Twitter Clients Explained

Date posted: February 21, 2010

So you’ve started to use Twitter as a business communication tool and you would like to learn more about improving the usability of the service. One of the most beneficial ways of doing this is by using what are termed “twitter clients” to manage your presence on the social network.

A twitter client is a 3rd party developed desktop, web or mobile application which allows a user to access their twitter account(s) and functionality through the Twitter API service. This allows a user to take advantage of different features which are either not available or used in a different format than the twitter.com website itself. Indeed much of twitter’s recent growth in users and usage has been as a result of the various 3rd party applications developed to support the service.

So let’s start by taking a look at some of the best clients that are available for both your desktop computer and mobile device.

Desktop Clients

Hands down the most popular desktop application on the market at the moment is Tweetdeck, although there are some other good options available. Seesmic desktop seems to be hot on the heels of Tweetdeck, and its founder Loic Le Meur would be sure to stress this.

If either one of these top desktop clients don’t appeal then check out these other available twitter desktop apps:

- Tweetie (Mac)

- Nambu (Mac)

- Twitterrific (Mac)

- DigiTweet (PC)

- Destroy Twitter

Browser Clients

These are basically web based clients which allow a user to take advantage of a third party twitter client without leaving your web browser. Seesmic Web is a good example of this type of application, and provides most of the features that are available on Seesmic Desktop and even some that are not.

Mobile Support

Maintaining communication through twitter becomes a whole lot easier if you have the ability to do so while mobile. This allows you to monitor your presence and contribute to the network at a time that suits.

iphone

If you’re enjoying the use of an iphone then there are a couple of nice apps available to support your twitter presence. We’re personally a fan of Echofon, given its usability, design and the fact that it’s free.

Other popular iphone twitter apps include:

- Tweetdeck for iphone

- Tweetie 2

- Twitterrific

Android

Twitter support for the android market is getting much stronger and some very useful apps are now available, of which Seesmic seems again to be emerging as one of the top dogs.

Others include:

- Twidroid

- Tweetcaster

- Twicca

- Touiteur

Blackberry

And of course one must not forget the old business workhorse blackberry, who for a while felt like the kid not getting picked on the twitter football team. Now that its users have a few notable options, and with the official Blackberry Twitter app in the pipeline things are looking that bit better. The current top twitter blackberry apps include: