Threads: Should Your Business Be On It?

In this blog post, we'll take an in-depth look at what Threads is and how businesses can benefit from using it. We'll explore why having a presence on Threads could provide businesses with various advantages that set them apart from their competitors and how it may be more effective than other well-known social media platforms, but also address the disadvantages all businesses should consider when making the decision to jump on another social platform. By addressing these questions head on, you'll have a better understanding of whether or not it makes sense for your organisation to take advantage of this platform right now — or wait until later when things shake out further.

What is Threads?

Built by Mark Zuckerberg, Founder of Meta Platforms, Threads is a new social media app integrated with Instagram that launched on 11^th July 2023. The new platform is designed to be a text-based conversation app that allows users to post and share text, images, videos as well as follow what’s going on in the world and start conversations aka ‘threads’ of their own or join public conversations.

On the day Threads launched, they reached over 30 million signups within the first day, with over 100 million signups in the first five days. Given the encouraging take up, should your business be jumping on Threads? Well first, let’s understand more about what makes it different to the commonly known social platforms already out there.

What makes Threads different to other social media platforms like Twitter or X?

While Threads and Twitter (recently renamed X) have some undeniable similarities, they are unique platforms and do hold very different purposes. Let’s break these down further.

When it comes to interface and structure of the two apps, they have very close similarities however, one of the main differences are found within the length of posts users are able to share and the way the apps are used. On Twitter, you can only post tweets of up to 280 characters (10,000 with the paid version) with photos and links, purposely to encourage users to share quick, concise updates, whereas on Threads, users have a 500-character limit which can include links, photos, and videos up to five minutes in length, allowing for more freedom and in-depth conversations.

Another feature worth mentioning is that currently Threads is an ad-free platform, and they recently released that they won’t be monetising the app any time soon. Twitter, however, do allow users and businesses to promote sponsored ads which means feeds can become dominated by sponsored content. Twitter are also implementing new ways of monetising the platform with subscriptions providing users with additional features such as editing tweets, text formatting, expanded reach, and additional character limits amongst others.

At this moment in time, the search feature within Threads isn’t as extensive as on Twitter, where they allow you to search for any news article, topic, hashtag, user or account and it’ll prepare a selection of top tweets to fit your search. On Threads you can only search for a user, however this is believed to be amongst the newer features which will be rolled out in the future.

Whether you’re interested in sharing a quick business update or getting your audience involved in a discussion, understanding the unique differences between Threads and Twitter will help to make the most of the platforms and engage effectively with your audience. 

Should Businesses be on Threads?

So, the big question for marketers is ‘should my business be on Threads’? The short answer is, yes, most likely there is very little downfall to creating a Threads account and beginning to explore the platform, experiment with different styles of content and find your niche. However, the lengthier answer is that while there is very little to lose, it doesn’t mean it’s necessarily the right platform for all businesses and, while it can be easy to feel pressure to join, particularly when the initial take up is high, it’s important to assess whether it’s right for your business and if there is value in investing in the platform. If the majority of your audience isn’t on Threads, then it would be a waste of time spending precious budget, time and resource creating a strategy for this platform, when you could be focusing your attention elsewhere in the business.

There are plenty of pros and cons to jumping on the Threads bandwagon, but first, let’s take a look at some of the advantages you could benefit from.

What are the advantages to joining Threads for Businesses?

Easy onboarding process

One of the main reasons why Threads has had such an encouraging take-up is due to its link with Instagram and easy onboarding process. As part of the Meta group, the app has been tightly integrated with Instagram meaning that anyone with an Instagram account can seamlessly create a Threads account within a matter of seconds. All you need to do is download the Threads app and follow the very easy steps to link your existing Instagram account to your Threads, it’ll then give you the option to follow the same accounts you have on Instagram. This feature alone has been seen to benefit brands with large Instagram followings, as it’s likely when their audiences join Threads, they will continue to follow them and therefore making it easy to go from zero followers to millions in a very short space of time.

If your business already has an Instagram account, it would be very straightforward to set up an account on Threads and start experimenting with different posts. It’s worth noting that if you don’t have an Instagram account, you’d likely be starting from the ground up so this might be something to bear in mind as it may require a little more time.

It’s also important to remember that Meta have been a little sneaky and made it impossible to delete a Threads account without deleting your Instagram too, so this is worth considering if you have built up a large Instagram following.

Tap into new audiences

A new social media platform can be a great opportunity to uncover new audiences and reach out to people you hadn’t previously. Particularly if you’re finding the content you’re sharing on other social platforms is starting to feel stagnant or perhaps, you’re not quite seeing the same number of impressions as before. There is often benefit to switching things up and experimenting with new content on a new platform that may just have a higher chance of being shown to a fresh audience.

Benefits of a new algorithm

Similarly to the above, sometimes there can be a real advantage to new joiners and data in the past has implied that algorithms can sometimes prioritise the fast movers which would give you a good head start from your competitors. Especially if your Instagram account already has a large following as we mentioned previously, this would give your Threads account a higher chance of seeing rapid growth.

