While Facebook's importance is gradually decreasing, there's Threads, a new kid on the block targeting a young audience. What is it about, what works, and how to find your space? Let's take a look!
Overview
Over the past few years, Facebook became known as a social network for old people. Its genius acquisitions, especially of Instagram in 2012, allowed them to stay in the game and form a parent company Meta. In 2023, they decided to create Threads, a competitor to X/Twitter. While there’s not much for you to do on Facebook, Threads may be a different story.
Threads
Threads bet on an extremely clean user interface and having only core features - there are no bells and whistles you may be used to from X. It even adopted one of the main pillars from the original Twitter - the posts have limited length, and there’s no option to write anything longer.
Also, just to clarify - not all posts on Threads have to be actual threads that contain multiple posts. You can post single posts, too. The funny thing is that even these single posts are called Threads, even though they’re not typical threads!
Connection with Instagram
The first thing to do after you create your Threads account is to check and follow all your Instagram followers who have a Threads account. This can help you create a nice follower base on which you can build. One of the reasons Threads grew so quickly is that Meta leveraged their huge Instagram user base and allowed its users to use their Instagram accounts to log in to Threads. It means Threads has many users from Instagram that either never used X or don’t use it very often, which in turn means they’re not used to X’s reliance on viral content and are alright with posting their personal updates - something that was completely normal on Twitter in its early days.
Explaining the transformation
A post type that does well on Threads is inspirational stories about who you - or your company or friend - were yesterday and who you are today. You may think this post type is very narrow, but with some creativity and storytelling, you can turn many usual posts into a demonstration of before-and-after.
A good hook
If you’re posting a Thread consisting of multiple posts, especially if it’s a story, treat the first post as a hook - create a nice cliffhanger that will make people want to read the rest. You can even use the hand pointing down emoji 👇 at the end of the post to indicate that the story continues below after the user clicks on it.
Plug in
The easiest way to get noticed on Threads is to comment on popular posts from other users. Although the number of its monthly active users isn’t that far from X, even popular Threads posts have much fewer content interactions than their X counterparts. If you have something valuable to contribute, this is your chance to be seen without having to deal with many competing post comments.
💡 Keep in mind
You don’t have to limit your response to a single post. It can be a thread of multiple posts, too.
Authentic content
There’s a big push on social media to create authentic content, and Threads isn’t an exception. Whenever you look at a profile, it’s easy to see whether the posts are just something made up to hopefully get some engagement or something interesting and unique the person wants to share.
Interact with your microcosm
The only way to find your space and create a community you can interact with and that will interact with you is to do exactly that. Define the area you want to post about, find authentic accounts that belong there - even if they are small, and interact with them on a regular basis.
These account owners and people who follow them and are part of the microcosm you want to establish your place in may not remember you after a post or two, but they will gradually get used to seeing your posts in the comments and start to consider you an authority, and eventually follow you. That’s why it’s important to be intentional about the accounts and posts you interact with. If you post replies to random posts, even if they’re good, it’s not serving any higher purpose. But if you zoom in on accounts from your microcosm, sooner or later, you will start getting recognized by people from this community.
So, before you start interacting with accounts, take your time to identify all relevant players in your microcosm. Focus on accounts that post something valuable because that’s the only type of content you can react to with something of the same substance. Following accounts sharing “no pain, no gain” and similar maxims, everyone has seen a thousand times won’t get you anywhere. There’s nothing valuable you can contribute to these posts, which means no potential to reach people from your microcosm looking for something valuable to read.
Unfortunately, Facebook for creator and company profiles is now a pay-to-play thing. Organic reach is very low, and unless you sponsor your posts, they will be seen only by a tiny fraction of your followers. Go to a profile of any popular creator or company, and you’ll be shocked at how low the engagement numbers are.
If you already have a significant following on your profile, it’s worth it to keep posting and get at least a little of the views that you’ll get. But starting and growing a new profile on Facebook in this day and age is almost impossible without dumping a lot of money to get your posts in front of some audience.
Facebook tried to improve this by introducing Reels. These short videos can indeed get plenty of views, but it’s mostly viral clips from non-creators that get the attention, and it’s very difficult to compete with those as a creator.
Remember
👉 You can leverage your existing Instagram network to kickstart your presence on Threads.
👉 Your threads (multiple posts) will perform much better if you can insert an interesting hook into the first one that tempts users to click and read the rest.
👉 Finding a way to make some of your posts into before-and-after transformation stories can help them to get more engagement.
👉 Threads emphasize simplicity and authenticity - focus on meaningful and relatable content.
👉 Focus on engaging with authentic accounts from the microcosm you want to be a part of.
👉 Facebook’s pay-to-play model requires a budget for growth, but Reels can sometimes provide an alternative.
Homework
1️⃣ Follow all your Instagram followers on Threads to let them know you’re there.
2️⃣ Define the microcosm you want to be a part of and then make a list and follow all authentic accounts from it. Be very thorough - the more good accounts to interact with you’ll find, the quicker you will be able to establish yourself in the given microcosm.
👏 Learning with purpose!
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