Gary is wrong on this one. Twitter’s problem isn’t noise, it’s a lack of organic conversations. The one thing that attracted many of Twitter’s hardcore users from 2006-2008, is now all but dead in 2015. The beauty of Twitter in those early days was that it was an incredible discovery tool. You could meet new people seamlessly, and you could expand your network (personal or professional) all at the same time via simply chatting with people on Twitter. It was a huge chat room open to everyone, 140 characters at a time.
Then in 2008, Twitter decided that it didn’t have the bandwidth or funding to pay for all these ‘silly’ conversations. So it changed the rules, and said that you couldn’t see a reply a friend left unless you were also following that 3rd person. This effectively killed any chance we had of organically expanding our networks on Twitter. Which was one of the key attractions of the site prior to 2008. This alone caused many of Twitter’s early adopters to either leave the site, or spend far less time there.
Then…came the celebrities.
Ashton Kutcher killed Twitter
It was 2009 and I was looking at a billboard in Alabama telling traffic up and down Woodward Avenue to follow Ashton Kutcher. I had to pull over and take a picture, because this was a huge deal, right? Finally that little site I loved was getting mainstream attention!
Which, of course, was the beginning of the end. Ashton had found Twitter. Oprah had found Twitter, which meant everyone was about to find Twitter. The mainstream floodgates opened, and suddenly everyone was joining Twitter.
And the user experience was about to change dramatically. When the marketers found Twitter, the marketers did what marketers do: They turned Twitter into their new marketing channel. Another blow to early adopters that had come to Twitter for the conversations, which were increasingly being choked out by self-promotion.
The Rise of the Twitter Chats
In late 2008, the Twitter chat was born. And in great part, this was a direct response to the increasing difficulty in creating and cultivating organic conversations. Prior to 2009, I could go on Twitter almost anytime I wanted and ask a simple question and within 5-10 mins be involved in a deep conversation with a dozen people. And that was when I had maybe 5,000 followers. In fact, I started #blogchat simply because 6 years ago I asked a simple question about blogging and in less than an hour, there were over 200 tweets in that conversation, and I wanted to add a hashtag to it so I could keep up with everything said around the topic.
But even the increasingly use of Twitter chats points to the fact that organic conversations have increasingly left Twitter. So much so that we had to schedule them! Let’s meet on Twitter every Sunday night at 8pm Central to talk blogging! Because otherwise, it won’t happen.
User Behavior Has Adapted as the Experience Has Changed
More and more, Twitter has become a content stream where it used to be a conversation stream. It’s not about interactions and discussions, now it’s about sharing links. The way I use Twitter has completely changed in the last few years. I used to use Twitter as a networking tool, I’d go there, say hi to a few friends, and over the course of a couple hours I’d reconnect and catch up with friends, I’d be introduced to some new ones, maybe even grab a work lead or two.
Today, the primary way I use Twitter is as a content stream. Every day I send out more links to my own content than I would in a month in 2009. The type of engagement when from conversations to clicks and RTs. And we all changed our behavior as a result. At least those of us that stayed did. The result is that there’s more ‘stuff’ on Twitter and none of it is getting the eyeballs or engagement that it once did.
I’d Like to Order a Tweet, and Can You Upsize My Engagement?
Back to the issue of falling engagement for a minute. I currently have about 50,000 followers on Twitter. When I send a tweet out, obviously not all 50,000 followers will see that tweet. I get it. But according to Twitter’s analytics, only about 1-2% of my followers see the majority of my tweets. That means that less than 1,000 of my 50,000 followers see the average tweet I leave.
That sounds impossibly low, so on a whim I decided to spend $10 promoting one of my Tweets to see if I saw similar engagement numbers. Here’s what happened:
Numbers are a bit hard to read, but what this means is that organically (free), my tweet reached 754 of my followers. When I paid Twitter $10, they were able to reach 5,850 of my followers. Which brings us to the second way to get engagement for your social media content: Pay for it.
Twitter is Dead and it’s Never Coming Back
I joined Twitter exactly 8 years ago. For the first 18 months I was there, it was truly a magical place because of all the wonderful people I came to know. But when ‘everyone’ found Twitter, the experience began to change. And Twitter began to devalue the role of organic conversations on the site. The core experience that attracted many of us to Twitter in the first place began to erode. Now that Twitter has gone public, shareholders and Wall-Street will push for more monetization efforts. Which means the experience that drew me to Twitter in the first place will continue to disappear.
