Would You Pay for Twitter ‘Pro’?

There has been a lot of discussion and online polls over the past week or so about the value of Twitter, and how Twitter should go about monetizing itself. Twitter is no doubt a very useful and successful tool for bloggers, companies, professionals, etc. How much is it worth to you is the real question being asked. There have been a variety of discussions with plenty of ideas from simple banner ads to sophisticated marketing schemes, but I think Twitter can go another route and still be very successful. Twitter and Twitter ‘Pro’.

‘Pro’ online services are certainly nothing new, but I think it’s the perfect direction for Twitter to go in. I like to use Flickr as an example, because although the free Flickr service is great, just about everyone I know has no problem dropping $25 a year for Flickr Pro. Why? Well simply because the Pro offerings are well worth the minimal cost. Twitter can go the same way.

Twitter as it is, is a fine service. However, there are many features that can be added that I think people would not hesitate upgrading for.

Just a few examples of things I would like to see.

• Unlimited API calls. Many of us use Twitter clients like Tweetdeck, Twhirl, etc. and are faced with the common downtime due because of too many polling calls going out. ‘Pro’ users shouldn’t have to worry about this.
• Enhanced Page Customization. If you go to my page now (http://twitter.com/islanddog), you will see I have a little graphic listing a brief summary of “who I am”, and where you can find me. It’s just a simple image, but ‘Pro’ users could get an enhanced page where they can customize certain aspects with HTML. This will enable more flexibility when wanting to refer people to your sites, blogs, etc.
• Enhanced Friend Search. Right now, you can find friends by a basic search, or by entering your e-mail address and let Twitter try and find a match. ‘Pro’ users could have an advanced search with extended search parameters and possible integration with other services like FriendFeed. Also, the ability to see “recommended” friends/followers would be another awesome addition.
• Better Follower Management. It’s hard to keep track of who’s following you, who isn’t following you, and so on. There are several third-party tools that try and solve this, but in my experience I have found many of them to be lacking in features and accuracy. Lets see the ‘Pro’ version give much more thorough friend/follower tracking and management options.

These are just a few suggestions, and I would definitely like to hear things you would be willing to pay for. Now we have to look at how much features like this would be worth. For me, I would like to see a Twitter ‘Pro’ in the $20-$25 per year range. I think that would be an excellent and reasonable starting point to consider.

So for now, all we can do is just wait and see the next big move by Twitter is. Do you think a ‘Pro’ version of Twitter is the right way to go?