When I decided that it was worthwhile to shift the focus of The Lair Blog, a lot of my reasoning stemmed from the fact that I thought I could generate more value for people by focusing on content that specifically had to do with my work. Despite the generally noble intentions of this idea, however, I have come to the conclusion that conversations about marketing, content creation, and product design cannot be meaningfully had in a vacuum.
While it would be nice to share perspectives, work examples, and outcomes that originate in their entirety from me, I have come to the conclusion that this is not a sustainable approach to holistically covering the topic of content creation—and by extension, content marketing. The truth of the matter is that the way we market, and the way we create content, is primarily affected by the world around us. Despite any illusions we tell ourselves about the proactive nature of marketing, the truth of the matter is that its common practices are reactive, and based on how to best navigate promotions within a mutually agreed-upon reality.
That’s why a conversation about Twitter necessitates itself to exist, and why a written piece about the social media platform is the first conversation I want to have after an almost yearlong break. Quite simply, I think that the act of resuming content operations on this blog requires conversations about what is so deeply defining the zeitgeist. As it stands, while content marketers look on in shock, horror, and disappointment at what has been the precipitous decline of a once-beloved social media platform—and rightfully contemplate what the hell is going on with Twitter—another question manages to rear its ugly, inconvenient, head: What do we do next?
While I cannot give you a complete answer to that question, at least I can say this much: It may be time to leave Twitter out of your content plans.
Now, for as much as I’d love to explain how it is we got here, let’s cut the shit: We know exactly how we got here, and that the sole reason why Twitter has gone completely off of the deep end is because of the egotistical wiles of one Elon Musk. Regardless of whether you agree with his “free speech” intentions, flighty moderation practices, or mass firings across every section of the company—or you just think that he’s a market manipulating, thin-skinned, short-tempered run-of-the-mill dipshit that should probably wear a condom once in a while—ultimately, that doesn’t matter. What truly matters, is whether Twitter in its objectively skull fucked condition can continue being a platform marketers use to reliably share content, and generate leads.
To this, I think it depends. For personal brands, media organizations, as well as corporations with a clear and distinct customer-facing voice, the losses associated with abandoning Twitter may be palpable. Twitter offers a level of communications agility that very few services provide while giving businesses the perfect medium to communicate brand voices that engage customers and invite interaction. It also gives users a unique level of access to the people that they follow, and gives brands unique access to the people who follow them.
At the same time, there are various social movements that have sprung up over the years of Twitter’s existence—with the service playing a major part in helping with organization and mobilization for a panoply of social causes. It has been an important tool in documenting the activity of oppressive governments, foreign invaders, and human rights abuses all over the world. Naturally, for these reasons, there are many people in the media sphere who believe that the social service is simultaneously the world’s largest repository of human history.
These are the cases for why Twitter should not only be preserved, but maybe even saved from its erratic leadership. These reasons are why journalists, entertainers, and businesses are so precariously on the fence when it comes to the topic of staying on the service. Collectively, these things have allowed Twitter to occupy the monolithic space of being seen as the world’s town square—which has ultimately fed into the perceptions surrounding its essentiality.
And while all of that may be true, I am still not convinced that the service is too big to fail—nor am I convinced that Twitter’s cultural importance necessarily translates into practical importance for content marketing operations.
For as many types of brands that correspond to Twitter-friendly business models, there are plenty more that do not. If they did, then most businesses wouldn’t treat their Twitter pages as glorified RSS feeds. The truth of the matter is that while large, non-media or entertainment-related entities benefit from Twitter attention, many times that attention is attracted through the Twitter accounts of their employees—which forces one to question the purpose of a business Twitter account in the first place.
Then there are the more practical problems that have arisen since the company’s recent Musk-over. Loosening of content standards has rapidly led to the 4-Chanification of Twitter—opening the door to not only conspiracy theories, but also domestic terrorists, Christian nationalists, Russian trolls, and the return of Donald motherfucking Trump himself. All the same, the mass firings of moderators have led to the increased proliferation of misinformation, user botnets, and spam. Finally, all of the shenanigans with paid verification checks have led to account impersonators, and the accelerated decline of user authority, authenticity, and factual information.
All things considered, when it comes to the topic of content marketing on Twitter, I think professionals have a right to ask if the juice is worth the squeeze anymore. Though Twitter absolutely has a distinguishing experience, as well as a distinguishing set of capabilities—features that make something unique are not the same as features that make something essential. While Twitter’s feature set makes it unique, the truth of the matter is that the role these features play in a content marketing experience can absolutely be replaced by other—in some cases, superior—services.
I think one of the issues associated with making a true assessment of the strength of Twitter’s feature set is that people, rarely if ever, consider the importance of Twitter’s first-mover advantage relative to its more media-rich contemporaries. The reality is that when Twitter came out, it was released as a follow-up to Facebook, and a precursor to Instagram—as well as Snapchat and TikTok by extension. Because modern social media services today do exist with immediacy and media richness in mind, Twitter has been playing catch up to social media platforms that can make good on these features in spades. Sure, while these services don’t necessarily make it easy for you to turn your social media account into your website’s RSS feed, let’s be honest: that was a pretty crappy and low-effort application of social media, to begin with.
Nonetheless, taking into consideration Twitter’s first mover advantage, it deserves to be asked if Twitter’s features would even be considered culturally relevant if they were released in the present day. Possibly, but I think there is a good cause to believe that Twitter might exist as a smaller more specialized tool for disseminating news, rather than as a means of partaking in the public discourse—or vaunted as this massive store of human culture.
Here’s the thing: social media is archival by nature, so all of it accounts for representing human history in some form or another. Putting the onus of history on Twitter, and Twitter alone, is a narrative that plays into the hands of the organization—and by extension, Elon Musk’s—by buying into the perception that the company is too big to fail. After all, if it were then the next question would logically be, how to acquiesce to the thin-skinned authoritarian at the top of Twitter’s organizational structure so that anyone should ever hope to enjoy it going into the future.
In reality, though, neither of these things is true: While Twitter is useful, Twitter can be replaced. Part of the reason why events like Elon Musk’s takeover can be so damaging, is because it forces users to make an inventory of the benefits versus the drawbacks. Unfortunately for Twitter, some marketers were already part of the way there before Musk—and while Twitter did not necessarily have major drawbacks per se, people have openly questioned the service’s utility to content marketing in the past for advertising, small business campaigns, and more. Sure, if you are dealing in heavily branded micro-content, then Twitter can be a deeply useful tool for reaching customers. The same thing can be said for personal brands that want to establish deep levels of affinity with the respective fan bases that they are in front of. But using Twitter to market specialized B2B or enterprise services? Using Twitter to market a regional restaurant chain? Using Twitter to market a small business? Get the fuck out of here. There are better uses for your time.
In closing, whatever Twitter’s fate may be: I’m fine with it. For a period of my personal history, I can even admit that I had a good time there. Like all good things, however, Twitter has already come well to an end—regardless of if anybody else knows it yet. But I do think that the tale of Twitter is avowedly a cautionary one for marketers, about the true value of shared channels in the 21st century: Despite investing what can be insane amounts of money into social channels, the value of those channels can be diluted if they rely on services that are rendered by a madman. I did the thing many others have done, and deleted the app from my phone over a month ago. In the end, while I liked Twitter in the past, I won’t subject myself to what Twitter will become in the future. If this is what it is going to be, then fine: Elon can run Twitter into the ground, and bask in the glory of his incompetence.
As for me? I’ll happily move on, plan content around another service, and cease to give a shit.
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