Twitter has come in for criticism with stagnant user growth, but it still can work for you #RIPTWITTER – a worldwide trend that started with a rumour that Twitter was changing its layout and adding an algorithm to show relevancy over recency. Outrage has ensued since. I’d imagine a few agencies have put in a bit of overtime to work out what the potential change means for their marketing plans.
The rumour has now become reality – and it could have implications for your social media marketing efforts.
Ignoring the decisions of Twitter to become like a hybrid Facebook – the character limit increase and the timeline changes – you might think that it’s becoming a ‘big brand’ paid advertising network. But ignore the death knells from the recent reports about user growth stagnating and diving share prices – Twitter’s not going anywhere for a while yet.
Regarding the change on Twitter -the relevancy of a tweet shouldn’t matter too much to you. Yes there’s a lot of time and energy spent into perfecting the perfect time to tweet to your audience. But if you make sure your audience is clearly defined, your content is perfectly matched to them and your individual tweets are engaging to your market then you should still reach a lot of people. It’s something you should be doing now, so it’s not going to alter after this change.
So I’m not going to bang on too much about Twitter. What I am going to say is that these changes bring into focus is how planning is key to quickly reacting to any situation.
Focus on the right platforms
Now more than ever requires you to make sure that you are on the right platform for your audience. It’s probably basic thinking but it’s so important. Look at your analytics to determine which is the best channels for you. If one you’re on is performing poorly compared to the others work out if it’s time to put it to one side and spend more time on the rest.
Reviewing your social funnel
The user journey – every part of it – should be planned out. Do you have contact details on your bio? Does your landing page match the message you send out? You want your audience to take action – so make sure that it’s as easy as possible for them to do this. From seeing a post on your account to the final step it should be simple and well thought out.
Define what the ‘user’ wants to see – not what you want to see.
Following on from your social funnel make sure you know what your audience wants to see. Not what you think they do. Talk to your customers. See what they are interested in. Review your ideal audience. See what they talk about and who they talk to. And make sure you talk to them, and not about yourself.
Don’t become noise
One picture is worth a thousand words. One quality tweet is worth 100 ‘noise’ tweets. Don’t add noise to your content mix. Make sure you think about the amount of content you put out. Too much noise means you’ll lose impact on your meaningful tweets.
Keep on top of trends
It’s vital that you are always on the lookout for the next big thing. Instagram should now be a ‘primary’ platform – something you should automatically think about being on.
Periscope, Snapchat, Meerkat – the list of new platforms is endless. So keep an eye on these and if you’re the first on there you can quickly become a leader on it.
So it’s not quite #RIPTWITTER just yet, it’s about adding a defib to kickstart adaptable plans.
By Helen Pritchard, a former recruiter and owner of Blue Sky Digital Marketing – a Social Media company with a speciality in Social Recruiting
Join Over 40,000 Recruiters. Get our latest articles weekly, all FREE – SEND ME ARTICLES
Recruiters love this COMPLETE set of Accredited Recruitment & HR Training – View Training Brochure
