A deluge of press lately has been a shot in the arm for Twitter, which seems to be gaining traction outside its core audience of hyper-connected tech geeks. But all the buzz hasn't exactly made it a household name, according to Hitwise, which says the micro-blogging platform is still very much of a niche product.

Twitter, which began experimenting with ads last October, has been on the minds of many in the interactive community lately. Back in March, Twitter got some great press when legions of disgruntled SXSW attendees used the service to overwhelm Sarah Lacy's now infamous interview with Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.

More recently, Twitter made headlines on its own when news broke that the company was looking to take on more venture capital.

According to Hitwise, Twitter has managed to grow its audience by eight-fold year over year. Traffic in the last month has grown by 60 percent, and visits in the last three months have more than doubled.