Commentary

Will Twitter Do A Facebook? The One Question Brand Marketers Need Answered

Is Twitter going to go the way of Facebook? Is the time-based approach to a user's timeline going to be replaced with one based upon what an algorithm believes should be most interesting to them?

The latest hints dropped by its CFO would suggest that it will -- and though it might annoy Twitter fans, it would probably make a lot of sense.

The bigger question for brand markers, however, is what impact this may have on where their tweets end up. The elephant in the room is whether an algorithm would get between brands and the following they have build up in the same way that it does with Facebook. 

The single most important question Twitter will need to answer is whether -- regardless of where they appear on a user's timeline -- all tweets from all brands will be put into the algorithm mix and presented to all their followers. Or will Twitter do a Facebook and hold back something like nine in ten users and then expect brands to pay to promote to people who have already decided to follow them?

The algorithmic approach isn't the end of the world, because -- let's face it -- Twitter is a broadcast channel. Sure, there are people having conversations, but these are usually based around content or a view someone has just broadcast. That's why we all get so worked up about having as many followers as possible and following people who follow us and, for many, unfollowing people who have unfollowed us. This tit for tat following means that people simply can't be expected to keep up to date with what another thousand people and companies are broadcasting every second of the day. 

So, although it might not be popular, an algorithm might at least bring some sense to a timeline and let people know which content has been most engaged in.

There is a very real point here that those with large followings are likely to get more interaction and end up topping timelines, at the expense of smaller and niche content providers, but that is probably the case at the moment anyway. Whether it is a user who can't be bothered to scroll down several screen lengths or it's an algorithm that places some content at the top of a timeline, I'd bet that most people don't keep up with much more than 10 percent of the tweets available to them anyway.

Twitter is an unwieldy beast with users confronted daily with just far too much information. An algorithm would make perfect sense. It will annoy a lot of people, but it really does make sense.

One point I'd still make to Twitter, however, is that there should be dispensation for any site reporting on a time-sensitive event. Football games are a good example. How often have you gone on Facebook to see that your team is at the top of your feed and they're winning through a goal scored twenty minutes ago? Scroll down and there's the news that the other team got one back a minute ago. Because the first post got a lot of engagement it's considered more important, but for the user, the latest score up top is the most relevant post to see first.

Aside from that, the big question is going to be whether Twitter allows a brand's entire following to be exposed to all of its tweets with the proviso that their order on a timeline will vary according to engagement. That would be the fair way of approaching a new-look, engagement-based feed.

The alternative of allowing brands to build up massive followings only to have them taken away by an algorithm would be far too much like Facebook for my liking. And I suspect that brand marketers share this opinion.

By all means judge a brand's content by its engagement -- but don't let that mean it gets hidden away until released into public view via the corporate cheque book.

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