Whether you refuse to ever look at a newsfeed that isn’t from Facebook or your heart belongs to your Instagram feed, Twitter is here to stay. Twitter currently has over 330 million active users all around the world who are constantly sharing content and interacting with each other. If you aren’t using Twitter, your target audience definitely is. The past year has brought along numerous changes to the social media landscape, including with Twitter. In an ever changing online world, it is crucial to keep up with change and try to stay ahead of trends to establish and maintain your presence.
Going from 140 to 280 real quick...
If being short and sweet isn’t your specialty, the new 280 character limit on Twitter is a dream come true for you. Starting out, Twitter rolled out this new feature to a select set of users at the end of 2017. Now, every user is able to share their thoughts in 280 characters or less. In a social media atmosphere plagued with outrage over SnapChat’s less than favorable update and Facebook’s seemingly never ending data breaches, Twitter is doing their best to make their platform more favorable to users.
While the art of brevity has been a trademark of Twitter from the beginning, changing things up has seemed to improve overall engagement in your newsfeed. Without the frustration of 140 characters, less tweets are being abandoned or left to clutter up your drafts. While we’ve only had the pleasure of 280 characters for a few months now, it has already increased average engagement, mentions, and retweets across everyone’s timeline. Users are finding a much higher return on their tweets now that they have more characters to work with.
Goodbye fake accounts, hello influencers
In a world shying away from TV news and turning towards social media to stay updated, live streams are continuing to grow in popularity. SnapChat and Instagram both have stories, Facebook has a live feed, and now Twitter has live videos. Having a story on a platform that is constantly being flooded with new content would be nearly impossible. However, now users are able to post live videos to share on their page as they’re recording and even once they’re done. Unlike other live streaming options, these videos won’t disappear after 24 hours. The live video feature is most commonly used for sporting events and breaking news. Much like Facebook’s live feed and Instagram’s stories, viewers are able to interact with the live video by either commenting or liking it.
In a newsfeed that seems to always be filled with #FakeNews, Twitter has decided to eliminate #FakeAccounts. At some point, your feed was probably plagued with bot or spam accounts. Twitter has now decided to take a proactive approach and weed out any accounts that have been classified as ‘fake’. Many users are seeing a drop in their follower count thanks to this. The accounts most affected by this purging are those who have purchased fake followers/engagement. Going forward, as Twitter continues to clean up your feed, you can expect to have more genuine engagements with your content.
If you aren’t familiar with the concept of influencer marketing, now’s the time to learn. There has been an increase over the last few years of companies utilizing “influencers” to reach larger audiences online. While opinions are mixed on how useful influencer marketing is in generating a return on your investment, companies still continue to use it. From Walmart using Logan Paul to draw attention to their #FightHunger awareness campaign to Sperry utilizing hundreds of micro-influencers to generate and share content, if they haven’t already, influencers will quickly become a huge part of your timeline.
What Do Wendy’s and MoonPie have in common?
The saying may go “content is king” but engagement is giving it a run for the crown, especially between consumers and brands. The gap between consumers and brands is rapidly closing thanks to social media. Whether you’re addressing a customer concern or merely interacting with users, Twitter has become a huge component of online customer interaction.
Even if you’re not a fan of Wendy’s food, you’ll love their Twitter account. Nobody has quite mastered the art of social media quite like this fast-food chain has. With over 2 million followers, Wendy’s is a strong competitor for best brand on Twitter. There’s nothing they won’t say to keep their customers amused. Wendy’s even went as far as dropping a mixtape on Spotify to further their online feud with rivals, Burger King and McDonald’s. Wendy’s bold approach to social media appears to being paying off in the form of engagements.
While Wendy’s is clearly going all out to earn engagements, MoonPie has taken a more simplistic approach. While MoonPie hasn’t dropped a mixtape (yet), their simple take on their product has earned them over 200,000 followers. Between drafting commercial ideas or serving as the internet’s go-to for all things moon related, MoonPie has certainly won the hearts of thousands on Twitter.
While there definitely isn’t a shortage of changes across all social media platforms, Twitter seems to be making great strides in improving the platform for all users, whether they’re consumers or businesses. If you haven’t already established your brand on Twitter, now is the time to jump on the bandwagon and learn how to use a hashtag and what a retweet is.
