Recent news suggests that Twitter is to make a move towards branded pages – something Facebook already does. Why? It is hoped it will assist with ad revenues. It is expected that the pages would work in a similar way to Facebook – allowing businesses to deliver messages to those using Twitter and encourage them to visit their site.
As it currently stands, and some of you may have already witnessed, brands can pay for promotional tweets and can sponsor hashtags. We’ve been following the responses to the idea on the popular site Brand Shandy, and there have been mixed views. We had a chat with our resident Twitter expert, Kelly Hopkins to get her view. And here’s what she had to say:
“As clichéd as it sounds: if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Twitter has always been a great alternative to Facebook. It’s different in its approach and its audience – and that’s its appeal: so why change it?
By mimicking Facebook, Twitter risks losing its own unique identity. The two social media giants don’t dominate exactly the same space and do, currently, have their own unique selling points.
Trying to imitate the success of a platform that’s used for totally different reasons is very risky. What if it doesn't work? I appreciate all organisations have to take risks and need to consider how they can best drive revenue, but in such a hugely competitive market perhaps they should look at what they do best and beating out potential competition in their own space.
I think that brands will need to be conscious of the different audiences and approach to building fans/followers. On Twitter I’m not sure how many people tend to revisit a profile once they have started following it, as it’s mostly stream based, so how would a brand attract Twitter users to their 'page'?
The simplicity of Twitter, allowing you to follow and then stay in one place (your profile page), is part of the appeal, so why overcomplicate things?”.
So we’ll have to wait and see if Twitter make further steps and actually implement branded pages. And if they do, it will certainly be interesting to see how successful it is. What’s your view – let us know by commenting below.