Staying ahead of the game

If your competitors are joining Threads, it could be beneficial to stay ahead of the game and join the platform too, at the very least to secure your username.

However, don’t follow your competitors blindly! If they’re joining, remember it doesn’t necessarily mean your competitors are going to do well on the app. To get started, create an account to secure the business name and take some time to do your research and figure out your businesses niche on the app before diving in! You should never jump on a new trend just purely from the fear of missing out alone - do your research first.

Engage in conversations

Another benefit to businesses joining Threads is that it’ll give your business a new opportunity to engage in organic conversations with your target audiences. Due to the nature of this new platform and the focus around text-based conversation, the app encourages users to interact with their followers making it easier than ever to build a community and engage in deeper connections. If you are interested in joining Threads, why not start by interacting with your audiences, from responding to comments, to initiating new topic of conversations and discussions.

Now we’ve touched on a few of the benefits, let’s highlight some of the potential drawbacks.

What are the disadvantages to Joining Threads for Businesses?

Time & Investment

This is where marketers need to think carefully before jumping straight onto Threads. It’s another social media platform, therefore it requires a new social strategy, unique content creation and that’s before implementation, which let’s face it, takes time and can cause a distraction from other important tasks within the business.

This is time well spent if it aligns with your marketing goals and taps into an audience you struggled to reach previously. However, if this platform doesn’t align with your marketing goals and isn’t likely to attract your target audience, it may end up being a distraction from other priorities and not the most valuable investment for your business. Particularly if budget or resource is already tight, you don’t want to add another channel into the mix if you can’t give it 100%.

The future of the platform is uncertain

Perhaps the biggest consideration businesses are asking themselves, is there a future? Threads is still very much in the early stages of development and having only launched in July, it is likely to still be building up a userbase while gradually releasing new features. The initial take up on the app is encouraging, however there are still a lot of unanswered questions around the long-term future of the platform with many concerns around it being a short-term fad that may pass. It’s hard to anticipate the direction Threads will take and just how long this will last. In these cases, we’d recommend waiting a few weeks or months to see whether there is any further news on where Threads is heading.

Let’s face it, we’ve been here before with other newly released social networks and it doesn’t always last. If you were using social media to stay connected with friends and family during the pandemic, chances are you may remember ‘House Party’ the video-based social media app that saw an unexpected boom in growth during the global pandemic. The app saw over 50 million additional users in early 2020 and became the number one social media platform in 82 countries around the world during this time. However, the following year as it began to lose traction, they announced the app was shutting down. Despite huge initial traction, it isn’t always an indication into the future success.

May not be compatible for your business

Similarly to the point we made above, not all businesses will see the value from joining Threads due to the nature and style of content shared on the platform. Threads is a text-based social media app and therefore businesses using the app are primarily focused on sharing short-form content in a conversational way. Other forms of content such as video, imagery and long-form may not fit the style and if this is predominately the type of content your business focuses on, you may feel limited in what you are able to share. This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t repurpose your existing content to fit the app, however it’s just worth bearing in mind as this may require additional time and resource to do so.  

Lack of Scheduling Tools

This isn’t necessarily a deal breaker, however it’s a consideration we feel is worth mentioning, particularly if you currently use social media management tools such as Hootsuite or HubSpot to monitor, analyse and schedule social posts. Currently, the management tools or scheduling capabilities for Threads is pretty non-existent and is solely driven via the mobile app. What’s more, the analytics and performance data available for Threads is nowhere near what it is for other Meta apps such as Facebook and Instagram. This will likely be developed as time goes on but currently it’ll be harder to monitor performance and schedule posts.

What Should Your Business Consider Before Joining Threads?

Whether you’re a small business, larger corporation, consumer-focused brand or B2B, you should already be considering Threads and the opportunities it can bring to engage with new and existing customers in a different way. However, the level of time and resource invested will vary for every business and will depend very much on your marketing goals. Based on the main benefits we have highlighted, we think there are a few key questions every business should be asking themselves before jumping on the next social media platform, whether that’s Threads or another new release in the future.

These include but are not limited to:

• Is your target audience using this platform already or are they likely to use it?
• What style of content would you share, and will it fulfil what your audience wants?
• Will your content stand out from competitors?
• Do you have a tone of voice established that fits with the platform?
• If not, is there a niche your business could adopt to become more aligned to what the users want to be engaging with?  
• Does joining Threads align with or compliment your current digital marketing goals?
• Is there capacity within the current marketing team to add a new social platform to the mix and still achieve the goals set out?
• Does budget/resource allow for another channel?

These prompts can help to give you a better understanding and indication into the value your business may see from joining Threads. However, if unsure on the answers to many of these points, then it may be beneficial to take some time to carry out more research before you make the decision to sign up to Threads. Once you’ve decided, ensure you have the right expertise to carry out your strategy successfully.

Contact us today to find out more about how our team of highly skilled experts can help guide your business to stay ahead in the ever-changing world of social media, share advice on whether your business is in a good position to be on Threads while building a successful social strategy to achieve your goals.