Tweetworks TV Episode 54 – Twitter Newbie Attrition Rate + Pro Mass Unfollows = Trouble
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Yesterday the ratings firm Nielson released a report on Twitter’s new user retention rate and the numbers aren’t good. With only a 40% retention rate, as defined as users returning to Twitter.com one month after they signed up, Nielson just may have put forth the first quantitative evidence of a key weakness for Twitter. Last month I posed the question “What happens with the other 90% starts using the conversational web (Twitter)?” apparently the answer is they leave.
In this episode I’ll take you through why I think the retention rate is so low and what it means from my perspective. In general I think it’s easy to view these numbers as either:
Holy Shit! – If 60% of the people who sign up for Twitter don’t bother coming back after only a month, how low is the adoption rate after month two, three and four? Not only does this raise the issue of new user retention but I gets me thinking about existing user base decay. How many existing users are quitting?
I’ve also noticed significant changes in how professional users (early adopters) are managing Twitter. In February Loic Le Meur, Founder of Seesmic, made a decision to unfollow everyone. And last week Ari Herzog did the same. Both guys articulated their reasons for doing so very well and everyone is free to use the tool as he sees fit. I find myself wondering however, what it means when people who championed the power of Twitter and used reciprocal following as a technique to build their numbers and in turn promote themselves and their brands make a decision to pull out of the relationships they assured us were genuine. What happens when others follow suit?
Eh. No Big Deal – I wasn’t using Twitter much in the first few months after I signed up and now I’m an entrepreneur in the space. It takes time for new users to come up to speed and see the value of any new technology. Then again, I did work very hard at first discovering the value of Twitter and then learning how to harness it. I wonder if the average person who signs up because Oprah or some other celebrity is on it will be willing to put the effort in that I did?
The Other 60%
I think the reason for such a high attrition rate (low retention rate), despite the blitz of gaga media attention Twitter gets on a daily basis, is the simple fact that no one has answered the question “Now what?” for the average user. What’s the value proposition for the Oprah viewer to actually use Twitter?
I’ve made it no secret that I’m building Tweetworks for the other 60%, those people who simply do not find the status update nature and follower construct palatable. People want to engage in relevant conversations. People do not want to follow hundreds or thousands of people. And they certainly do not want to have to work so hard to follow a conversation. Early adopters have been willing to work hard to extract value from Twitter but the rest of the public simply won’t be willing to pay the same price.
Add 15-year-old Joel Drapper to the list with me and Loic. Following my lead (though not realizing it until I commented on his blog), he unfollowed 13,000 tweeps for the same reasons as me and Loic.
Gerald Weber of Search Engine Journal clued me into Joel and why he think it’s a terrible idea: http://www.searchenginejournal.com/unfollow-friends-twitter/
On Joel’s blog, I’d like to highlight a particular comment he wrote in response to Gerald:
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I’m sure you subscribe to multiple blog feeds, and I’m sure you have many people that subscribed to yours (maybe because you subscribed to theirs and left a comment at one point) but that doesn’t mean that it would be unfair to go through your feed reader, and unsubscribe from some of the blogs that are not that relevant and take too much time to keep up with.
You would still be sending your blog posts out to all of your subscribers, and I doubt you would write a post about why you unsubscribed from a load of blogs. It doesn’t mean you should quit blogging for that blog, and start another one.
It’s not at all a one way communication when I tweet. If they follow me, and I tweet a message, they can reply, and I’ll reply to them.
Same with blogs. If you have thousands of subscribers, you can’t be expected to subscribe to thousands of other blogs. It just doesn’t work like that. It’s a two way communication because people can leave comments.
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– http://joeldrapper.com/unfollow-everyone/comment-page-1/#comment-2378
I couldn’t say it better myself.
Ari Herzog
May 2, 2009 at 1:43 am
I’m not sure that Joel Drapper’s commenting and subscribing to blogs via an RSS reader analogy holds water. While Twitter is often referred to as a micro-blogging platform, there are some important distinctions that need to be taken into account in the “unfollow everyone” scenario.
When you comment on a blog it is often done in a transactional nature. “This looks interesting. I have a relevant opinion. I guess I’ll leave a comment.” or “This person is a thought leader in the space in which I’m writing. I’ll comment on his posts in hopes that his readers will see my content.” Now, you could do the same with tweets and maintain a similar transactional relationship but when you engage in a reciprocal follow with another person I would argue you have entered a new realm and trashing those who you have followed without nuance creates some problems.
Personal Relationships – How many of the people in your mass unfollowing were individuals you met in person and exchanged Twitter handles with as a means of staying in touch? This doesn’t fit the simplicity of the blog analogy. In this scenario you followed up a real world handshake with a digital one. To wantonly discard all of these connections seems to be a social faux pas at best.
Laziness – The lack of nuance conveys laziness. Getting to the point where you’ve created too big of a mess to handle is one thing, but dealing with it by dumping everything is simply lazy. Would you do the same if your desk were overrun with paper? Might a smarter and more prudent approach have been to protect your updates to prevent or slow new following relationships from being created and make a commitment to invest an afternoon in cleaning things up?
Your Original Intent – Twitter is still new and evolving but I think it is safe to say that your (and other mass unfollowers’) original intent was not to create a mass mailing list. But, here you are with a big list of “followers” that does not accurately reflect reality. Unlike Loic (founder of Seesmic and Le Web), who most likely followed back the majority of his large number of followers in an effort to be polite, I suspect that you and Joel (and I as well) actively followed people with the hope of reciprocal follow backs. What I mean is, the huge number of followers you have compared to the small number you now follow is not an accurate representation of your influence nor the contribution you have made. I know it wasn’t your intent to misrepresent yourself but the numbers are now fiction. They make it look as if you must be someone who is so important and creating such amazing content that everyone follows you but you only follow back a select few.
Value Exchange Fraud – Unfollowing people is fine, we all do it for different reasons. But dismissing everyone could be seen as a form of fraud. You still have the value of that person’s follow with no exchange of value in return. Now, if you are producing tremendous content, are a person of some fame, or a business leader as mentioned above the value exchange may still be there even without the follow. But, I suspect that if you sent a DM or @ reply to each person who is following you and let him or her know that you unfollowed but request they continue to follow if they feel that they are receiving value in return you may just be disappointed in the result.
People are not RSS Readers – When I add a blog to my RSS reader it is completely anonymous, you have no idea if I read your blog or not in most cases. But, with Twitter the connection is overt and public. You see me and I see you. It’s a relationship.
Disregard for the Impact on Others – How many times have you looked at who follows a person when considering whether or not you should follow them? Did you dump a newbie or two who were excited about this new medium.
I have no love for the follower construct. I actually see it as unnecessary but the unfollow everyone approach just seems extreme and lacking in authenticity.
Mike Langford
May 4, 2009 at 1:46 pm