How to do Twitter right (and not “wrong”)



Contributing Writer
Photo: Supervisors Credit: Vasant Dave


Buddy Media just released a report entitled, “Strategies for Effective Tweeting, a Statistical Review.” which discusses their recommendations for Twitter engagement based upon data collected from 350 of the “top brands” on the platform.  Besides specifying some precise times to tweet, they recommend sending a meager four tweets (or less) daily to optimize “engagement” (defined as replies and retweets).

Todd Wasserman wrote about the report on Mashable with the headline, “Sorry Marketers, You’re Doing Twitter Wrong,” which is a pretty sensational headline to describe this study (“How the Big Dogs effectively leverage their scale to distribute content” might have been more descriptive – but I suppose that’s boring).  Contrary to how this report is presented. it’s relevant only to social media advertisers who want to place content for optimal re-distribution on Twitter.  From that perspective there are some good insights to glean.

….but you can send 1000 tweets per day.  For a business with a local clientele, Twitter gives you the unique ability to engage direct to consumer, proactively, geographically-specific and with the frequency that you choose.  I have a hard time understanding how sending four tweets a day would have any marketing value for anyone other than the top brands.  What’s the point of having a Twitter account if you’re sending banal messages four times a day to a small audience that may or may not received them?  Not a lot.

The big picture lesson is that social media is all about scale.  The top brand on Twitter is Twitter, and if they send out four tweets a day to 11 million people it is going to get a lot more traction than me or you doing the same thing.  #3 brand Facebook has 4 million followers, #6 brand McDonald’s 500K, et cetera.  These are not typical users – these are brands spending brand dollars to drive traffic to branded content.  If your Twitter scale is on this level then maybe these insights apply.  Otherwise there’s not a lot of comparison.  It’s like comparing skyscrapers to oranges.

Arguing that David should market like Goliath is pretty weak when you think about it for two seconds.  The Davids of the world have to rely on frequency and direct to consumer engagement to differentiate on Twitter.  For whatever reason (actually it’s short-term ROI), big brands are reticent to take that tact and that’s a great thing for smaller businesses (Imagine if Goliath had a slingshot, too).

When it comes to anything around “social media,” people want to intimate that there is a level playing field for all users and there isn’t.  A report qualifying the marketing practices of average users on Twitter will have to look at best practices within that population.  Four tweets a day just isn’t going to cut it for most people and brands – so I hope people are taking this study with a grain of salt.

Afterthoughts: One of the more curious measurements in the study was “engagement rate,” defined as the retweets+replies to a tweet then “factoring in” followers.  What’s odd about this measurement is that it expresses engagement rate as negative from Monday through Thursday.  It begs the question of how you can have a deficit of engagement.

Also, all of their times expressed in the study are EST, meaning that after 4 PM Pacific Standard Time Twitter “engagement” diminishes.  Though the East Coast has a higher concentration of Twitter users, it seems that something is off if engagement ends when everyone on the east coast turns on Jeopardy.

 

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Jim Dougherty

Jim Dougherty

Writer and chief of miscellany at leaderswest.com

I aspire to give people something to think about rather than tell them what to do. My favorite Google Alert is “social media research,” I am increasingly compelled by Gen Z, and I appreciate good writers agnostic of where they write. At one time I was Kred’s 12th most influential social media blogger and Klout’s most influential person on the topic of David Hasselhoff. Transplant from Seattle living in Cincinnati. Haven’t entirely adopted the local sports teams yet.

Jim Dougherty

@jimdougherty

Writer about social media and tech at Leaders West, I also tweet as @leaderswest.

Infographic: How to optimize photos for Facebook’s News Feed http://t.co/6OkhbTRkb0 – 10 hours ago

Jim Dougherty

Jim Dougherty

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  • http://www.magnetostrat.com Suzy

    Thanks Jim! Very helpful as always!

  • http://jupiterjimsmarketingteam.com/ Jupiter Jim

    Jim,

    Great article. As you said, it’s important that people who are small businesses and entities follow the same tactics of Huge Megabrands like MacDonald’s , Pepsi, Coca-Cola, etc. As usual, it’s important that people interpret the data correctly.

    Thanks for sharing!

    ~ Jupiter Jim

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