Three ways brands can boost the impact of social media conversations

We like to think of the conversations on Twitter as a litmus test, a barometer or even a live, real-time focus group on what people care about.

You don’t have to take our word for it: According to new research conducted in partnership with Neustar, Nielsen and Pulsar, whether you’re a brand launching a new product or participating in a cultural discussion, conversation focused on your brand is directly linked to business outcomes across the funnel, from awareness to sales.

It can also make your brand’s paid media dollars work harder. The conversation on Twitter helps create compounding earned impressions. We have found that on conversational social platforms, paid media can drive, on average, a 131% incremental conversation lift. This can have a direct positive impact on the volume of mentions and retweets happening around your brand.₁

Of course, just being present isn’t the best way to contribute to a conversation. So we’ve outlined three techniques to help optimize your brand’s creative output and media strategy, and create more valuable and impactful conversations.

1. Let your creative do the talking, and make sure it also sparks conversation. Here’s how:

• First, simplify your asks. When you're asking people to join the conversation around your campaign, make sure that what you're asking them to do is simple while still being effective for the campaign. Help consumers respond to your campaign by creating an experience that tells them why they should care and how they can participate.

• Provide an incentive. Conversations are a two-way street, so you should make it clear that what you’re offering is valuable. Whether you're giving viewers early access to exclusive content or a chance to interact with a favorite celebrity, consumers are sure to engage in return.

• Join forces with influencers. Collaborating with creators and influential people on Twitter helps encourage organic participation.

2. Tailor media products to desired outcomes

Using the right media mix of products at the right time in your campaign can get more people talking about your brand.

For example, notification products can help personalize your outreach, making consumers feel like you’re talking directly to them. In a recent campaign to promote the final season of the hit series “Shameless,” Showtime used a suite of products, including Twitter’s Branded Notifications, to help fuel buzz and build anticipation for the show’s return. The campaign generated a 276% incremental lift in Tweet volume, and a 65% lift in people talking about the campaign.¹

On the other hand, our research has found that broadly targeted ad placements, like Twitter Timeline Takeover and Trend Takeover, help amplify the conversation during peak campaign moments. Our internal data shows that using these products fuel a 1.8-times higher lift in Tweet volume and a 1.6-times higher lift in the number of authors tweeting about a campaign, versus those campaigns that don’t.²

Finally, people on Twitter often find participation in a campaign easy and fun. Use engagement-focused ad features to provide simple, easy and authentic opportunities for fans to participate in your campaign.

3. Don’t leave a conversation that’s just getting started

Perhaps most importantly when it comes to ad campaigns, timing is everything. That goes for length of time, too.

We’ve seen on Twitter that longer campaign flights lead to more efficient CPMs. And campaigns longer than eight weeks show a 3.6-times greater efficiency than campaigns that last less than one week. And it makes sense. On conversation-driven platforms like Twitter—where paid media generates compounding impressions through retweets, replies, quote tweets and more—brands can maximize the effect of that earned media by flighting longer campaigns.³

The bottom line: Marketers who optimize the right mix of creative assets, media products and flight time can maximize user engagement and make their media dollars work harder for them.

Sources:

• Sourcing: Twitter Internal Data, November - December 2020, US
• Twitter Internal Data, April 2020 - April 2021, Global (US/UK/BR/JP/MX/TH) (TKO N = 89, Non TKO N = 36)
• Twitter Internal Data, April 2020 - April 2021, Global (US/UK/BR/JP/MX/TH) Campaign duration ( <1 week N = 61, 1-4 weeks N = 30, 4-8 weeks N = 25, 8+ weeks N = 9)