Americans have innovated during each economic downturn in our nation’s history.  Some significant companies have spawned from the Great Depression such as Proctor and Gamble and our current movie studio system.  (There are plenty of blogs talking about this topic: Fast Company, Business Week, McKinsey.)

What we do here at Cherp is think about Twitter, and it dawned on me today that there is a perfect storm brewing that spells success for Twitter.  The economy will drive two specific activities that will help Twitter.

1. More people are going to have time on their hands and will turn to technology to help them network to find a job.  

2. Businesses will turn to new technology to find ways to acquire customers.  

Both of these will lead to greater numbers of people joining Twitter and networking, and no one else is better positioned (besides Linkedin.com, but it’s a closed network so it doesn’t foster accessibility the same way Twitter does.)  Think about it.  People refuse to give up their phones and their computers - they are essential to finding and applying for jobs, networking for interviews, marketing oneself, and in some cases, freelancing to try and pay the bills.  While they are there, it’s only natural to reach out more and more through social networks.

Additionally, companies will continue to look for new ways to market and in an economy like this they will be looking for less expensive methods than TV and Print.  Media is traditionally more expensive and requires a large distribution to provide a proper ROI.  Blogging has proven to have a phenomenal ROI for companies who do it right because it boosts SEO rankings, builds and fosters community with consumers, and provides a constant voice for the company in it’s respective market - and it does so inexpensively.  Twitter continues to show the potential to be more effective in some ways than blogging because it harnesses the viral loop methods of social networks better than blogs do.

Twitter has the momentum, it has the openness, it’s searchable, it’s easy, and the buzz just keeps growing for Twitter.