Watch out Mr Musk, there’s a new Twitter in town

Many PRs and marketeers have seen a decline in their clients’ engagement and impressions on Twitter in the last year due to the ever-changing behaviour of its users. When its prolific owner [Elon Musk] monetised various features, cut his staffing levels and declared war on Meta (I’m exaggerating here for dramatic effect), Twitter’s users were caught in a conundrum. Do we stay loyal to the platform that gave us the hashtag, or do we walk over to the dark side? 

With Threads, Meta has an opportunity to rival its former frenemy. If it can win over businesses too, it could be the start of a faster, more effective way to build a brand. So, how can businesses use it to achieve their PR goals? 

Threads: Friend of foe? 

Threads has the edge over Twitter in that it can make use of connections that businesses already have through other Meta platforms. Brands who already have a prominent social presence across Facebook or Instagram can easily link up with like-minded followers on Threads, giving them a head-start in their building brand awareness. Furthermore, though you can’t buy ads on the platform yet, with 50 million users after just two days, businesses may soon have found a new pool of audience members to target their marketing at. 

Of course, Zuckerberg’s endeavour to create a platform that is “friendlier” than Twitter is all very well and good, but perhaps we should also approach with caution. If we’ve learned anything from Instagram over the years, it’s that the platform is just as capable of sharing negativity as any other social media. It’s also guilty of blindsiding online scammers and sharing ‘false happiness’ (to quote Musk himself), both of which threaten a business’s brand perception. 

It would, therefore, be wise for businesses to continue to reinforce their digital and social PR campaigns across other tried and trusted methods, like LinkedIn. While LinkedIn didn’t have anything like the number of users that Threads did in its first 24 hours, it uses an algorithm that prioritises thought leadership over content it considers irrelevant. 

We also can’t write Twitter off. Many businesses will see Threads as a Twitter-dupe for the younger generation, preferring to stick with the Tesla founder who has a demographic better suited to their products. A similar stance has been taken by businesses regarding Snapchat and BeReal – though I tend to believe that BeReal’s true potential has yet to be unlocked. 

Publishing content for Threads 

Finally, you won’t go too far wrong with publishing content that is personable, community-spirited, and true to your brand. We’re learning so much very fast about this new platform, including who its demographic is and what its algorithm is trained to do. For now, businesses might be limited by the information it can publish via Threads, given there is no private messaging function (bring back Blackberry Messenger, I say). Furthermore, I struggle to believe that with the billions of dollars at Musk’s disposal, he doesn’t have a genius card in his arsenal to play against Zuckerberg’s pocket ace.  

Erin Softley is a junior account manager at Eden Public Relations.