How to Grow on Twitter Using the New Algorithm

It's 2018 now and a lot has changed in the universe of tweets and hashtags. Twitter as a social media platform has changed vastly from the 2016 version that you may still have in your minds. What you know and understand about Twitter, such as their ever-changing algorithm, may be old and outdated. However, approaching Twitter with a few different perspectives can be the key to understanding it today and into the future. This article will provide five very basic perspectives to help you get the most out of your content and grow on Twitter.

Promote and Link Less Often

Yes, you read that right - stop linking so much! It's common for content creators to want to share their content on multiple social media platforms, seeking as many eyeballs as possible for their work. Creators on YouTube and Twitch.TV are likely most prone to the notion of promoting their videos on multiple platforms, especially on Twitter. However, this is actually counter-intuitive to Twitter's algorithm:

Social Media blogger Ste Davies has assembled this simple chart above which illustrates the process that your tweet can go through after it's sent. When Twitter's algorithm scores your tweet, it checks initially to verify that 1) your profile is credible - your email is verified and you have quality branding in your bio, avatar, and header image, 2) your tweet contains a media element, and 3) that it does not contain a link.

In order for your tweet to score the highest possible placement in Twitter's algorithm, exclude any links that would otherwise take users off of the platform.

It's important to understand that Ste Davies' model above is a subjective interpretation of Twitter's algorithm. However, you can observe this theory in action on accounts that link often.

Take Ad Age's Twitter account as an example. Almost every tweet contains a link to an article on their website, each with less than a handful of engagements. For an account that has accumulated almost a million followers, this is extremely low engagement. While the algorithm sees that the account has a credible profile and media attached, excessive linking off of the platform has all but destroyed the account's content placement priority.

Despite this, we still need to be able to execute promotions on Twitter. Your brand is working on important and exciting things, so how do you grow on Twitter and generate lead conversions for your website? The answer is simple:

When you do promote on Twitter, ensure that your link is truly valuable to your followers. Promote rarely.

In addition, marketers should be using Twitter's advertising platform to create promoted-only tweets for promotions. With this method, you can avoid hurting your algorithm placement by posting links and ensure that your promotion reaches an audience that will find it valuable.

Define a Singular Audience

Have you given careful consideration to whom you would like to follow and engage with you on Twitter? What are their interests?

Why do your followers follow you?

Many of us approach Twitter as an extension of ourselves, tweeting about a wide variety of interests, thoughts, opinions, and likes in the hope that we gain followers who like our personality. While this can work, it does need to be focused if you're seeking to build a larger following. Specifically, define the attributes and demographics of your audience:

1. How old are they?
2. Where do they live?
3. What are their primary interests?
4. What languages do they speak?
5. How often do they use Twitter, and what time of the day are they active?

In the algorithm, Twitter serves your tweet to an initial sampling of relevant followers to see if the content will resonate and result in any engagement. If it does - great! Your tweet can now be served to a larger portion of your followers in their timelines. When your tweet is served to an initial sampling of relevant followers and it yields no engagements, then your tweet is essentially dead -- it will never make it onto the timeline of the rest of your followers.

Your tweet is essentially dead when it is served to an initial sampling of relevant followers and it yields no engagements.

This behavior is most commonly identified when an account goes "off-topic" and posts content that does not match the interests of a majority of followers. In the example from Kotaku's Twitter account on the right, a tweet was sent that does not immediately seem to match the interest of most gamers. Since Kotaku has built an audience of gamers primarily, this post received dramatically less engagement than what the account might see on average.

For this reason, it's important to cultivate an audience through a single theme and shared interests. The more that you stray from those shared interests, the more you will dilute your scoring within Twitter's algorithm.

Too Many Cooks in the Kitchen

For those of you who operate brands on Twitter, especially as a job, then you know this one. Sometimes, everyone has to have a stake in what happens on the company Twitter account. As a social media professional, you may hear some requests around the office, such as:

It's just a tweet... can't you just send it? 😉

It's common for many teams under one company to seek the benefit of promotion on the company Twitter account in order to generate awareness of their work both internally and externally or to simply improve their own goals. While you should certainly seek to help your fellow co-workers, blanket promotion of their work on Twitter is not necessarily the answer.