And the irony is I’ll post this on Twitter, and a lot of the people that would agree with me, the people I connected with in those first 18 months will never see this post. And it won’t be because there’s so much ‘noise’ on Twitter that my post gets lost in the content stream.
It will be because they’ve already left Twitter.
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I couldn’t agree more, Mack. It’s funny, the other day someone I follow asked if anyone else was having a hard time with the way twitter is now. I responded that I certainly had to work harder to get a conversation going these days. The person who asked the question? Never respond. Arrrggghhh!
I agree, Lauri. The funny part? Look at the top of this post, it’s already been shared 2.5 times more on Facebook, I only posted it once on Facebook, I’ve already tweeted it twice on Twitter. Guess people are just more chatty on Facebook?
Yo Mack,
Regretfully I agree completely…
Thinking BB King, ‘the thrill is gone’.
Or penning a blog post: ‘…after the thrill is gone’ when all those so called ‘social media marketing’ experts aka re-branded 1.0 PR co’s don’t deliver on their viral/visibility/call to action promises?
Thanks for your continuing commitment to this challenged community…
Gregg
Thanks Gregg, the thrill has been gone for a while now, hasn’t it? At this point I’m hoping another site comes along that can at least replicate some of the magic from the early days of Twitter.
It’s funny because I’ve noticed this recently myself. But where has conversation gone? I don’t see much anywhere. Lots of broadcasting but little actual engagement from anyone.
To be fair, I found this post through Twitter…. so it still clearly has value!
Jamie
Jamie it seems to me that many of us are simply changing our behavior from chatting on social media sites to sharing and curating content. Not completely, but there seems to be a shift away from conversation and toward content sharing and curation.
My feelings exactly about Twitter. I joined in 2007 & enjoyed the experience. Now tweeting is kind of like farting in the wind…who knows if anyone noticed? I can put the same comment on Facebook and Twitter. On Facebook, I’m sure to get engagement, even if it’s just likes. On Twitter, it’s often gone into the abyss.
I do use Twitter for business as well and try to make sure that our tweets are not just for self-promotion (though some are), but tweets that spark conversation.
And it’s getting harder every day to spark those conversations on Twitter! Honestly neither Facebook or Twitter are very business-friendly.
Mack, I’ll go ahead and be the one that disagrees with your post. Twitter has not changed. Consumption habits have, like you said. It doesn’t mean that it doesn’t work anymore. I guess my point is that I still believe in the power of the conversations that can bubble up. The difference might be in that you have to work a bit harder for them to happen. It’s no different than when any other company, startup, device, restaurant or whatever, catches on. They evolve into something you don’t really recognize anymore. It’s OK, I’m nostalgic too but the fact of the matter is 8 years ago, we had great conos because there was no one else here. Now it’s like Epcot!
I still believe in the power of Twitter and still believe in the power of conversation-it’s just they are across the room from each other now. That’s as good a contrarian viewpoint as I could muster.
Take care.
Marc
Hey Marc, I agree with more people joining Twitter making it hard to have convos, but for me when Twitter changed it so you couldn’t see replies that your followers made to non-followers, it really stifled conversations. It was sooooo easy to meet new people and jump into side-conversations before, but when Twitter made that change, you literally could not SEE those side conversations. It’s not the entire reason for the decline in conversations, but IMO it’s the main reason.
I kind of agree and kind of disagree. There is now doubt that, out of my 10,000 followers very respond to my daily blog post link, etc. However, when I ask for followers to RT a fundraising message or a do-good message or ask for help, they respond pretty well.
I think it is the difference of having a conversation among 5 people around a table (what twitter used to be) and now there’s a huge room of people socializing and it’s simply harder to get the entire room, or a critical mass of the room, on a single conversation without having a bull horn OR without being Asthon Kutcher. Good article though. And BTW, I hate FB although I have one associated with my blog. I love twitter for news.
It’s funny, I had to go back and check how I found this post because I thought it was via Twitter, but as it turns out it was from a Facebook post by Sean McGinnis. These days, I actually prefer Twitter over Facebook and according to my recent Sprout Social report, I get about 18K clicks on links in my tweets in past 2 weeks, which is not bad… Facebook business pages are a ghost town unless you can have an ad approved and pay for it.
