Are you Thready for this?
Is Threads really as it seams? Or is it maybe a bit sew-sew?
Dubbed a copycat of Twitter for its direct immitation, there’s major hustle and bustle around Instagram’s new, text-based companion app. In the words of one technology reporter:
Although you could say that Meta-owned Threads is not the only culprit of mimicking an existing social platform. Take Instagram’s Reels feature, for example, which you could argue is just a TikTok in disguise. (What’s a reel you ask? We’ve got you, there’s a blog about that! ) Also lovingly known as the Twitter Killer, Threads has seen record breaking downloads since its debut, in fact over 150 million at the time of writing this, with 100 million active users!
Threads is becoming a mega point of discussion globally, with availability in over 100 countries (including the UK, the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan). However, due to either privacy concerns or government censorship, it is still unavailable in the European Union, China, North Korea, Russia and Iran, even though it has been pitched as a platform that doesn’t encourage politics and hard news, unlike Twitter.
On close inspection we’re finding ourselves (literally) pulling at Threads to determine the differentiating factors. On Twitter you can ‘retweet’, on Threads you can ‘repost’. It’s finding itself in the tomayto-tomahto, potato-potahto territory. Or is it?
Well (not including you Blue Tick subscribers to Twitter, who are granted up to 25,000 characters), Threads allows a total of 500 characters, that is 260 more in comparison to its rival, Twitter, who only lets you rant in up to 240 characters. So, Threads allows you to string along your story just that little bit more. And we know that more is more. It’s a fair amount of spiel…or should we say spool?
Threads also allows you to post videos of up to 5 minutes long, a bit of an upgrade from Twitter’s 2 minutes and 20 seconds, wouldn’t you say? If you’re an avid fan of posting videos on socials such as TikTok, you may be rejoicing at this, giving you more options to share videos from Tiktok to Threads, leaving Twitter behind in the video race.
In a sea of Twitter hashtags, there’s a hashtag void in Threads. What could this mean for users? Well, potentially this could lead to increased hurdles to broaden reach….at least until we get a better understanding of Threads algorithm. So far the algorithm has been reported to show a bunch of random accounts in a non-chronological order in your feed. And, hey, at least with Threads, users are not bound by the newly-imposed rules that Twitter have announced, such as the limited number of Tweets that can be viewed in a day. We’ll take that as a win for Threads.
Is Threads just a novelty?
It has seen such astronomical growth and lured even more substantial traction than the recently launced ChatGPT, but is this just down to social pressure? All the most important people have got to have the latest social media, right? Some might argue that Threads growth is a bit misleading because of it’s incredibly streamlined ability to take your followers right from your Instagram account to your Threads account. The joys of being owned by the same mega company. Fuelled by FOMO (the fear of missing out), it’s THE new social playground, but for how long?
So what is the Yellow Cherry verdict?
We don’t object to the use of Threads, there are some great benefits.
There’s no need to start the platform with zero followers.
That is if you already have an active Instagram account. Threads handy feature of importing followers from Instagram is a great time saver on building relationships, especially for small businesses who can find themselves strapped for time. So much so, to quote the feelings of one CEO in the marketing technology industry:
However, (for obvious Musk vs Zuckerberg reasons), the same can’t be said if you want to import Twitter contacts into Threads, so there’s a bit of upheaval there, which could become a bit of an inconvenience trying to recruit your followers again.
Familiarity
You won’t find yourself getting in knots over the Threads interface as it is a familiar and intuitive app. But yet another social media app? Social media fatigue is a real thing… sustaining yourself on yet another new platform can be a challenge. One Sociology academic researching social media culture was interviewed on his thoughts on Threads, he pointed out that there’s already a level of anxiety amongst users of Threads. This is around the norms and the social culture of what version of themselves they should present on Threads. It isn’t easy being social!
Engagement
Neil Patel carried out a test on performance between Twitter and Threads. It will be interesting to keep an eye on this and see whether it stands the test of time. Patel suggests that there’s no harm in posting on both Threads and Twitter in tandem as it should only increase the volume of people that see your posts, with a slight variation in your audience on each platform.
So, is Threads a bit of a one-trick pony right now?
Well, some parts of it might need a little more work.
Direct messaging
The lack of a chat function may leave many scurrying back to Twitter in search of a timely private response to their customer service query. If you’re anything like me, you probably head right on over to the old blue birded app when your online purchase remains undelivered! Some things are just better left private.
Monetisation
Threads isn’t becoming a monetisable platform for now, as confirmed by Meta.
‘I’m running ads on Twitter, what should I do?’ you might be thinking? Worry not, Twitter are seeing fluctuations in its traffic. If you are currently running ads, keep an eye on them, the pause button is there, should you need it. Maybe now is a good time to also consider running ads on other platforms while Twitter seems a little more volatile. For reference, Similarweb identified that Twitter’s turbulent traffic was down by a measly 5% (in comparison to the previous week) in the first two days Threads was available.
Is any social platform without some form of politics?
We do wonder how the community will develop, be policed and how non-political the app stays. Take the example of the Aldi vs M&S cake wars on Twitter, will we see this tongue-in-cheek behaviour in Threads? Time will tell. After all, Colin the Caterpillar is quite a political topic. Cue blog on the most famous internet feuds… watch this space!
After a yarn over Twitter’s ‘dupe’, it’s almost time to wind this up…
There’s no harm in trying out Threads. Just be warned that you can’t yet completely delete a Threads profile without deleting your Instagram profile (😮 so there are actually some threads attached…). We’ll certainly be keeping an eye on the latest news on Threads and keeping you in the loop.
Need(le) help with your social media marketing? Perhaps it seams like you should run some social media ads and don’t know where to start ? Sew, get in touch today!