I’ve given the newsletter a bit of a revamp to give me a kick to actually start writing regularly again. I’ve done a few things over at The Online Rule and enjoyed being back in the swing of things since my big contract with Business Northumberland ended. Below is a photo of me speaking at the last in-person event we ran in March to mark the end of the programme. Given the t-shirt, it seemed like a nice thing to rebrand this to something I say literally all of the time.

A reminder that I’m available for all things digital marketing, including workshop delivery, strategy and consultancy, and web development.

Issue 9 of the newsletter covers a big social media change coming this week that you should be prepared for.

Never a dull moment in social media, is there?

Earlier this week, Meta (the ones behind Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp) announced their new social network Threads would launch tomorrow (Thursday 5th July) at 3pm in the UK.

Usually, social media sites start with small user bases and build. TikTok grew fairly rapidly, but it still took a lot of big businesses a while before they saw the potential and jumped in. That gave them time to make sure it was for them. You’re not going to have that luxury with Threads.

Statista estimates that there are 3.81bn monthly active users on Meta platforms. That’s a lot of potential eyeballs. When Threads drops, expect a lot of nudges and notifications from Instagram to get you signed up.

So what is Threads? And should you be looking at it as a potential social media platform? As ever, it depends…

What is Threads?

Threads is a Twitter-style app described as a cross between Twitter and Instagram. You can see the screenshots from the app’s App Store listing below.

For a short while today the web interface was accessible. It looked a bit sparse, but there were users, activity, and things like reposts, likes etc. Pretty much everything we’ve come to expect.

Given the well-documented turmoil at Twitter - here’s a potted history by TechCrunch because I haven’t the time or inclination to remember it all - it’s no surprise Meta are looking to move into this space. They’ll have a bit of a monopoly over social media sites if Threads takes off. Bit worrying, but if you’re using Facebook and Instagram already then they’ve already got all your data anyway so 🤷‍♂️

Most recently, Twitter has been limiting the number of tweets people can see unless they pay a subscription fee, and stopping people from seeing a thing on the site if they aren’t logged in. A lot of cleverer people than me think this could be the endgame, so Meta’s new app is pretty timely (personally, I think it’s been pushed to launch sooner than planned to capitalise on this, and I doubt it was even on their radar 12 months ago).

Should you be on Threads?

Am I allowed to say “it depends” again? It is the title of this newsletter now after all…

If you’ve the time and resource then, short answer, yes. If you’re using Twitter, then cross-post your content in the first instance. If you use Instagram already then you’ll at least want to sign up and get your brand’s username - they’ve said you’ll automatically be able to get the same handles as you use on Instagram, but I’ve no idea how long that offer will stand for.

They’re going to make it easy for you to follow the same accounts on Instagram, so getting set up and seeing an active timeline - always a big thing when you join a new platform - should be straight forward enough. At that point, take stock and see how it works and what people are doing.

I’ve long suggested small businesses don’t bother with Twitter. It’s a bit nuts over there, as much as I love it, and getting any meaningful engagement has been getting harder and harder. But you can’t argue with a potential slice of more than 3 billion people. Like anything, it’ll live and die by how many people subscribe and are still using it in around six months.

It probably won’t surprise you to learn that I’ll be there. I’ll be at both @scottgoodacre and @scottdigitalco if you do find your way over!