I definitely agree that Twitter has changed and it is much more about news now. However, I still attend and find value in chats as the main vehicle for conversations. Meerkat has recently brought a fun new element to Twitter with streaming videos which has changed the way that people can communicate on the platform as well. So, I can’t say that Twitter is dead because I certainly play, have conversations, share posts and have leveraged a ton of connections there that have supported my business. I definitely find value in Twitter as a means to connect with people around the world and love connecting with new followers doing exciting things in other countries. That’s the thing I have always loved about Twitter, the ability to connect with people from all over the world and share their content, have a conversation and maybe… something awesome comes out of that connection as a result.
Hi Britt, I agree, have always loved how Twitter lets you connect with people from all over the world. But for me, that ability seems to be diminishing the longer I stay there. Glaring difference between now and 2008 or so.
Great read. Found it on Facebook.
A couple more thoughts:
1) Can’t it have both a noise and a conversation problem?
2) Is it really a problem if it just happens that most people are using Twitter differently from how early adopters used it? What you write about seems to be a demonstrable trend, but not necessarily a problem.
David that’s a good point, to anyone that joined Twitter from say 2011 on, the experience now is probably pretty similar to them as it’s always been on Twitter.
I agree that the problem is both, and I would argue that over-automation is what killed it. Some of us fought the good fight against tools that allowed people to automatically share posts of their friends, but about a year ago I (privately) conceded defeat on that front. On top of this, noise begets more noise – as everyone increases their posting frequency to try to be heard.
I try not to think about the changes in Twitter too much, because it makes me so sad! It was a wonderful platform that helped cement many real friendships (present company included) and business collaborations. I believe Twitter chats still provide this opportunity, but otherwise it’s difficult.
Kellye you’re exactly right on automation, I have to schedule a dozen or more tweets a day to get any type of referral traffic from Twitter. It does help get some conversations started around the content, but’s a case of either not doing that and getting no traffic, or do it, getting traffic and contributing to the problem. Not ideal in either case.
Boom. Nailed it.
(Found this post via Facebook of course.) 🙂
Of course 😉
Great post! I agree. I’ve been on Twitter since 07 and it’s been a wonderful tool for me to connect with others and also completely change the course of my career. While it has become more of a content stream versus a conversation tool, I do still see a lot of conversations happening on my stream and in my lists.
Does it mean that overall, it’s as effective as it was 5 years ago? No, but it’s not that dead. Just like with any tool, it’s what we make of it. I’m not giving up on it just yet, though I definitely don’t check it as often as I used to.
Hi Berrak! Twitter isn’t dead, but I think that Twitter from 2007 is definitely dead. As I said above the people that joined within the past few years probably see the experience as pretty much unchanged since they have been there.
I’d agree with that. I also miss the days of Tweet Ups!
Interesting opinion. I found this post on the “Share and Engage” page of a LittleBird report (that means people I consider influencers are engaging with your content across all social platforms.) There still is great value to be found on Twitter, but I agree with other people that it doesn’t always take the form of a person to person conversation. I signed up in 2008 and used to do a lot more “lurking.” I actively engage in conversation a lot more today.
i didn’t start blogging or using Twitter until 2011, so I guess I’m a late adapter. I have met some people on Twitter through chats, but very few through Twitter in general. I have grown my blog and website and social media connections mostly through Facebook, specifically in private groups. I do wish there was more organic connection on Twitter.
I agree on so many of the points but want to point out I’ve known you forever thanks to Twitter and continue to talk to you there, but I also talk with you on other channels and Twitter has changed a lot. I can’t help but think with 10k or 50k followers, neither of us is engaged with all of them so we’re part of the problem too. I know I rely on key lists and the kinds of hashtags that deliver the most value. I do still love Twitter for certain things, including #blogchat.
Thanks Janice, Twitter chats like #blogchat are a throwback to what Twitter used to be, at least for me. See you Sunday 😉
Hey Mack
Twitter was my first ‘marketing’ crush, but your article is the reason why I use it as a content stream too! Of course, I have a few conversations with friends, but every social media platform has transformed into a ‘Paid Ads, Promoted Posts Paradise’, with a few organic posts by big brands that gain steam! 🙂
LOVE – thank you for having the courage to speak up! #HUGS
Kitto
Yes, agree with all of this Krithika!
I also disagree. I mean, yes, there is noise and yes, it’s gotten harder to find organic conversations like those we were having in 2007. But they’re still happening.
For instance, women of color (in particular) are having incredibly real, engaging, powerful conversations around all kinds of topics on a regular basis.
