According to marketing research firm Emarketer 18 million people are currently on Twitter and that number will grow to approximately 26 million next year (which is 45% growth). About one in five Americans are using social media services like Twitter that allow them to post updates about themselves. These numbers are only going to continue to grow especially as younger people who initially did not take to Twitter are now embracing it and participating more on the microblogging site.

Benefits of using Twitter for your business include increasing brand awareness, gaining competitive intelligence, promoting blog/website content, personifying your brand, and it can be an internal communication tool and a CRM tool. Twitter is being taken more seriously as a marketing tool by more companies each day and it will only increase in how beneficial it can be for your business. With the launch of social media search engines from Google and Bing, companies can more effectively search for their brand in social media and find out more telling information about their target market.

Examples of Twitter success stories include:

• Dell’s Twitter account brought in over $2 million in revenue from followers alone thanks to Twitter exclusive deals.
• Southwest was able to do major damage control on Twitter (which has over 815,000 followers) after a hole was found in one of its planes in July.
• Threadless, a community-based t-shirt company, has been recognized as one of Chicago’s top 10 most Gen-Y friendly companies thanks to their heavy interaction with consumers through Twitter (there are over 1,300,000 followers).
• BBgeeks, a blackberry troubleshooting and enthusiast site, developed a strategy to grow their Twitter account which resulted in over 500 followers who may not have heard of them had it not been for their activity on Twitter, several hundred site visits from Twitter each month, and has created networking opportunities that have led to gaining access to exclusive press conferences.
• Comcast uses Twitter as a CRM tool by monitoring all mentions of their brand and personally responding to comments, complaints, and concerns through phone calls, emails, and tweets.
• Through Twitter, American Apparel, a vertically integrated clothing manufacturer, linked up with a fan/photographer to advertise on his blog, pacingthepanicroom.com, and it became one of the top performing sites for American Apparel’s online ads.
• Zappos has successfully utilized Twitter as a tool to help employees communicate with each other more effectively and efficiently.

Proof that Twitter is here to stay can be found at a university in Australia. Griffith University has made Twitter a required class for journalism students. It’s time to really embrace Twitter whether you currently love it, are indifferent to it, or wish it would crash and diasppear from the earth forever. It’s proving that it’s not just a fad and here to stay as it’s becoming a tool that people are using on a daily basis to communicate and get things done.