A few of my close friends know that I have a habit of working on new product and business ideas in my spare time. It usually happens when I’m on a long flight from one end of the coast to another. Just as I lean back and close my eyes, inspiration hits and I am literally forced to pull out a notepad and start outlining the idea in great detail. In my past few flights, I have been inspired to work on a business model for Twitter. Sure, it might be a quixotic quest, but it’s an incredible mental challenge and just might help make money for our company and clients while making the world a better place.

I’ve always been a big fan of sci-fi author William Gibson, and see myself continually using his famous quote: “The future is here. It’s just unevenly distributed.” I find this quote useful when I think about the companies that we work with every day. Each is at a different comfort level with digital marketing; some are still learning about email and websites, while others are challenging us to bring them the next cutting-edge technology. Our job is to adjust to their “base” comfort and keep stretching them a bit with each interaction or idea.

One of the reasons that we and our clients are not fully living the future today is that we don’t always see how the next digital bell or whistle can grow our business. Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube are all great services for consumers on their own, but where’s the opportunity for advertisers? There are many creative ways to win on a case-by-case basis, but there is no one easy solution (certainly not banners, which are virtually invisible to visitors’ eyes).

And so the following quote came onto a PowerPoint slide over the weekend:

The future is here; it just needs a business model.

I’m sure a quote alone is not going to bring millions of visitors to this blog, but when I threw it out on Twitter this past Sunday afternoon, a few followers re-Tweeted me (gotta love the instant feedback)!

On Sunday I sat down at my laptop and created a presentation about a way to monetize Twitter and Facebook. A daunting task to be sure, but the idea rolling around in my head just seems too good to drop into the wastebasket. In fact, the couple of people I have verbally shared the idea with loved it. And I’m going to have a more serious discussion with my Tech team on the feasibility of it tomorrow.

In case you’re wondering what it is, I’m sorry but I’m going to have to keep it under my hat for now. But rest assured that it is completely grounded on the idea of Marketing with Meaning, and when I share something with the world you’ll hear it here first. For now, wish me luck that my fellow board members don’t laugh me out of the room.