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Twitter has become not just a microblogging outlet for individuals and celebrities, but also for big brands, such as Coca Cola, Starbucks and Victoria's Secret. Twitter's popularity, though, goes beyond the global exposure it offers to people and brands. It's also a listening tool and a means for building community.Twitter's strength is real-time. No other social platform comes close on this front. While Facebook is trying to compete and Snapchat offers a unique perspective on the theme, Twitter remains our best indicator of the wider pulse of the world and what's happening within it.

Twitter has obviously been used to raise awareness of political topics, spread political messages and coordinate collective action. This has often come through specific campaigns such as #blacklivesmatter (protesting violence against black people). Twitter data opens up new horizons for scientists, both as a rich data source in its own right but also as a way of gathering information from the public. This has the added benefit of increasing their awareness of and participation in science. Twitter data gathering can be passive (capturing tweets that are already published) or active (asking people to take part in a project and send in information).Twitter has opened up a two-way communication between businesses and their customers. On the one hand this means it’s easier for customers to complain to a company - and do so publicly. But it’s also much quicker and easier for companies to reply and potentially resolve an issue, and can potentially even reduce customer support costs.

Twitter also creates a market research opportunity for businesses to see what customers are talking about, their sentiment and what is important to them about products and services. And the service lets a firm’s loyal customers do their marketing for them, defending and protecting the brand online and recommending it to other potential buyers.By observing competitors' Twitter activity, you'll gain insight into business and market trends and learn more about what you can do to distinguish your company and brand. Additionally, you may gain insight into the failures others have had, which could help you from making similar mistakes.

Don't view Twitter as a stream of nonsense and Justin Beiber fans complaining about their first-world problems, view Twitter as an up-to-the-moment track of everything that's happening. Whatever you want to know, wherever that may be, you can find it here. Considered from that perspective, the value of the platform takes on a new importance. And believe me, it's not something we want to lose.