Microsoft goes all a-Twitter – with Bing search and official tweets
Today is a big day for Microsoft, as well as a big day for Twitter. Microsoft has not only started tweeting from its official /Microsoft account, it has also rolled out real-time Twitter search on Bing, its new search engine.
Microsoft has been present on Twitter in quite a big way for a while now. It seems as though every different department has a Twitter account, including Windows 7 @MSWindows, Windows Live @WindowsLive, Windows Mobile @wmdev, and many others. But today saw the company deliver its first tweets on /Microsoft.
As TechCrunch reports, the first update was, “Anyone can make games now, Kodu is available on Xbox LIVE Marketplace http://bit.ly/3wlWKo #microsoft #xboxlive #kodu”. Nothing too exciting but it has all the hallmarks of a good commercial tweet, including hashtags, keywords, and the promotion of a new product.
The /Microsoft account is apparently being kept updated by the corporate communications team of four people. Which is fine, and they obviously know what they are doing, but I’d rather see one real person connecting with Microsoft’s customers rather than a team of corporate drones. Although, at least they’re not faceless corporate drones, with each having a photo on the page.
Today has also seen Microsoft integrate Twitter into Bing search results. This doesn’t mean everybody’s tweets are suddenly appearing on Bing, rather it means a select few (thousand) people’s tweets will be indexed and shown when that person is searched for alongside “Twitter” or “tweet”.
The Bing Community Blog explains that only “prominent and prolific Twitterers” will be indexed initially, and they have all been chosen “based primarily on their follower count and volume of tweets.” The four names mentioned explicitly are Danny Sullivan, Kara Swisher, Al Gore, and Ryan Seacrest.
The idea of a real-time Web is growing in popularity, with Google, Facebook, and Twitter itself talking in these sorts of terms. Microsoft has kind of beaten them all to the punch with this effort to bring Twitter updates to Bing search results, but I’m sure the other companies will be keen to catch up fast.
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