I still have a good/fun/entertaining time following friends who are commenting on television shows in real-time. And with the folks I follow just because they’re funny and have always used Twitter as a tool for being comedic.
I’m not saying you don’t have a point, but your experience and how you use/what you expect from Twitter isn’t universal. As echoed here, it may well be common among a certain type of Twitter users (those like you and your extended followers)…but that may just mean it’s time to rethink how we have Twitter ‘conversations.’
Kirsty raises an important point: while many of us are experiencing the worn-out, closed-offer version of Twitter, there are other subcultures currently enjoying an explosion of engagement. I suspect they’ll catch up to us soon enough, however, for the reasons Mack pointed out.
I’ve noticed the same thing. No one talks anymore. It’s all pushing information. I don’t know if it’s all the newbies who just don’t get it but feel like they have to be on Twitter or what, but I miss the way it used to be. Might as well change the name to “media” and drop “social” if there is not going to be any conversations.
Mack,
Well done sir…. just nice to understand it, finally. To get the changes and know why it’s so flat.
Thank you.
Shawn
I have been on Twitter since around the end of ’08 I think and it is definitely different than it once was.
I miss the days of popping in any time and knowing if I asked a question or just said hi many people would answer.
Today I still have conversations but only when I work to make it happen. Some of those have been outstanding but they are few and far between.
Mack,
Agree. For me, it was the whole Justine Sacco situation that changed twitter for me. Not that I agree with what she tweeted – but the fact she was attacked by a “twitter” mob, to the point they were tracking her plane and taking pictures of her at the airport.
I put my account on private, and am more careful what I say now. I thought of her tweet and thought – what if someone grabbed my phone and tweeted a racist comment from my account? Or what if my account was hacked and they did the same? The way the twitter mob works – I would be out of a job, probably in jail and homeless before the truth came out. I can’t risk that – and I know many that are in the same boat as me – thus we are on private and engaging less.
Good read. I agree with you.
Chris that’s a great point, it was a terrible thing for her to say, but everyone here has said something we later regretted. She just made the mistake of saying it on Twitter. And the great irony is that the ‘twitter mob’ almost always ends up acting far worse than the offensive behavior that rallied them to become a Twitter mob in the first place. Another example of how narcissism is weaved too tightly into all social media.
Excellent points, Mack. I didn’t join Twitter until 2010, but there were still a lot of real, engaging conversations happening. The last five years has done away with a lot of those authentic conversations, and I miss that. It’s what made Twitter the tops for me. I still use and enjoy the “new” Twitter but not anywhere near the level I used to years ago.
I totally disagree with this post. I am still having wonderful, engaging conversations with my followers. There is a certain etiquette in communicating with others on Twitter. What I’ve seen is most people do it poorly.
Agreed!
Beverly you’re right, there are still many conversations happening on Twitter. But it was far easier to create and cultivate conversations on Twitter in 2007 and 2008 than it is in 2015.
I use TweetDeck. I see every reply whether someone is a follower or non-follower. I think if I was still utilizing the platform from Twitter dot com I’d have given up. But because of TweetDeck, I agree with Marc’s comments above
Carole, you can see replies in certain situations like a Twitter chat or if the tweet starts with a period, but if I reply to Marc and you are following me but not following Marc, then you won’t see my reply to Marc if I start the tweet with a reply. Twitter made that change in early 2008. Prior to then, you could see the reply, but not after.
This is why people started putting a period at the start of their tweet, because it overrides this setting.
I loved twitter when it was new. Loved it. I never even went on back in the day but the day Ashton Kutscher, Coca Cola started tweeting that was the end for me. I never even waited for Oprah. I made a couple of comments similar to your article and some people told me I didn’t know what I was talking about. Once in awhile I will tweet an article that I think is interesting, but to go to Twitter and have a conversation with someone, I don’t even wast my time.
Change is the only constant and the Internet is the definition of fluidity. Nothing is the same as it was in 2008, least of all ANYTHING on the internet. Roll with it, adapt, create your own, or move on.
Do you see the irony of the fact that you’re bemoaning how no one talks on Twitter anymore while you saturate Twitter with links (“more in a day than you used to do in a month”)? Twitter is still an excellent source for organic conversation. I don’t follow people who only or even mostly tweet links and I rarely post any. Because of this, I still have plenty of conversation. If all Twitter is to you is a promotional platform, and it sounds like it is, then it’s unlikely that the kind of people who want genuine conversations are going to follow or engage you. You get out what you put in.