This activity actually breaks our first two tips: 1) promote and link less often and 2) define a singular audience. It's exceedingly likely that your company's internal promotional requests will want to contain a link of some sort. It's equally as likely that the promotion will contain content that is not valuable to your Twitter audience and doesn't match a shared interest set. Going back to our Kotaku example -- how well would a tweet about a keynote speech at WWDC (Worldwide Developers Conference) be if posted on Kotaku's Twitter account?

Some gamers may find it interesting, but the content does not have an obvious link to gaming. As a result, the tweet was treated quite harshly by Twitter's algorithm and only received a total of five likes. There should only be one person that is ultimately trusted and can make the final call on what appears on the feed and what does not, and that is the Social Media Professional that works on that account every day.

Be More Selfless and Genuine With Your Content

Proactive engagement on the platform is considered one of the primary means of fitting into Twitter's algorithm. It's the advice suggested by all of the major social media platforms: Hootsuite, Sprout Social, Buffer, etc. and for good reason. Broadcasting content about your likes, interests, and opinions is no longer enough to win over followers and friends.

Content needs to be more selfless and provide value to your following.

Twitter builds a historical account of your engagements with users and will use this information to curate your timeline more appropriately for you. The same goes for the followers who engage with you in return conversation: your content will be made more accessible in their timeline. You can also design your content to be used strategically to begin a new conversation, or seek to learn more about your follower's interests.

Twitter polls are also an excellent tool to get your following to actively participate in your brand and generate discussion. Be creative about how you can utilize video and image media to entice followers into sharing their thoughts and opinions. Talk to your followers, form friendships, and (especially for brands) be genuine! We can tell when you're fake.

A second question that you can ask yourself before posting content is: "Am I trying to get something from my followers with this post? It's essential that your content be valuable to your audience, and if you're constantly trying to take something from them without giving in return then your post will be received much less positive way.

Are you trying to convince your audience to buy or click on something? Are you merely seeking to get gain likes from them on a post? Find or create content that will make your audience laugh, relate to them, or inform them on a topic that they are passionate about.

Advertise Your Content and Develop an Audience

Twitter's advertising feature is an absolutely invaluable tool for growing your audience and engagement, and no proper Twitter strategy should be without. While it is possible to grow completely organically:

Money is worth more than time on Twitter.

Unless you have a personal network of influential Twitter friends that can assist you, growing a Twitter account from the ground up will take years. As a content creator or marketer, making use of Twitter's advertising platform is not only essential to the growth of your account, but to the development of the audience that you'd like to reach. Simply posting your content on Twitter in the hopes that an audience will find you will only ever reach so many eyes. Instead, specifically target your defined audience with your most valuable content with a well-placed advertisement on an organic tweet. Even if you're only willing to spend less than ten dollars a month on acquiring new followers, this can add up over time and result in a substantial following of engaged followers.

A simple method to accomplish low-cost follower and engagement growth is to set your bid type to "Target cost" and select a low bid amount such as $0.02 to $0.10. If you limit yourself to only spending a total of $0.50 a day, then you should rarely exceed a monthly spend of $15. Keep these campaigns going for months while regularly updating the audience targeting and after an entire year, you may be surprised by the results! If you aren't approaching Twitter with the intent to supplement your content with some advertising, then you simply won't be able to compete with the brands and personalities who do.

What's Next?

There is so much more to learn and understand about Twitter's algorithm! The platform is changing so rapidly, that even in the construction of this article there has already been a significant update that might change your perspective:

Its new approach will now also take into account thousands of behavioral factors -- such as whether an account has confirmed its email address or how often an account mentions users that don't follow them back -- into how tweets are ranked. For example, tweets that are off topic, spammy or troll-like will appear lower in conversations and search results. - Money.CNN.com 2018

Notice how the developers of Twitter are continuing to crack down on content and conversation that is off-topic, as explained in this article under 2) Defining a Singular Audience. With the correct approach and perspective, you can also be far better prepared for future changes to the platform such as the CNN update above.

This article has all but scratched the surface of how to effectively use Twitter's algorithm in 2018. In future articles, we'll continue to look at Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram and how to approach each platform with a similar understanding that will greatly assist you in benefitting from algorithms that control the flow of content.