When Twitter started out, no one was expecting to hit it as big as it has. Now, as the micro-blogging website recording an every growing base of users and high popularity levels, co-founder Biz Stone has revealed the firm's plans to "capitalize" on the huge interest in the site's services.

Two major ways to make money are currently being explored by Twitter, as has been confirmed by Stone. One is the "licensing and syndication" effort of the firm, which has already resulted in tie-ups with Google and Microsoft's search engine Bing. Both the search engines will soon start incorporating "tweets" in their search results to give more focused and localized results.

The second way shared is Twitter's plans to offer commercial accounts as well, which would provide "a specific layer of access". Twitter has already grown into a major social media marketing tool, and by including commercial accounts, the company is looking to cash-in a little on the same.

"People are very curious about exactly how we make our money and we're going to be entering into that this year. Twitter will always be free to everyone whether it's commercial or personal. But you'll be able to pay for an additional layer of access to learn more about your Twitter account - to get some feedback, to get some analytics so that you can become a better twitterer", Stone was quoted as saying.

As of figures shared in February this year, Twitter recorded a global user base of over 6 million, and this is bound to reach a 9-digit figure by the end of 2010. Also, Twitter has signed major deals with Orange and LinkedIn.