to reach out to audiences all over the world who are more informed and have the knowledge about technological trends (Brian, 2010). Initially the twitter services are understood to have only been valuable to small enterprises and business as they start up and are in need of advertising to gain recognition. Twitter offered a cheaper approach through the companies could be advertised and gain market. The website enabled the small companies to reach out to the people providing them with updates thus leading to the growth of a list of followers who gained interest with the company. In large organizations managers have the opportunity to both update their employees as well coordinate them as they execute their day to day activities. However it is quite challenging for some employees are bound to spend quite a lot of time in the website and might as well be engaging in non work related activities. Nevertheless twitter is a company that has the potential to gain greater popularity and have more users depending on the service in a bid to ease living. References Alex C. and Mark E. (2009). "Inside Twitter – An In-Depth Look inside the Twitter World" Sysomos Amanda B. (2011). "The tricky business of business tweeting". The Irish Times Andy C. (2009). "Welcome to the Twitterverse". National Public Radio Balanarayan N.T. (2009). "Tweeting Via SMS Is In, the Way It Should Be". 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