The Twitterverse Ecosystem, Part 3

Mark Gibbs' Web site tips, plus network applications news headlines

This newsletter will be the last one in my Twitterverse series for a couple of weeks (unless, of course, you tell me that you want more right away).

Slideshow: Top 12 Twitter tools

Today I'm going to cover a couple of services that add value to Twitter in interesting and creative ways.

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This newsletter will be the last one in my Twitterverse series for a couple of weeks (unless, of course, you tell me that you want more right away).

Slideshow: Top 12 Twitter tools

Today I'm going to cover a couple of services that add value to Twitter in interesting and creative ways.

twtQpon is a free online coupon creation and posting system from twtApps that works with both Twitter and Facebook. On the twtQpon site you enter the details of your offer – your Twitter name, a title for the coupon, a maximum 140 character description, any code you like to identify the coupon, a redemption URL, and optionally an expiration date.

When you click on Create a Twitter Coupon you are shown the coupon your tweet will link to along with a private (obfuscated) link to your twtQpon administration page where you can approve, update, and delete your coupons. You can then click on buttons to post it to Twitter and or Facebook. The result is Twitter’s user interface being opened in your browser with the title of your coupon and a link to the created coupon ready to post.

Clicking on the link in the post will take users to the page on twtQpon that displays your coupon. Users can then click on the link to your redemption URL and post comments about your offer to Twitter from your coupon page.

This is a great idea and, in fact, Dell used the system extensively over the last holiday season to generate something around $1 million of extra revenue!

The standard free coupon design is generic (and very ugly) so any businesses with a sense of style may be persuaded to opt for the upgrade service. twtQpon takes an interesting approach here – they invite you to pay whatever you think the upgrade is worth.

This is a brilliant and demonstrably effective service.

Twippr is a Twitter-mediated micropayment service. To use Twippr you need to “follow” [1] twippr on Twitter. You then send twippr a direct (private) message [2] in one of the following forms:

twippr pay $1 @user
twippr tip 25c @user
twippr donate 25c @user
twippr iou $1 @user
twippr balance
twippr transfer $10 me@addy.com
twippr change £1
twippr cancel

The first form denotes a payment to the named user, the next a tip, the next a donation, and so on. Balance responds with your balance in a direct message while the transfer command transfers funds to given Paypal address (there must be at least $10 in your Twippr account to do this – Twippr takes 40 cents or 4%, whichever is greater, for Paypal transactions). The last two commands change the value and cancel last transfer respectively.

There is no minimum value for transactions and you can specify monetary amounts in dollars, pounds, euros, or yen. The recipient can be a Twitter name, an e-mail address, a URL, or a cell phone number.

Other than the Paypal fees Twippr is free and the entire system is based on trust – you and Twippr have to believe that the other parties will honor their debts.

This is an interesting idea and the only problem is getting tweeple [3] to accept and use the service.

Mark Gibbs is a consultant, author, journalist, columnist and blogger.