New Twitter Search Functionality and Analytics

A couple of notes for the Analytics community regarding Twitter's cool new search interface...

New URL
There's a new search engine referral URL as part of Twitter's new interface. You'll want to update those search engine configurations to be on the lookout for it, and note the additional parameters too. Here's what the referring URL looks like from their new sidebar search:

http://twitter.com/timeline/search?q=searchphrase&source=sidebar&category=search

I see one other category in there for the new "trends" they've added just below the search bar, but in my limited testing, the referring URL didn't always reflect the "trend" selected, which I hope they fix.

I also note that if you've searched for something, that search phrase stays in the URL, even if you go somewhere else on the site (example: I went to my @elbpdx area and clicked on a link in there and the /search?=searchphrase was still present in the referrer...I imagine this is a bug that they'll fix...)

Expect more changes
The URL portends some additional goodies that they must have up their sleeves. What additional "source" items will we be seeing? What else are they going to do with the "category" field? I'm looking forward to seeing more...

Twitter Analytics

It looks like Twitter is starting to get serious with how to monetize all of that amazing information they are collecting. According to Kevin Thau, Twitter's Director of Business Development:

"We can measure the tweets," he says. "We're trying to figure out what are the appropriate metrics around engagement and how to convey those."

Jeremy Owyang was also interviewed for that Forbes article, noting when asked about whether there's any money to be made:

"When it comes to enterprises, absolutely," says Jeremiah Owyang, a social computing analyst with Forrester Research (nasdaq: FORR - news - people ). "I just got off a call with a client that's asking about how to engage on Twitter. There's definitely interest."

I think Twitter rocks, and will continue to change how we communicate and share information. I use it to bookmark information now (so sorry delicious...), as well as staying in touch with the evangelists in the social media industry and the analytics industry. And with this new development of measurement coming from Twitter, I imagine we'll all be watching these industries get closer together as we figure out how best to integrate information.