Cara, you’re right, if you only follow 50 people and none of them share links and all are on Twitter just to chat, you can definitely find some great conversations. Ironically, you’ve just described what made Twitter so awesome in 2007 and 2008 🙂
There is wisdom in what has been said here and then there is wisdom in recognizing users are ultimately in control and they voted with their actions differently.
What if we could find new ways to enjoy Twitter is where I will focus my energy.
I think it’s healthy to pause and reflect on the changes, and then – as you say, Michele – move on and not look back. Social media as a whole has matured and become integrated into the lives of most people, and this is a good thing.
What a thoughtful article, Mack! No surprise.
I’ve been wondering what has been going on. You have put my hazy thoughts and ponderings into good rational thoughts and history, for which I’m grateful.
As you may know, I experienced a true HATE campaign a while ago and I think THAT too has hurt Twitter. People seem to NOW get more joy out of hurting others than helping others. I still think my JOB in Social Media is to support and help others. And you know well that I’m not shy about self-promoting. They are not mutually exclusive.
Anyway, I love you – love #blogchat – and am happy to have read this column!
Lots to think about in your piece, and I agree – the conversations are fewer and farther between. And I miss them. My question is has anything replaced it? Are the conversations and tools for openness re: making new friends/connections happening elsewhere? Or did we just get lucky and have a few years of that experience before things changed?
Tamara that is a great question and I think most of us are still waiting on that next great conversational platform. And we’re trying to ‘make due’ with Facebook and Twitter until it arrives. I think Friendfeed had that potential, although I never spend a ton of time with it, I know it had a devoted fanbase.
Fortunately, these things move in cycles. I have been using the internet long enough to remember when CompuServe was my favorite online experience. Then AOL went to Unlimited pricing, CS had to follow suit, the floodgates opened to everyone, and the overall experience went to pot. I can remember when thought leadership blogs were amazing, then Facebook and Twitter came along, and a lot of bloggers migrated there. So yes, there will be another ‘Twitter’, eventually.
There always is.
I’m a relative newcomer to Twitter (only been using it for the past year or so), so it hearing that it used to be different makes sense – in it’s current state of decline I couldn’t understand why it ever became so popular. I’ll post up odd links to my blog and things on there, and occasionally have a read of one or two tweets that catch my eye, but I’m far from thinking that any of it real means anything, or caring how many followers I have.
Still, when one thing on the web dies/becomes mainstream, another always pops up in its place!
I joined Twitter fairly late and didn’t really kick off my use until a year or two ago. So my experience is newer and very different. I actually have made weird and amazing connections here, so that does still happen, even if not to the degree it USED to. (I can’t compare because I wasn’t here.) One of the things I love about Twitter, though, is the way it adapts as users use it. Twitter isn’t static. I’ve been bummed about the new Pinterest Smart Feed so I get the way it feels to dislike the changes. But as a newer Twitter user, I like that it adapts and still find that I’ve made organic connections there more easily than anywhere else online. I loved reading this post, though! Gave me a great look at what I missed on Twitter.
I joined in 2009, and made a lot of fun friends. It just feels too ‘corporate’ now with all media using hashtags. I left for a while, and came back. Loved discovering your #blogchat & learned from it. I can’t remember what day it is, so consistently attending May be hard. Sorry , a bit off topic. This is a great commentary of how my relationship with twitter is….thanks for sharing your insight. It’s just not the same experience like it used to be. *sigh*
Hi Jane, #Blogchat is every Sunday night at 8pm Central, hope you’ll come back!
I always thought Disquis had possibilities along the lines you describe, Mark.
Agreed. Twitter is loosing its charm. They are doing much to get back into the business but it seems that in past few years we are getting a lot from mobile apps who are doing the same job in pretty much improved manners (I am particularly talking about the community phenomenon) However, I usually spent more than an hour on twitter and can get instant information in terms of my most interested topics, the current affairs. Thumbs up for twitter!
i used twitter for almost 3 years. i found everything i one place and i can tweet anything also from fb according to a apps.
Hello Mack,
To be hones with you Twitter was my first social media tool, however your post is the reason why I use that as a content stream as well! Surely, I have a few conversations with mates, but every social media websites has transformed into a ‘Paid Ads, Promoted Posts Paradise’, with a few organic posts by big brands that gain steam! :
I go to see every day some blogs and blogs to read content, however
this blog presents quality based posts.