Twitter’s numbers show it has a big problem. The platform is attracting fewer and fewer new users in the U.S., and its current users are abandoning it at an increasing rate. Twitter’s managers have tried to fix the problem by changing the look of Twitter profiles. Some observers suggest deeper changes to the platform: making the experience much more user friendly, developing better algorithms for surfacing interesting content, or improving search functionalities.

But what Twitter really needs is a global strategy. And this means a strategy to win in India. Without that, the bad news about Twitter will continue to pile on. Here’s why.

There are three key Internet markets in the world. First, there is China, with 618 million Internet users, about a quarter of the global online population. The Chinese will soon spend more on online purchases than consumers in the U.S., even though an average Chinese citizen only earns a ninth of what Americans do. But an American company cannot win in China, unless it engages in extensive censorship. This is why Facebook cannot compete in China, and neither can Twitter. So China is out of the picture.

Then there is the U.S. with approximately 250 million Internet users. Twitter has operated in this market since 2006, so almost everyone who wanted to try Twitter has tried it. And if they haven’t liked the service yet, it will be hard to make them do so now. On top of that, very few Americans haven’t tried the Internet yet. Even if all of them (15 years or older) went online this year, and all of them fell madly in love with Twitter, the site would add about 40 million new users. The U.S. is not going to be much help either.

Finally there is India, where in 2012 there were 150 million Internet users. This June, that number will grow to almost 250 million, about as many as in the U.S. The market is not as rich as in China or the U.S., but the number of Internet users will grow for a very long time, as there are over a billion people in India. And the Indian population loves the American social platforms: India is already the second biggest user of Facebook after the U.S., and by my calculations it will become number one this year. Facebook is already helping to make this happen. Remember WhatsApp, the acquisition Facebook made a couple of months ago for almost $19 billion? It happens to be the most popular social interaction tool in India. It’s not a coincidence that Facebook wanted to buy it to accelerate its growth there.

Meanwhile, Twitter had only 33 million users in India in 2013. And the country is nowhere close to becoming the number one user of Twitter. This is not surprising, as the company has no growth strategy in this incredibly attractive market.

So what should Twitter’s strategy in India be? The company needs to do two things. First, it needs to attract a lot of users by applying what it has learned in the U.S., where the viral process was not what brought Twitter into the mainstream and increased its numbers. TV was responsible for that. The CNN show Rick Sanchez Direct was the first to air live tweets on TV in early 2008. After the Mumbai bombings later that year, a Twitter ticket tape became a permanent fixture on CNN, and other broadcasters soon followed suit. With free 24/7 advertising on key broadcast media, it is no wonder that Twitter grew so quickly. Now, Twitter should turn that accidental success into strategy. The company should approach every conceivable broadcast medium in India to make sure that its name and its services are promoted broadly, even spending money to advertise to new Internet users in India. Remember, WhatsApp is already huge in the Indian market, and it’s used a lot by companies and politicians and other public figures. So Twitter can’t just sit there and wait for people to show up.

Second, Twitter has to keep Indian users very happy so they stay on the platform. That will require recognizing that most users in India access the Internet through their mobile phones. Indian consumers need light and fast mobile applications that don’t use up a lot of bandwidth (this is how WhatsApp become successful). Second, Twitter needs to develop additional services that alleviate some of the many information gaps in India. For example, it could develop services to aid the Indian democratic election process (currently, Google Hangouts, Facebook and WhatsApp dominate this process). Twitter could also help build a better public health information dissemination system (where it would not have many competitors). Or it could release an application to collect, aggregate and disseminate prices of produce across various markets.

All of these would help Twitter retain its Indian users for a long time. But first things first: Twitter’s management has to put India front and center of its growth strategy.